The Blues hosted a very special fan at Tuesday night’s playoff game against the Stars. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
How does someone go from never having seen a hockey game to rinkside seats in just a couple of weeks? By (hilariously) live tweeting your first hockey-watching experience.
Anthony Holmes, a self-proclaimed newcomer to the sport, was trying to catch the St. Louis Cardinals game April 25 but instead found himself watching the Blues’s 3-2 Game 7 victory over the Chicago Blackhawks. Holmes — or Tony X, as he’s known on Twitter — took the hockey world by storm by tweeting as he fell into hockey fandom. The St. Louis cable man started the night with just more than 1,000 followers, but his insights, witty humor and innocent ignorance of the game have since bumped that number to more than 94,000.
Holmes’s rise to fame began with a series of tweets about Game 7 between Chicago and St. Louis that racked up thousands of retweets and favorites, catapulting him to the front of Twitter’s viral celebrity list and earning him hoards of new fans.
The day after the victory, the Blues tweeted at their newest breakout star, inviting Holmes to Game 3 of their upcoming series against Dallas, an offer the now-famous Tony X quickly accepted, in his own way, of course.
The Blues made sure to put on a show for their newest fan when Holmes’s night finally came Tuesday. Alexander Steen and David Backes both netted a pair of goals for St. Louis as the Blues crushed the visiting Stars, 6-1, to take a 2-1 series lead — as Holmes watched from the first row.
As he is wont to do, Holmes documented the experience via Twitter, tweeting with fans and picking up rules of the game.
Holmes did not end up needing a jacket.
Although it may not feature the same narrative, the fan’s sudden rise to fame harkens back to memories of the 2014 World Series, when the Kansas City Royals brought Korean super fan Sung Woo Lee to the city.
Lee had already made a trip to the United States in August and attended seven Royals games. Kansas City won each of the seven games, solidifying Lee’s mark as a good-luck charm and leading to his interaction with filmmaker Josh Swade. As the Royals marched toward the World Series, the team’s first appearance in 29 years, a trend started on social media as part of a campaign to bring Lee back to the States for the World Series. Swade flew to Seoul to convince Lee’s bosses they should allow him the extra time and would go on to produce a “30 for 30″ short on Lee’s experience, “#BringBackSungWoo.” Kansas City lost the series in seven games.
The Blues are currently six wins away from an appearance in the Stanley Cup finals. While Sung Woo’s luck may not have brought a title to Kansas City, Tony X and his legions of followers could have a shot at redeeming the record of the super fans.
