For the past couple weeks, I've been working on a video recap of the first annual Ice Con presented by Draft Kings and Barstool Sports. The video is finally ready to view.
How I Met Mr. Ice (Elio Imbornone) In 2019, Elio picked the St. Louis Blues to win the Stanley Cup (risked $3,000 to win approx $96,000). Mr. Ice's hockey picks have been a second source of income for me the past few years. So I shipped some best-selling Blues Buzz hoodies to his restaurant, Tony's Place, in West Roxbury, MA. A year later, I told him we gotta get him on Instagram. He agreed, but didn't know how to make one. He asked me if I was interested in helping, so I created @eliobarstool for him. One week before the 2023-24 NHL season started, Elio called me. We talked for an hour about the Blues, this upcoming season, and a new show he wanted to start. It was going to be called "300 Seconds With Mr. Ice". We bounced ideas off each other, then he asked if I wanted to produce the show for him. I was all in. Watched a few YouTube videos then progressively got better at producing as the season went on.
My Visit To Tony's Place
It's March 2024 and Ice Con has been in the books for a few months now. There were some uncertainties of how things would go and who would be attending. I knew Dave and some of the Spittin Chiclets crew would be there, but that's about it. Elio and I are pretty close by now. We've talked on the phone or on a computer almost every day for the past six months. There's a difference between communicating thru technology and communicating in person, though. So I had to make a trip up to West Roxbury before Ice Con. I overnighted a camera, bought some equipment, and booked a flight to Boston. Pulling up to Tony's Place was an unreal experience. One of the best pizza reviews ever recorded took place here. It's an iconic joint to West Roxbury. I also post their food on Elio's Instagram story every day, so I've been dying to try it out. Elio gave me a tour of the property with fun facts and lore slipped throughout. We sat down in his office — where Dave gave his slice an unbiased 8.5 score. I unpacked my new camera and some more equipment that I picked up at a Boston Best Buy. While trying to set things up, Elio was holding up his phone. He had a confused look on his face, as if he was trying to find Murls' pick in a Swedish blog. That's not what he was doing.
This man snapped the MOST unflattering picture of me and sent it out to his 100,000 Twitter followers. Some of my favorite comments: If there was any awkwardness from the first in-person meeting, it was gone right away. I filmed a few questions for the documentary and he sent me home with a cheese pizza (devoured before I got back to my buddy's place) and a chicken parm sub. Heat. Ice Con Documentary My detailed recap of Ice Con deserves its own blog, but here's the documentary I put together with some footage I took, some videos pulled from Barstool accounts, and some Arizona B-roll I ripped off random YouTube videos (frowned upon). It's not perfect, but I had fun making this:
Counting down the days until we run it back. |
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