Award shows are usually stiff, scripted, and self-serious. Barstool's answer to that was to build one that's the opposite on purpose. The Bush Awards debuted as a live stream, and the premise is simple: take the trophy-show format seriously enough to run it, and not seriously at all in every other respect.
The Inaugural Bush Awards are live! t.co/tTctMhhPBf
The categories are where the joke lives. Instead of Album of the Year or Best Podcast, the inaugural slate leaned into the stuff that actually defines Barstool culture — vices, bits, and the personalities who've built reputations on both. Drug Addict of the Year isn't a category any legitimate awards body would dream up, which is exactly the point.
The Award for Drug Addict of the Year goes to…. t.co/fCo6WIdkPw
The stream itself played out like a group video call more than a polished broadcast — a handful of hosts in headsets, an awards graphic sitting mostly empty behind them, and the comedy coming from the reactions rather than any big reveal.
No Context Bush Awards 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Jersey Jerry got a moment of his own mid-show, cracking a line about somebody having "a little choker on too" — the kind of throwaway needling that's become the actual product of these Barstool livestreams. Nobody's walking away with career-defining hardware; they're walking away with a clip.
“Got a little choker on too right?” -@Jerrythekid21 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Whether the Bush Awards becomes an annual bit or a one-off depends on whether the clips keep circulating the way this first run did. But the format is cheap to run, easy to riff on, and gives Barstool's roster another excuse to rib each other on camera — which, at this company, is basically the whole business model.