In the second round of voting for CL’s Tournament of Ribs, history was made. Not by the ribs themselves, but by the people who eat and make those delectable slabs of meat, smoke, spice and bone. Safety Harbor’s Brady’s Backyard BBQ headed into the round after assembling a respectable 231 votes in its victory over Ozona Pig. 231 votes, however, wasn’t going to cut it against Brady’s second round foe, Largo’s Smokin’ Rib Shack.
The past seven days saw a battle for dominance between these two barbecue specialists that even hyperbole would have a tough time coming to grips with. Early in the week, Cory — owner of Smokin’ Rib Shack — and Brady himself got together to nosh a few ribs and talk about the contest. Their supporters engaged in lively, and usually civil, banter in the comments section of the post all day and into the wee hours of the morning throughout the week. They had to do something while they pumped up the votes.
By last Thursday, 3,000 votes had been cast and the two rib joints were separated by a mere 10 votes. When round 2 voting ended on Monday morning, however, more than 16,000 votes had been cast in this single matchup, with 8,863 going to
This article appears in Mar 17-23, 2010.
