Oh Fudge! Nashville Predators Fan Misses Message About Free Stanley Cup Final Tickets

NASHVILLE, TN — Sure, Twitter notifications can be annoying. The little buzz on your phone every time someone mentions your name or your retweets a joke. Or when a professional sports team sends you a direct message letting you know that you won free tickets to a championship game.

Nashville Predators fan Andrew Fudge learned a very hard lesson: it's important to check your direct messages, particularly if you entered a Twitter contest to win the hottest ticket in the city's history. (For more updates on this story and free news alerts for your neighborhood, sign up for your local Middle Tennessee Patch morning newsletter.)

Back on June 5, Fudge participated in a contest wherein fans took selfies in Preds gear at a Twice Daily convenience store. Entrants were placed into a drawing for two free tickets to Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Final against the Pittsburgh Penguins at Bridgestone Arena.

And then, for whatever reason, Fudge didn't log back on to Twitter. Until Monday, July 17 — weeks after Game 6 — when that little blue No. 1 indicated he had a direct message. Fudge told Yahoo's Puck Daddy “I thought it was some spam junk saying I won something and then I realized what it was.”

Fudge didn't end up attending any Cup Final games — he told Yahoo it wasn't "economically feasible" as tickets, even in the most far-flung sections, were hitting four figures — and his epic fail quickly went viral, leading to stories on ESPN and the NHL's web site.

And what's the aftermath? Fudge has been handling it pretty well, despite what being on the receiving end of a torrent of grief online and at home, telling Yahoo his wife Whitney is "pissed." He did win a $100 spa credit from 104.5's Monday Morning Facial contest on the Wake Up Zone and told the NHL he gave it to his wife as "a condolence package."

And there may be decades more grief in his future.

"I have ... a 2-year-old son and a 7-month-old daughter who will hold it over my head forever when they realize what happened,” he told Yahoo. “But if not, I accept my misfortune and the fact that I dropped the ball … big time.”

And while it's not Game 6 tickets — the Preds lost 2-0 to the Pens, who lifted the Cup on Bridgestone Arena ice — the Predators did offer him something.

"It's a good consolation prize, and we'll get to see them raise the Western Conference champions banner," he told the NHL.

Image via Pixabay