State of the Blog Address and TDG's Top Commenters of 2013

2013 was an outstanding year here at The Daily Gopher.  Record number of visitors, record number of comments, a great staff of writers to work with and most importantly a great community to discuss what were a successful basketball and football seasons.  Below are some of the highlights of the year followed by a few community rankings and awards.

Top Blog Moments of 2013

Some of the items below are significant Gopher events but they are really listed here because they were significant events on the blog.  A bazillion comments or a huge traffic boost or just something that happened here.

• Front page re-design - in early January we were allowed to release our new logo and announce the new design of SBN blogs.  It took some getting used to but I absolutely love the new look and the flexibility we have.  This is kind of techie stuff, but this was  pretty significant change over the old blog.
• Bourbon becomes a thing here - It was in February after getting tired of writing Gopher basketball losing recaps that I decided to go with bourbon.
• Gopher Basketball Upsets #1 Indiana - after a 3-8 stretch in Big Ten play and following two thumpings at the hands of Iowa and Ohio State the Gophers rebounded with a huge win over the #1 team.
• Gopher Hockey Wins McNaughton Cup - the final season of the WCHA as we know it was won by the Pride on Ice.
• Gopher Basketball Wins NCAA Tournament Game - the first actual NCAA Tournament win since the Gophers beat Syracuse in 1990.
• Tubby Smith is Hired, Richard Pitino is Hired - Norwood Teague fired Tubby Smith after the loss to Florida in the NCAA Tournament.  And then after a couple weeks of flirting with Shaka Smart, hires the young Richard Pitino.
• Addition to TDG Staff - in late June we added PuckettWept to the staff and have enjoyed his actual journalist skillz.
• Maryland-I Meme Bracket - GoAUpher put together the brilliant meme submissions into a bracket format and we not only came up with a winner, but most importantly we came up with "Golden-I".
• TDG's 5-year Birthday - August 12th marked 5 years as SBN's Minnesota blog.
• TDG Hangouts - our first Hangout was recorded prior to the UNLV game and I think people tend to like this in lieu of an audio podcast.
• Seizure-gate and Then TDG Raising Money for Epilepsy Foundation of MN - that seizure thing happened this season followed by Jim Souhan being an ass and then we tried to raise a bit of money for a good cause.
• Golden-I Referenced on ESPN - YES!
• Shits and Motions - this became a real thing.  Thanks JD.
• 2013 Record Traffic Numbers for TDG - I don't like to share traffic numbers very often but this was a big year for us.  Our traffic growth from 2011 to 2012 was a modest 6% growth.  But 2012 to 2013 was just a year of 120% growth.  Part of that is the quality of stuff that the staff here puts out (some is more quality than others, but that is why I strong-armed these guys to join me).  But a big reason people come here and come back often is the community and the interactions that you guys have with each other.  Civil disagreements, passion when things are going well, usually intelligent discussion.  Lots of fun.

2013 Community Recognitions

The techies at SBN HQ will occasionally send us small stat pack for each blog.  This little pack will include top commenters, who had the most FanPosts, traffic, etc.  This is something that is fun to share with you guys.  So below you have the top commenters here at TDG over the past year.

The 2013 Top Commenters.

I didn't even make the top 10 this year?  Time to step up my game but I think my problem is that I've spent more time tweeting than I have commenting.  Hats off to amiller92 who I believe made this list last year and vowed to spend more time working, less time commenting (he nearly doubled his comments in 2013).

FanPosts

@HipsterGopher took home the crown of most FanPosts winning not only with quantity but dominating in quality.  The historical pictures and stories as we headed into rivalry games and other significant games were just outstanding.  Thanks Hipster for making a significant impact on the community with these.

LifeTime Commenting Acheivement

Now we get to the biggest commenters in the history of TDG.  The LTD Total is not necessarily a total of each column, that was taken directly from the profile pages of each person.  For the individual years I only have the top 10 from each year.  For example, GoAUpher commented in 2010 and 2011 but how many each year I do not know because he was not in the top 10.  But I was able to get his total number from his profile page.

My commenting is declining and I am almost certainly going to fall to 5th on this list a year from now.  In the earlier days my comments were really just arguing with myself, now I have more than enough other people to tell my what an idiot I am.  Honestly though it is nice to be able to sit back and read the comments without having to feel like I need to facilitate or prod people to comment.  You guys take over and that is the kind of community I've desired for TDG since our inception.

Special recognition should also go to DallasGopher and rencito who have been here and interacting with us the longest.

The Real Winners

All of us and all of you.  Thanks to all of you who come here daily to read our chicken-scratch.  Most of us here are pretty passionate about our Golden Gophers and this is a great place to come and talk about it together.