Garth Brooks held a virtual press conference yesterday, July 29th, to announce that he is respectfully withdrawing his name from future nominations for the CMA Entertainer of the Year Award.

Last year Garth won his record setting seventh CMA Entertainer of the Year Award, but now he is asking the CMA’s to recognize him as “CMA Entertainer of the Year Emeritus” in the future” and that means he no longer wants to be considered for the category.

After last years awards show, he received a lot of backlash for winning the award that many thought Carrie Underwood deserved, and Garth said that really took the fun out of winning. He also said that, he too, assumed Carrie was going to win.

Garth said along with the backlash, there was one tweet that he saw in particular, out of the millions of tweets, that has stuck with Garth for the last eight months, and he couldn’t stop thinking about it. “There was one tweet in there that really stuck in my head. It said, ’Hey man. This guy. Why doesn’t he step down?’ One hundred percent agreed. The last thing I want to do is seem ungrateful, to the CMAs and everybody who has voted for us, we are officially pulling ourselves out. It’s time for somebody else to hold that award and know what that feels like, because they’re all out there busting their butts.

Garth will still vie for CMA Awards in categories other than Entertainer of the Year.

What do you think about his announcement?

You can watch the entire press conference below. Garth gets emotional at times, so you know this wasn’t an easy decision to make, but one he is now happy with.

7-30-20