Streamer and TikToker Joe Bartolozzi argued this week that Darren “iShowSpeed” Watkins Jr. no longer fits the category he is nominated in, telling his audience that iShowSpeed has crossed into celebrity territory and should be judged outside the “Streamer of the Year” race at the 2026 Streamer Awards.

According to a Sportskeeda report, the 24-year-old Bartolozzi drew a distinction between platform-native grinding and mainstream fame. “Speed is kind of a figure more than a streamer,” he said. “Speed is f***ing famous. Like, if you go to a random country and talk to somebody and go, ‘Do you know iShowSpeed?’ They’re going, ‘Yeah.’ Speed is a brand. I wouldn’t say a brand. I would say Speed is really just, like, a celebrity now.”

That framing shaped his actual pick for the award. “I think it’s like Streamer of the Year in my mind is you’ve got to be grinding,” Bartolozzi said. “I think Jynxzi is Streamer of the Year. Like, in my head, that’s just, like, the guy. He changes Twitch.” His argument treats the category as a measure of platform-specific output and influence rather than overall fame, a distinction that puts iShowSpeed’s crossover success, world tours, documentary production, and viral moments with foreign officials in a different bracket entirely from the day-to-day Twitch activity he says the award is meant to recognize.

Bartolozzi extended the same logic to CaseOh, another nominee, arguing that frequency of streaming should factor into the decision. “I don’t think CaseOh is Streamer of the Year,” he said. “He doesn’t stream enough. I stream more than CaseOh, and I don’t even stream that much.” He said CaseOh’s separate Gamer of the Year nomination was the more fitting recognition. Bartolozzi named Rani “Stable Ronaldo” as his other preferred pick, calling both Stable Ronaldo and Jynxzi “very deserving,” and added that despite his own nomination in the category, “I wouldn’t say that I am Streamer of the Year.”

Bartolozzi is nominated in three categories this year: “Streamer of the Year,” “President of Chat,” and “Best Breakout Streamer.”

QTCinderella, organizer of the Streamer Awards, revealed the full 2026 nominee list on October 16 across 37 categories. Jynxzi, iShowSpeed, Bartolozzi, Stable Ronaldo, and CaseOh make up the “Streamer of the Year” field. Winners are decided by a weighted combination of 70% viewer voting and 30% panelist voting, with one nominee in every category also hand-selected by a panel of industry professionals, according to the event’s official site. Voting opened October 16 and runs through October 31, with the ceremony airing live on Twitch and YouTube on November 12.

The debate over where iShowSpeed fits echoes last year’s result. He won “Streamer of the Year” at the 2025 ceremony, held at The Wiltern Theatre in Los Angeles, where the show drew a peak of 965,746 viewers across platforms, its highest total in five years, and also took home “Best IRL Streamer” that night. He has since been named Rolling Stone’s “Most Influential Creator of 2025” and carries more than 44 million YouTube subscribers and 41 million TikTok followers, a scale of audience that sits closer to Bartolozzi’s description of a crossover public figure than a platform-bound streamer.

This year, iShowSpeed is nominated for “Best IRL Streamer” alongside Qoqsik, Cooksux, ExtraEmily, and Evelyn Ortiz, while Jynxzi appears in “Gamer of the Year,” “Best Marathon Stream,” and “Best Streamer Collab.” Bartolozzi’s comments add to the broader public debate already surrounding this year’s nominee list, including separate criticism over the absence of female nominees in the “Streamer of the Year” category.

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