Thursday, May 21, 2009

The Morning After

After logging on to my Facebook page last night, I was a little surprised at how shocked everyone was over Kris winning.

Apparently, not as many of my friends read my blog as I thought…

I told you Tuesday night that my gut told me Kris was going to win, but I didn’t know why. So last night, I wasn’t surprised, and I still don’t know why…

The theories from the Adam fans have been plentiful on my blog (I encourage you to read all of them at your leisure.) and I’m not going to go into each one, but I will say a few things…

Yes, Kris did say, “Adam deserved this,” when Ryan interrupted him to try and get him excited. As for that showing a lack of confidence, I totally disagree. I call that modesty. And what would you expect from a guy that when on a missionary trip, gave his guitar to a kid he thought needed it more than he did. He showed no lack of confidence when he sang next to Keith Urban…

There was a mention that Simon didn’t stand up for Kris. He did earlier, but when the camera finally gave us a shot of all four judges, he had sat down. I would’ve loved to have seen Simon’s immediate reaction to the news. But I’m guessing he wasn’t all that shocked either, which is why he started saying so many nice things about Kris. He could see the writing on the wall…

Someone said that Adam had way more YouTube viewings than Kris. But was that because his fans were watching, or non-viewers were just going to the Internet to see what all the fuss was about? I think it was probably more of the latter…

And yes, I do think that Kris got some support from the Danny Gokey fans. But as far as saying that not all of Kris’ votes were for him, I don’t totally agree with that.

I do find it interesting, though, that Ryan said nothing about the margin of victory. We had all expected it to be close, but maybe it wasn’t.

And again, I remind everyone that we have no way of knowing whether Adam really was the front-runner the whole season. We just know that was what the press was saying. It is extremely possible that Kris may have been the top vote-getter last week and many other weeks, as well. That’s the trick with “Idol.” They never tell us…

Honestly, I think it can all be summed up in one thought, a lot of people bought into the hype. Because people had been hearing Adam was the front-runner all season, people believed that he was. And when they weren’t watching, Kris snuck up and took the title. You can spin your conspiracy theories all you want (and I encourage you to keep posting them), but I believe it was as simple as that.

And Adam will be just fine. He only needed “Idol” as a platform to launch his career. Kris needed it to have a career…

I just re-watched the final moments of the finale this morning and I was shocked at what little emotion I still showed. Usually, I’m fighting back tears, no matter how bad the song is. But that wasn’t the case this year. Maybe it’s because the song didn’t really lend itself to that kind of moment. Maybe it was because Kris was in such shock he didn’t really show any emotion. Maybe I’ve developed a stone cold heart when it comes to “Idol”…

Okay, you know that isn’t it…

I’ll just blame the song...

Since this post puts my final stamp on season eight, let me do my usual thank yous that I didn’t do last night…

Thanks to my editors Andrea and Robyn, to Jeramey and the guys in IT, and to all the publicists I’ve worked with this season to bring you the best “Idol” coverage I could.

And thanks to all of you for joining me for the ride. I couldn’t do this without you, so I thank you for your participation and I encourage you to keep doing so…

Because you know I’m not going anywhere as there is PLENTY of news to keep reporting. And I’ll do my best to keep bringing it to you…

Henderson, out!