American Idol Preview and Thread

10 girls and 10 guys remain, 4 who deserved the boot are gone and we are down to 20. Girls are up tonight, so let's look at the contender, pretenders, and chicks living on borrowed time.

Contenders
Katharine McPhee +402
Stamped as the fave to start, she still is the filly to beat although not the overall fave. Solid start last week and another workmanlike performance will get her one step closer to the all-important top 12.

Lisa Tucker +565
A Green Dobe-fave from day 1, her line dropped from 15/1 to 4/1 after a stellar debut. Young, but polished, she still a bargain according to my capping. Could we be seeing a little Mariah or Whitney tonight out of "Little Aaliyah"?

Paris Bennett +710
Last week's performance was fun and solid, but rubbed some folks the wrong way. At 16, she is going to have to show some maturity and range. Her odds have moved up steadily all week, and methinks she comes up with a power ballad to move back in the fray.

Mandisa +969
The powerhouse one-name wonder led off the show and showed she could step up with the young guns. Vocal range and booming songs should propel her further and keep her odds fairly low.

Pretenders
Kellie Pickler +1069
As feel-good as her story is, she showed her weakness in range and nerves last week. She's no Carrie Underwood that's for sure. While a lock to go top 12, she's going to have to seriously pick up the pace to stay with the top 4. If you bought her futures, keep her a few weeks then dump her.

Melissa McGee +2069
A pleasant surprise last week, but still a notch below the contenders. Melissa has the vocal chops to make the top 12, but lacks a connection with the voting base. She needs another strong show to surpass Ayla.

Ayla Brown +2298
The tin woman stunned us with a stirring Christina Aguilera last week. Will this be the week she shows her lack of personality and range. Silver spoon Ayla vaulted herself into the top 12 last week and just needs to not be lapped to keep that spot.

Living on Borrowed Time
Kinnik Sky +2546
The elder-stateswoman power balladed her way to survival. With much younger and better contenders in her demographic, any juicy odds on her to go this week are solid value. She won't sniff the top 12 barring a miracle.

Heather Cox +10000
Might as well burn your money as this looker is woefully outclassed. Becky going last week proved looks won't get you but so far. And Heather is the odds-on fave to get the boot. I won't argue with that logic one bit.

Brenna Gethers +15000
It could be 15 million to one and the book wouldn't see a cent of my money. Brenna is going to bring the claws out and she appeals to me in a strange passing the car crash kind of way. This year's Mikalah actually has a change to survive with a passable performance, for one more week that is.

I will try and recap if I am still up after the show (West Coast here). Generally I don't read the boards so as not to spoil it from the East Coast posters until I viewed it.


My picks to go this week:
Heather Cox
Kinnik Sky

Good luck,
GD

Green Doberman in the house...

Thanks for the excellent write-up on American Idol..




BOL. tonight, wil...

nice read doberman..

im personally pulling for Lisa Tucker, out of the girls..

one thing to note, do not underestimate the voting power that Kelly Pickler is going to have.. remember this is in America's hands now.. Look at Jerry Rice, in dancing with stars.. Kelly Pickler will be around a long time...

In saying that.. Chris Daughtry is still who, i am pulling for...

Nice write-up.
McPhee certainly has the voice but I think she will fall short due to a lack of stage presence.
America likes McPhee but I think Tucker and Bennett will go further because they have more personality.

SSI said:

nice read doberman..

im personally pulling for Lisa Tucker, out of the girls..

one thing to note, do not underestimate the voting power that Kelly Pickler is going to have.. remember this is in America's hands now.. Look at Jerry Rice, in dancing with stars.. Kelly Pickler will be around a long time...

In saying that.. Chris Daughtry is still who, i am pulling for...

Click to expand...

Pickeler is a lock for final 12 then needs to start singing better

Hate to say I said so, but McPhee just lacked the personality and stage presence I posted a moment ago.
Bennett and Tucker looking better all the time for the girls

I think the 2 best performers tonight were Pickler and Tucker.

But in the words of Simon no one had that wow factor tonight, Best part of show was Paula swicthing seats with Randy

I swear it's rigged. First off, no one in america cares about talent anyway. How the hell does the hottest chick on the show get voted off in week one, the day after pics of her were spread all over the internet. That cow Brenna stays? Uh uh, the fix is in.

LOCK OF THE YEAR :

A male will win this year...

my thoughts tonight

overrated:

Kellie Pickler. what a cute speaking voice. and likeable yes. Plus I give her bonus points for not dragging out the " My daddy's in jail" sympathy card AGAIN. But her singing stunk. Certainly safe this week though

Mandissa- Boy she butchered that Faith Hill song.

I'll wait till I get my bets in before I say much else especially about cuts. i wouldnt be surprised if pinnacle read this thread to get an idea of where the lines should be or where the moneys coming on.

heres my predicted final 4

Ace
Taylor
Lisa Tucker
Katherine McPhee

Even though mcphee & tucker werent that hot this week, it doesnt much matter. I dont know if they did it, but it certainly does make sense to save their best songs until later when theyll need them to beat out tough competition. for now they are safe. I'm currently picking McPhee to win, but its close.

And Paris Bennett vocally was much, much better. I see now she can sing. no performance this week but the vocals were much better. judges encouraged her to go back to being a goofball spazz. fine judges, just pay attention to her singing when she does that cause last week it sucked.

I think we are in for 1 and maybe even 2 surprises in the cuts

The official Doberman Idol review (brought to you by Tivo, of course):

As I said before, 5 of the final 6 are already set and the only fight is for the 6th girls spot. It showed in this week's performances as it was kinda like watching LSU run it up the middle in the 4th quarter against North Texas up 38-0.

McPhee: She's annoying in her personality and she ain't all that skinny even if her face is pretty. She gets a little Norah Jones-ish on us. She knows she's sailing through and pretty much mails in a standard performance. We'll tune it to her in two weeks when she has to start bringing her "A" game.

Kinnik- Our favorite palindromic (wikipedia, if you don't know what it means) idol picks a horrible choice. Here's where the demographics will bury her. Gretchen Wilson fans are rednecks, African Americans don't like Gretchen Wilson songs. Kinnik, who the hell is going to vote for you then? She's become the Ralph Nader of this competition. Luckily, she still has a shot as some later contestants were just as bad. If you can get plus money she goes, take it.

Tucker- The world's most mature 16 year old is up. Yeah, we know you were in the Lion King. She pulls a McPhee and pretty much says I will see you next week with a standard performance. It neither helped or hurt her. However, her personality and maturity may bump her past McPhee and Paris.

Melissa McGee- She's probably Illini's favorite as she is the Bradley of the competition. We're talking severe final 12 bubble here. She reminds me of Jessica Sierra in that white trashy way from last year. Tune in next week as they should just put Melissa and Ayla in the "Hell in the Cell" to decide the 6th girl.

Heather- Rule 1 and 1A of Idol is don't sing Mariah or Whitney unless you KNOW you can nail it. Heather does NOT nail it. She's in a three-horse race with two losers this week. We saw last week, looks alone don't get it done. Nice knowing you Heater, buh-bye.

Brenna- I thought she had a shot at advancing because Kinnik and Heather had little support. However, that was really, really bad. As in I think we found out why the guy jumped off the Stratosphere last week. Apparently Brenna was up there singing to him. No more claws, no more attitude. She is the definition of dead money.

Paris- No no no! Stop with the horrible songs. "Wind Beneath My Wings"?, Bette Freaking Midler could sing it on the show and people would be sick of it. Nonetheless, Paris shows a little range and shows us why she a contenda. Knock off the immaturity and she could pass Lisa.

Ayla- Did they mention Ayla plays basketball yet? I must have missed that the first thirty times. So we get to hear Ayla now is all girly. What next week, she tells us about her first period. Celine Dion should be off limits as well. Ayla meet Melissa, duel at sundown next week.

Pick Pickler- Perfect song for her on psuedo country night. She stamped herself as a contender with her unreal cuteness. They'll be playing that calamari highlight about 10 weeks from now, mark my words. With the pedestrian performances by the upper echelon, the Pickle Girl snuck into the fray.

Mandisa- Why does Idol think it's appropriate to just give first names to uniquely names African-American contestants? Frenchie, Fantasia, now Mandisa. We should petition them to just start calling the basketball player "Ayla". She's a little shaky at first, but her power vocals shine in the end. I like this girl more and more each week and if the likes of the others keep mailing it in, we could be looking at the female Rueben Studdard.

Summary:
I predicted there was a huge gap between the first 5 and the rest and they proved they knew it too. The top ones did enough to survive and advance, sorta like Duke beating Radford by 20 when they could win by 55. The bottom 3 (Heather, Kinnik, Brenna) further separated themselves from the two on the bubble for the top 12 (Ayla, Melissa).

Thursday it is two of Heather, Kinnik, or Brenna to go. Take the best odds you can get. Anyone else goes I would be shocked (mildly so in Melissa's case).

prop lines are up at pinny.

my bets:1st female to go

Kinnik +231
and double that amount on Brenna +264

I threw a hard slider towards pinnacle just in case with my " their may be some surprise cuts"

their aint gonna be no surprises. its coming from heather, brenna or kinnik. 2 of them is outta here.


brenna was clearly the worst one

comments:

underrated

Melissa McGee- sand verey well twice in a row.
Ayla Brown- sang well last week sang GREAT this week. similiar song to K McPhee, but Ayla banged it out and was much better.

doesnt matter judges keep telling them the same thing. In a monotone-
" Gee you surprised me, that was good. I really liked that."

What their saying is- No matter how good you do or no matter how poor our darling favorites do at times, we want you out before them. You have no chance no matter what.

judges were too mean to:

heather Cox. Look I dont have a crush on her, but she was not that bad this week. Much better than last week. Did the judges actually expect her to sing a Mariah Carey song as good as Mariah? They should have listened instead of comparing, which is what they did. It wasnt great, but it was OK.

If I were in a bar and heard it over a beer, I would have enjoyed it. And shes a knockout. I would be entertained watching her.

If I were in a bar and Brenna Gathers sang, I would run screaming for the exit.

If I were in a bar and Kinnik Sky sang that song with that hat on, I would be shocked frozen, unable to leave as I would desperately want too.

Heather was 3rd worst tonight, really didn tdue that bad. But judges were hard on her. She is in deep, deep trouble. Perhaps being hot can save her, I mean its betwenn her and miss bassmouth and miss chubby porkchop. Plus black vote gets split 4 ways. Heather might, just might scoot by.

who should go:

kinnik
Brenna

who will go;

kinnik
brenna

asterisk- tough call on who will go. Heather may go and its no surprise. I think its going to be very close

bet is on who gets eliminated FIRST. two will be elimininated in total. last week I believe it was the low vote getter who went out first, then later they dumped the second low. If they do it that way again.....


Brenna should be the low vote getter. then later its neck and neck between heather and kinnik as to who gets to stay. but it could be such a close vote between these three, there really arent any surprises.

Heather could be the first out. then my bets, as they say, are outta luck

some people will vote for Heather cause shes hot. Why will anyone vote for Brenna?

there is no reason at all to do so. no claws no attitude and no singing ability and thats two weeks in a row. buh bye brenna.

I think I got this bet right. the kinnik bet covers my brenna bet just in case. I dont know why anyone would vote for kinnik either.

there arent many reason to vote for heather, but at least there are some

good stuff Mr. Smith. Pretty much dead on there with your analysis. They like to throw curveballs eliminating people, so the first person eliminated may actually be the person with the second least votes. That is why everyone should tread carefully with that pinnacle prop.
Either way it's two of those three, no question.