BREAKING: Long-Time Music Blogger Knows Her Shit... [19 May 2007]

[image courtesy Fox via Idolator]

...or 75% of her AI-finalist-predicting shit, which is still pretty fucking awesome!!!

[sure, we coulda saved this for next week, but we're bored NOW, DAMNIT!!! plus, these were who's-gonna-make-the-top-12 predictions, not who's-gonna-win predictions, so, why not now??? -- Ed.]

I was blowing the dust off some old posts on my blog when I came across a link to a piece on Idolator in which Maura Johnston evaluated the AI-top-24 and made her predictions for the top 12.

And "Damn Girl" -- Maura needs to pat herself on the back big time.

Maura looked at the top 12 men and the top 12 women at the end of "the Hollywood round" and made a prediction about which 6 men and which 6 women would make it to the finals -- as well as a prediction about which 2-of-each would get booted in the first week of the semifinals.

Here's what Maura got right about the top 12 [in order of her discussion]:

MEN: Chris Richardson, Sanjaya Malakar, Chris Sligh, Blake Lewis, Phil Stacey

WOMEN: Melinda Doolittle, Jordin Sparks, LaKisha Jones, Gina Glocksen

Two words: WOW!!!

Put another way, here's Maura's top 12, along with their actual finishes:

1-2: Blake Lewis, Jordin Sparks
3: Melinda Doolittle
4: LaKisha Jones
5-6: Chris Richardson, Phil Stacey
7: Sanjaya Malakar
9: Gina Glocksen
10: Chris Sligh

Leslie Hunt [17-20]
Rudy Cardenas [21-24]
Nicole Tranquillo [21-24]

And Maura's first 4 out:

Antonella Barba [13-16]
Sundance Head [13-16]
Alaina Alexander [17-20]
"Shoeless" Paul Kim [21-24]

And Maura's "missing" 3 finalists:

Haley Scarnato [8]
Stephanie Edwards [11]
Brandon Rogers [12]

And the rest:

Jared Cotter [13-16]
Sabrina Sloan [13-16] [!!!]
Nick Pedro [17-20]
A.J. Tabaldo [17-20]
Amy Krebs [21-24]

This was all done the night the top 24 were introduced to us -- in some cases, with very little info to go on.

Kudos to Maura for nailing the top 7, and 9 of the top 10. That's a bunch of highlight-reel home runs, right there. Sure, there were a coupla big swing-and-a-miss-es there [2 of Maura's top 12 were out in the first week of the semi's], but, occasionally, the pitcher throws a spit ball [STEPHANIE EDWARDS] and the ump misses the call [SABRINA FUCKING SLOAN!!!]. Plus, every big home-run-hitter strikes out a few times -- BUT STILL, Maura bested even the bestest!!!

Congrats, Maura, on showing us how it's done.