‘The Bachelorette’ Season 15 Betting Odds

by James Murphy in Entertainment on May 13, 2019 3:45pm

This is the 15th season for ABC’s distaff spin-off of ‘The Bachelor’.
‘Survivor’ was one of the early pioneers of the reality TV genre.
The second episode of ‘The Bachelorette’ will air on Monday, May 20 at 8 PM Eastern.

This is the second season of The Bachelorette that I’ve done odds on and I have to preface Season 15 the same way I the first time around: This is why we can’t have nice things. Once again, there are more spoilers circulating for Season 15 than any reality show I’ve ever seen. I already have a pretty good idea of who is making the ‘Final Four’ as you’ll see in the pricing once we get to the odds. Before the next episode there’s a good chance I’ll have the ‘Final Three’–if not the ‘Final Two’ and maybe even the winner–nailed down. Obviously, there’s some trick to evaluating this type of information. You name the movie and/or series and there’s countless spoilers to be found, many with conflicting information. That being said, I’ve got a pretty good grasp on what is and isn’t legit information.

As you’re no doubt aware, I’ve watched a ridiculous amount of reality TV to do odds on the various shows. I’ve watched everything from RuPaul’s Drag Race to Dancing with the Stars. The popular ones all have fan websites where theories are thrown around and spoilers floated for their viability. The Bachelorette is different animal entirely–the producers might as well have spent the first 15 minutes of Episode 1 telling viewers what would happen this year. I can’t figure out what they’re thinking. Either they’ve orchestrated (at least to some extent) the early release of the show’s results or else they’ve got the worst ‘operational security’ of any TV show production in history. Maybe they’re of the opinion that it doesn’t matter to their viewers and expect them to tune in regardless of the outcome being known in advance. Maybe they will. If they do, it doesn’t say much about the fanbase.

IS ‘THE BACHELORETTE’ A ‘WORK’?

Season 13 of The Bachelorette saw a number of revelations implicating the legitimacy of what the producers spoon feed to their viewers. The premise is that thousands of eligible bachelors ‘audition’ for the show and the producers select the most appealing or at least the most entertaining. That’s apparently not the case, at least in some instances. For example, prior to Season 13, DeMario Jackson was (hint, hint) *expected* to do really well. Turns out that he was ‘recruited’ for the show and didn’t ‘try out’. Not surprisingly, no one really seems to care.

It’s no secret that the producers of reality TV shows have numerous ways to manipulate the outcome. The easiest is selective editing with which a nice person can become a ‘heel’ to the audience and vice versa. Many shows have some sort of ‘audience voting’ component and I’ve always had doubts about the veracity of the results. Producers can either ‘cook the books’ on the outcome or just pick who they want to win without regard to the real voting numbers. This allows them to manipulate the outcome and not end up beholden to the ‘judges’ scoring. That makes Dancing with the Stars less of a ‘dancing competition’ and more of a popularity competition where the producers tell you the outcome with little to no transparency of results. That sure seems legit. There have also been strong indications that certain celebrities are ‘recruited’ for DWTS with some negotiating a specific length of time and/or finish position in return to doing the gig. We’ll revisit this conversation prior to the next season of that show.

Of course it’s all entertainment so it doesn’t really matter how the decisions are rendered and winners selected. The majority of reality shows, however, at least have enough respect for their audiences to create a subterfuge of legitimacy and to go to great lengths to keep the outcomes under wraps. That’s why we can create betting markets on reality TV in the first place. The Bachelorette doesn’t even try to maintain a patina of being on the ‘up and up’. I’m still scratching my head to why this is the case but every theory I come up with suggests that the producers don’t really care.

THE MOST ANNOYING ‘BACHELORETTE’ EVER?

One thing isn’t a work–the Season 15 Bachelorette, Hannah Brown, might be the most irritating protagonist in the history of the series. She’s a 24 year old interior designer from that epicenter of cutting edge art and design, Tuscaloosa, Alabama. She was crowned ‘Miss Alabama 2018’ and represented Alabama at ‘Miss USA 2018’. She failed to place in the top four on Season 23 of The Bachelor but we’re told she became a ‘fan favorite’. That may or may not be true. She’s a big University of Alabama football fan and another reason why I’m glad the Crimson Tide got their asses kicked by Clemson in this year’s National Championship game. Clemson, South Carolina is something of a backwater but compared to Tuscaloosa it’s like Venice Beach.

Given her background, you might be shocked to learn that Hannah is no Mensa member. In fact, she’s not a particularly bright girl at all. This is a gentle assessment of her candlepower:

Hannah was an odd choice for The Bachelorette, for two main reasons. The first is her story line. While every other Bachelorette in the show’s history was a top-four finisher on a previous season of The Bachelor, Hannah finished seventh on Colton’s season. She was part of the entertainment before everybody started getting emotional—and normally, the show wants the new Bachelorette to be one of the people who got emotional. But the bigger reason is that … how do I put this… Hannah no do talk good. Hannah do talk bad! Her most infamous moment on The Bachelor came in her one-on-one date with Colton, when a simple request for a toast on her birthday turned her brain into mashed potatoes, as she struggled to find “words that sound good” and “words that are real.”

The good news is that she can use the catch phrase ‘Roll Tide’ whenever the synapses aren’t popping much like Larry the Cable Guy says ‘Git-r-done’ all the time. Actually, it’s not good news at all. It’s irritating as hell. An Alabama news website (AL.com) suggested that her constant ‘Roll Tide’ blather was ‘polarizing’. This is a polite way of saying that everyone outside of the state of Alabama hated it–not unlike the Crimson Tide football team itself.

Hannah is the type of girl that I avoided like the plague when I attended the University of South Carolina. She’s conventionally attractive–if you’re into toothy, horsey looking girls–and I’m sure she’s a lot of fun drunk at a sorority mixer. On the downside, she’s annoying and as dumb as a box of rocks. I find her repellent to the point that I’m not sure how many episodes I can commit to and I don’t think I’ve ever said that about a reality show other than the Project Runway minus Tim Gunn and Heidi Klum reboot. The thought of actually being married to this broad is chilling. And, yes, she is riding on a farm implement of some sort in her promo photo. I’m sure she’ll be able to parlay this appearance into a reality show on HGTV or another third tier cable network. I wish her well, but I’m not going to be watching.

Anyway, here’s the Season 15 ‘Final Four’ betting odds. We’ll be back next week with an update and more betting odds on The Bachelorette. I’m pretty sure I can make it through one or two more episodes. Wish me luck: