In addition to Jason, producers also met with Blake, Becca’s devastated runner-up, before officially announcing Colton as their next lead, and it seemed like the beer salesman was actually the fan-favorite to the gig after his emotional journey during The Bachelorette. In fact, ABC was concerned Blake
“The hardest turn that a lead has to make is then getting the empathy toward, ‘Oh my god, now I know what this person went through.’ And for him to have to say, ‘Now I know what Becca went through,’ and break someone’s heart…you just want to make sure he can handle that because I think he is a guy that loves deeply and there’s a potential to fall in love with not even two women, but three or four, which would make for great TV,” Rob Mills, ABC’s SVP of alternative series, specials, and late-night programming explained at the time. “But you will definitely want to do right by him as well. That would probably be the big thing, but he certainly has a lot of the attributes you love seeing in Bachelor.”
Of course, producers ultimately went in a different direction, and after the announcement, Blake took to Instagram to congratulate Colton and wish him luck, as well as thank the fans for their support.
“I wanna thank you all for the support over the last few months! It has been incredibly humbling and it means the world. There really is nothing like #bachelornation,” he wrote. “I wouldn’t change the man I am if I was the bachelor and wasn’t going to change the man I am to become the bachelor. I am excited to close this chapter and see what the future holds!”
Well, the future held a “dumpster fire” turn on Bachelor in Paradise season six, when his various hook-ups (most notably at the Stagecoach country music festival) when several Bachelor Nation contestants, including Caelynn Miller-Keyes, Kristina Schulman and Hannah Godwin, were exposed. As the drama played out on-screen, it also took over social media, with Blake sharing private text messages between him and Caelynn ahead of Paradise in an attempt to clear his name.
“Blake himself was an absolute dumpster fire,” Chris Harrison recently told E! News of Blake’s BIP run. “He was just a car wreck.”
