The Bachelorette: Why JoJo Should Have Kept James Taylor Over Chase

On Monday's The Bachelorette, JoJo Fletcher made what was obviously a hard decision for her, choosing to keep handsome non-entity Chase McNary over nice-guy singer-songwriter James Taylor. Who stays and who goes is ultimately JoJo's choice and critiquing her decisions is pointless and honestly a little rude, because who am I to tell JoJo what's in her heart? But as a viewer of The Bachelorette, I think she made a mistake keeping Chase over James, because James is more watchable than Chase.

Next week is hometown dates, and each of the four remaining contenders will be getting a lot of screentime and backstory as viewers meet their families. This means that viewers will have to sit through 20 minutes of uninterrupted Chase time. This could be a disaster, because Chase is the most boring contestant on the whole season. I've watched every episode and I can't tell you anything about Chase other than he has a big tattoo on his side and he looks like Jordan Rodgers. But we already have a Jordan Rodgers, so why do we need another one?

James Taylor, on the other hand, is polarizing. Some people think he's sweet, while others think he's annoying. Whether you like him or not, he has a personality: humble Texas good ol' boy with a big heart and an insecurity-fueled dark side, as shown in his attempts to undermine Jordan and Robby when they were doing better than him. He has a sense of humor and he's folksily articulate.

Here's the thing: neither James nor Chase were ever going to win. They were the bottom two Monday night. James even talked about how they each knew one of them was going home. Jordan is going to win, and whoever else is there doesn't matter. So why not throw viewers a bone and keep James rather than Chase? James' hometown visit would be much more fun than Chase's. Maybe his parents could explain why they stayed the course with the name James Taylor Jr. when doing so would saddle their son with a mockable name.

Maybe there's a good behind-the-scenes reason for choosing Chase over James. Hometown visits with James and Luke and then JoJo the following week is a lot of Texas, and maybe the producers wanted to keep some landscape diversity by going to Chase's hometown in Colorado. Maybe this exit will help James' Bachelor chances somehow. Maybe the interesting parts of Chase got left on the cutting room floor, and JoJo sees a side of him the rest of us don't. But if not, JoJo should have thought of us at home and shown us some mercy. I'm sure ABC will agree when a million people change the channel to stay awake. Chase may have better biceps than James Taylor, but in order to be good at TV, you have to be both physically attractive and able to talk.

What do you think?