My Fourth Annual American Idol Predictions - Season 10 - 2011

As some of you know, each year I make my predictions for who I think will win American Idol and in what order I think the contestants will be voted off. I also invite others to post their predictions in the comments below or email them to me. We then score our predictions each week as contestants are voted off. (Here were the predictions and score results for previous years: 2010 - 2009 - 2008)

Normally I set my predictions after the first performance night of the Top 12, but since this season they had 13 in the top group, I decided to do it before the Top 12 perform, since we all got to see them perform last week.

Here are my predictions for this year. As always, I'm not saying these are my PERSONAL favorites, but just how I think America will end up voting. (Casey, Pia, and Thia are my personal favs.) To hear how each of these artists sounds, you can click their photos and sample 90 seconds of their songs from last week via iTunes.

My predictions are:














Click to sample their performances last week.
#1 is my predicted winner, and #12 my
prediction as first to be voted off.

As with previous years, email me with YOUR predictions or post them as a comment to this thread, and we'll use the same point system used in previous years to see who is winning at the end of each week and how we all did by the end of the season. Don't worry if you miss sending me your predictions before they start voting people off this week, as the point system takes into account when you jumped in with your predictions with a penalty for jumping in late. (You can see the details of how the scoring works below.)

To make it easy to email or post your predictions, here are the contestant's names in text form, so you can easily cut, paste and move them around in the order you predict.

Casey Abrams

Naima Adedapo

Lauren Alaina

James Durbin

Stefano Langone

Jacob Lusk

Scotty McCreery

Paul McDonald

Thia Megia

Haley Reinhart

Karen Rodriguez

Pia Toscano

Let's see who has the golden ears and can spot what America likes.

Kevin

SCORING POINT SYSTEM: Every week, you get 1 point for every number off you were for where someone would be voted off. For example, if you predict Casey will make it to #2, but he gets voted off #4, then you get 2 points. If you guess it smack on, you get no points. Like Golf, the LOWEST SCORE WINS.

BONUS POINTS: Top Three Bonus: You get to deduct 1 bonus point for each of the top three contestants you correctly guessed. Top Two Bonus: You get to deduct 3 bonus points if you guessed the Top 2 correctly. Winner Bonus: You get to deduct 5 bonus points if you predict the winner. (This is new this year, so think hard on your top 3!)

PENALTY POINTS FOR LATE ENTRANTS: All predictions must be in BEFORE the performances this Wednesday night (March 16th). If you're predictions come in after that time, you are penalized 4 points OR the maximum points anyone else was off for the first round (when they vote off #12), whichever is higher. If you miss the first two rounds, you are penalized 8 points OR the maximum points anyone else was off for the second round (when they vote off #11), whichever is higher. No more entries after the first two rounds and we are down to 10 contestants.