10 Stars Who Were So Close to Becoming the Bachelor or Bachelorette
The bait and switch. It happens more often than you think while executives for The Bachelor and Bachelorette are debating the next season’s lead. Choosing the lucky one to hand out roses each season is no easy feat, which is probably why ABC producers have plenty of back-up choices in case something goes awry.
“It’s always a very difficult choice. And people get angry no matter who we choose,” producer Mike Fleiss previously told Entertainment Weekly. “Really, you can’t look for 100 percent approval, you’ve gotta make your best decision in terms of story potential.”
Take this upcoming season, for example. Mike Johnson has been the obvious Bachelor front-runner for weeks now, but producers threw fans for a loop when it was announced Peter Weber, a.k.a Pilot Pete landed the job.
And this isn’t the only upset in recent memory. Plenty of stars from Bachelor Nation have been on the receiving end of that inevitable bait-and-switch in the past—and it’s not pretty. Check out 10 former contestants who were this close to landing the role of Bachelor or Bachelorette.