First The Oscars and Now The Voice Season 12 Finale

Photo by: Trae Patton/NBC

I haven’t been this happy since La La Land lost the Best Picture Oscar to Moonlight! At the end of The Voice Season 12 Finale – in a stunning upset of the iTunes rankings – Chris Blue was crowned the winner of The Voice. Let me repeat that: Chris Blue, from team Alicia, is the winner of The Voice!

Honestly, I was expecting a night more like the recent Grammys. You know, that feeling you had when Adele won Album of the Year when everyone – including Adele – knew it should have gone to BeyoncÃ©. I had resigned myself to another There have been so many times like that on The Voice….but let’s not dwell on the past!

What made the win by Chris Blue so incredible is that while he was clearly a crowd favorite he wasn’t the leader on iTunes. When Alisan Porter won The Voice season 10 she wasn’t just a favorite – she had the most top ten songs on iTunes. In fact the placements from the winner on down matched the descending order of iTunes top 10 hits a artist scored.

In general the iTunes rankings are a great predictor of who’s ahead in the competition. That’s why I, and many others were resigned to another win for Blake Shelton. His country artist Lauren Duski was consistently ahead on iTunes – including for The Voice Season 12 Finale.

However, iTunes has occasionally been wrong. There have been times when someone you thought was going home because of their song didn’t do well on the top 200 chart ended up being “saved by America” with the voting. It happened last season with Courtney Harrell. That’s never happened with the winner though – not until The Voice Season 12 Finale and Chris Blue!

The Big Sign We Missed About A Chris Blue Win

There was one huge clue that Chris Blue was going to win The Voice. It was something every reviewer was aware of, but didn’t factor in. That clue was Chris’s YouTube views.

Normally we all ignore the YouTube views as a factor in winning because they don’t count as votes. It can help gauge an artist’s popularity and how people are voting, but not with any precision. Usually the difference between the top contenders views is a matter of a few thousands, or even tens of thousands, so it’s not worth staking an assessment on.

However Chris Blue wasn’t leading the YouTube views by tens of thousands. He was consistently getting at least double the amount of views of every other contestant on the show! Lauren Duski, who ended up being the runner-up had been hitting number one on iTunes for three weeks straight. Yet she had nowhere near the amount of views as Chris.

This is a lesson happily learned. When it comes to winning The Voice iTunes isn’t everything. (Thank God!) From now on we’ll all be paying a bit more attention to YouTube views!

The Wrap Up: Congratulations Chris Blue, Alicia Keys & The Voice

This was a huge win for Chris Blue, but also for Alicia Keys! She’s the second female coach in 12 seasons to win The Voice. Her strategy this season was a real game-changer, one that helped Chris’s talent soar to the top! Since she says this is her last season, it makes the victory even sweeter.

Chris’s win is also a victory for The Voice. There have been far too many seasons with winners that seemed like a mistake. It isn’t the case now! This win by Chris Blue is totally deserved. because he’s the total package. With his win it looks like The Voice may have finally found its first big breakout star! Take a look at him doing his new single, “Money on You.”