Well, there’s been no official announcement yet, but it’s looking more and more like Tayshia Adams has been chosen to replace Clare Crawley as the next Bachelorette.
Execs might be holding off on issuing a statement for any number of reasons, but at this point, their silence on the rumors speaks volumes.
Mainstream media outlets have been reporting that Tayshia is the new queen of roses for several days now, and ABC appears to be in no hurry to put a stop to those rumors.
Does that mean, necessarily that Clare is definitely out, and Tayshia is definitely in?
No … but at this point, we would be very surprised to see Clare complete her season.
It’s been a long and winding road that led us to this point, and everything from the coronavirus to Clare’s intractable nature has factored into the drama.
Most of the media coverage has focused on Clare’s relationship with Dale Moss and her stunning decision to step down from her post as a result of it.
Amid all the madness, two important questions have been lost in the shuffle — who exactly is Tayshia Adams, and what should fans expect from her season as Bachelorette?
Well, for starters, the Bachelor and Bachelor In Paradise alum is more than ready to assume a starring role in the franchise that made her famous.
When concerns about the lack of diversity on the Bachelor series were raised earlier this year, Tayshia stated that she would be thrilled to join Rachel Lindsay as one of only two Black Bachelorettes.
“I have to say, anything that comes my way, I am ready for. I am ready for love!” she told Entertainment Tonight in February.
“No matter where life takes me, I am open to all opportunities, and I don’t think that this is where my TV presence will end. I would love to still interact with a lot of people in a beautiful way.”
Tayshia has logged quite a bit of airtime over the past two years, but the Bachelor franchise isn’t known for delving deep into the pasts and personalities of its participants.
And so, Us Weekly has offered up a helpful primer on Tayshia’s past:
She’s divorced: Tayshia split from Joshua Bourelle in October of 2017. The divorce was finalized in April of 2018.
"I felt a lot of pressure to make sure that my marriage worked, so at the same time, I made sure to do everything I needed to do in order to know that I did everything I could at the end of the day. It definitely was scary to tell my parents it’s just not working out,” she told Dean Unglert during a podcast interview.
“Before my divorce, I really wasn’t open with my parents about every single thing that was going on in my relationship slash me in general. But, because of my divorce, I opened up a lot more and they are now my closest friends in a way.”
She’s a phlebotomist: One of the more memorable scenes of Peter Weber’s season of The Bachelor featured lawyer Kelley Flanagan job-shaming her fellow contestants.
Too bad Tayshia wasn’t on that season.
As a lab technician who specializes in drawing blood, she could have taken Kelley down a peg or two.
She was the first to fo to the Fantasy Suite with Colton Underwood: Yes, there was a time when it looked as though Tayshia might be the one to take Colton’s V-card.
Sadly, it wasn’t meant to be.
Tayshia says she finally turned in for the night around “two or three in the morning” after she realized “nothing was going to happen."
Colton found it a little more difficult to nod off.
“I laid down next to her in my sweatpants and long sleeved shirt. I didn’t sleep all night," Underwood wrote in his recent memoir.
Dude’s got discipline; we’ll give him that.
She dated John Paul Jones: For a brief, glorious period, Tayshia dated the divisive John Paul Jones, whom she met on Bachelor In Paradise.
“John and I had something incredibly special. We fell for each other in Paradise, and everything was a whirlwind after that,” she said after their split last year.
"But the reality was, we were living on opposite coasts, and working insane schedules that made it impossible to see each other and build a life with each other. We truly did the best we could," Adams added.
It sounds like Tayshia is really looking for love, and she’s willing to put real effort into a relationship.
So yeah, in Bachelor-speak, she’s "here for the right reasons."
Here’s hoping the guys in her contestant pool are, as well!