Chris Harrison Was Shocked Wells Adams Didn’t Replace Him As ‘Bachelor’ Host: “The Easiest Call Since Ken Jennings Got The ‘Jeopardy’ Job”

The first two episodes of The Most Dramatic Podcast Ever… With Chris Harrison have arrived. And in addition to opening up about his controversial exit from the franchise, former host Chris Harrison shared some thoughts about who he thought would replace him.

After testing out several guest hosts in Harrison’s absence, the franchise named Bachelor alum and former NFL quarterback Jesse Palmer as a permanent host in September 2021. But Palmer wasn’t who Harrison expected or wanted to carry the torch. He was rooting for show alum, Sarah Hyland’s husband, and beloved Paradise bartender Wells Adams.

When discussing who from the franchise reached out to support him in wake of the controversy, Harrison explained, “Wells has always been a very good man and a good friend of mine…Wells was in a very difficult situation because obviously he was still kind of connected to the show and he was doing stuff on Paradise, but he was one of the first to reach out to me and just say, ‘Look, I’m staying out of this. I love you and respect you.'”

“I appreciated that, and I appreciate him, because if anybody had sights on the job it easily was Wells, and deservedly so by the way,” Harrison continued in the podcast’s second episode. “I thought, to be completely candid, that Wells was going to get the job. I thought that was kind of the easiest call since Ken Jennings got the Jeopardy job. He’s in the family. Everyone loves him. It just seemed like a layup, but that’s not how it went down.”

Harrison went so far as to give Wells his blessing. “I even told him, ‘Man, I won’t speak out publicly, because I don’t think that would help you at all. In fact it would probably do a lot more harm than good, but I really hope you get the job. I think you’d be great at it,'” Harrison said.

Back in September 2022, Decider argued that Adams should, at the very least, host Paradise in Harrison’s absence. And in a 2021 interview with Us Weekly, Adams admitted that he was “a little bit bummed” Palmer was asked to host the spin-off instead of him. In Season 8 of Bachelor in Paradise Adams certainly stole the spotlight from Palmer despite not being a host in title, so at least he had screen time on his side.

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