Fans are starting to believe that production forced The Bachelor's Clayton Echard to keep the show's coveted villain Shanae Ankney. Viewers meet Clayton for the first time when he competed for Michelle Young's heart during her most recent season of The Bachelorette. When fans saw Clayton on the show, they expected him to be much more interesting and to have a stronger storyline line throughout the season since Clayton was rumored to be The Bachelor in September 2021.
When Clayton's season began to air in January, his season brought a lot more drama than expected. Not only did Clayton take away the group date rose and ultimately sent home Cassidy Timbrooks, but there was a lot of drama going on between the women in the house. Most recently was when Clayton sent home Elizabeth Corrigan over controversial contestant Shanae, who Elizabeth claimed was bullying her.
Fans have started to notice signs from Clayton on social media that he didn't want to keep Shanae over Elizabeth during the rose ceremony last week. Internet sleuth's figured it out when a fan asked the reality star in the comment section of one of his Instagram photos to "Wear blue in your next photo if you were forced to keep Shanae against your will." Clayton, who issued an apology to Elizabeth, didn’t respond to the comment whatsoever, but he did post to the app again a day later. "YOUR SHORTS ARE BLUE,” the same fan wrote on his February 9 post. The 28-year-old later replied, "That is a correct observation!" Fans of The Bachelor are taking this comment as confirmation that Clayton was forced to keep Shanae on the show. Why else would he reply to such an odd comment about his clothing?
In recent weeks, Shanae has received quite a bit of backlash over the past few weeks for her feud with her fellow Bachelor costar Elizabeth. Shanae said she was the one being bullied by Elizabeth behind the scenes, but viewers think she crossed a line when she made fun of Elizabeth’s ADHD struggles. During the January 31 episode, Clayton ultimately decided to keep Shanae over Elizabeth and sent the latter home. However, the former football player claimed he would have made a different decision had he known what was really going on with the two women. "I would have sent Shanae home immediately for making fun of you for being neurodivergent, had I known," Clayton wrote on social media at the time. "Overall, the experience for me watching hasn’t been fun, simply because I’m seeing all the damage that I caused. I really meant well..." Clayton later said that Shanae "killed his credibility" as a lead for allowing her to stay when she should've gone home.
It has been common knowledge to Bachelor fans that the lead is often forced to keep contestants because producers think they make good TV. Clayton was clearly nodding to the notion in the Instagram post when he shared the photo of his blue shorts. Overall, Clayton knew what he signed up for, and sometimes that means keeping the villain on longer than expected.
The Bachelor airs Mondays at 8 p.m. EST on ABC.
Source: Clayton Echard/ Instagram