Some starting pitchers do well on short rest. Maybe it’s something Idol should try it more often – this week was a huge improvement for the guys from last week. Of course, given that last week was solidly in the land of the trainwreck, just an average episode would have been an improvement.

What we got was more or less a “standard” semifinal episode – the frontrunners are beginning to establish themselves, there are a few contestants on the bubble, and the trainwrecks are providing the bathroom breaks.

Michael Lynch got some good song advice this week. Now we have a good idea what he’s good at. He’s not technically outstanding, but he connects with audiences extremely well, he can move around the stage, and he’s got a huge amount of confidence and self-belief. It’ll be interesting to see how much versatility he has down the stretch – it’s one thing that could really pose a problem for him down the road. For now, though, barring a major disaster, his top 12 ticket is punched.

John Park wanted to be more “honest” this week. It didn’t work. Technically, he’s pretty good – he’s got good power, control, all the characteristics you normally look for in a good singer. Unfortunately, singing is so much more than the technicals: in that department, John is sadly out gunned.

Five years ago, Bo Bice sang I Don’t Want To Be and really knocked it out of the park. Since then, three other Idols have done the same song. None of them did as well.  Casey James’s take on it was… okay. The vocals were okay, but that wasn’t the problem. I Don’t Want To Be is as much a performance as a song; to do well with it you not only have to sing well, you have to command the stage. Casey didn’t. Standing in the middle of the stage and playing his electric guitar without much in the way of theatrics… it didn’t work so well. The singing was good enough to make it above average, but only just.

Alex Lambert was a very pleasant surprise, and easily the most improved from last week. Then, he was clearly scared out of his wits on the “big” Idol stage. This week, though, he was clearly nowhere as nervous. Part of it may have been his decision to slow down and give his song – and the environment – a very intimate feel. He may not be able to out-perform the rest of the field, but his vocals are competitive, and his personality has an honesty to him that people will love. He will do better than people think.

In a night of people learning from their mistakes last week, Todrick Hall learned nothing. Last week’s fiasco had relatively little to do with how much or how little he changed the original material. It was simply because he didn’t sing well enough to allow people to forget the original. This week was no different. He’s just not good enough to pull off these drastic reworkings of songs. The past two winners – David Cook and Kris Allen – were both supremely good at it, and in part that was because they had a good idea of their strengths and limitations. Todrick doesn’t seem to have that, and he will probably go home before he figures this puzzle out.

Perhaps by picking What’s Going On as his song, Jermaine Sellers was tempting fate. That was what we were asking as his performance went on: what is going on here? It just went nowhere – the singing was mediocre, he didn’t really connect with the audience – it was one of the worst of the night.

For a so-called favorite, Andrew Garcia hasn’t really been all that impressive. Certainly he did himself no favors with You Give Me Something. It’s hard to imagine a more ironic title. The audience had very little to take away. It was just… there. Andrew’s a decent enough singer that it wasn’t awful, but it was a very mediocre and middling performance.

My Girl does not have an auspicious history on Idol. While Aaron Kelly had the best version of that song ever on Idol, that’s not saying much. It was okay, but it was not particularly memorable. The David Archuleta comparison is inevitable, and there’s no way Aaron comes out of that comparison well – he’s not as good. By any standard, though, it wasn’t bad. Maybe not particularly good, but not bad.

After last week’s apologize, my expectations for Tim Urban were… low. He was better than he was last week. That doesn’t make him good; just less awful than he was last week. It was a much better song selection, and wouldn’t have been half-bad… but it justly confirmed that Tim wasn’t really top 24 material.

Lee DeWyze didn’t do anything too different from last week. It won’t convince anyone who really disliked him back then, but I’ll give him due credit: give him the right material and he shines. That’s not to say his performance was perfect – there were some rough spots in his vocals (not many), he spent a little too much time “pandering” to the camera (that’s what I’m calling eye-screwing now)… but overall it was quite well-rounded. Well done.

Here’s how our rankings go:

1. Michael Lynche
2. Alex Lambert
3. Lee DeWyze
4. Casey James
5. Andrew Garcia
6. Aaron Kelly
7. John Park
8. Tim Urban
9. Jermaine Sellers
10. Todrick Hall

The top three places are fairly close together in my book; so are Andrew and Aaron. Casey’s right in the middle between the two groups. There are still four bad performances, but they weren’t all quite as bad as they were last week, Todrick excepted.

Who’s going home: Unlike last week, there’s a pretty clear delineation this week of who was bad and good. While semifinal boots are always something of a crapshoot, last week might as well have involved rolling dice.

This week, though, the bootees should come from the bottom four. The rest either have “strong” (as strong as they can be this early) fanbases, sang well, got praise from the judges, or other factors that put them safe. (Of that group, the closest one in danger might be Aaron. He’s forgettable, yes, but his youth should give him some help with the tweener voting bloc.)

So who’s going home? Our picks are Jermaine Sellers and Todrick Hall. America does not really like contestants talking back to the judges, and Jermaine has managed to do that two weeks in a row. “Justice”, as administered by the Idol voters, isn’t always delivered on the same week as the crime, but doing it twice in a row is asking for it. If he’s not gone this week, chances are he’ll be gone next week.

As for Todrick… whatever he’s doing, this can’t be a good way to build up a fanbase. He hasn’t sung well, not defined himself artistically in any meaningful way… this isn’t a formula for success either. Last week he escaped largely because so many people stunk so badly. This week? Not a chance.

Our picks: Jermaine Sellers and Todrick Hall to go home.

Controversy and shock exits are part of Idol. Usually, however, it takes a few weeks for something in that department to happen. This year? Surprise right out of the gate.

Let’s break down all the boots. Ashley Rodriguez was something of a surprise, but largely because I read the tea leaves wrong: I put her safe thinking that her fanbase (as measured by the Twitter/Facebook/MySpace numbers) would be enough to delay her exit by at least one week. Unfortunately, I forgot one of my basic rules making that pick: the Idolsphere != the Idol voting base. Ooops. On pure merit alone, she deserved to go home – although if that was the deciding factor, more than two girls could have gone home.

The story was the same for Janell Wheeler. Let’s be blunt: both Ashley and Janell were trainwrecks. True, they weren’t the absolute worst – Haeley had that dubious spot – but they stank. If you stink, you usually get sent home. I was wrong on my picks, but I don’t mind too much – neither boot was really too outrageous.

As for the guys… this is what happens when you have a genuine trainwreck episode. The What Not to Sing numbers aren’t in yet, but it’s going to be ugly. (Hello, Tim Urban.) This early in the season, without the fanbases solidified yet, if the viewers at home don’t see anything really worthwhile to vote for, the preshow fanbases come into play – and there are lots of factors that come into play there that don’t include singing. Essentially, it comes down whether enough people like Contestant X or not.

Unfortunately, both Tyler Grady and Joe Munoz had issues in this department. Joe Munoz had practically been unheard from before the show. With a lot of hindsight, it’s easy to see that Tyler could have rubbed people the wrong way. My view that Tyler was good is clearly something of a minority view, so let’s put Tyler and Joe at about midcard in terms of overall performance (in the eyes of the wider Idol voting audience.) That made them vulnerable if something odd happened. And it did.

They both ran into the mother of all Sesame Street effects. With so many trainwrecks, there were a lot of power voters energized to vote to “Save Contestant X!” Neither Joe nor Tyler got that. Joe was essentially anonymous. Tyler was okay, but not so overwhelmingly good that he had the uncommitted voters breaking his way. He didn’t really have people who voted for him just because they found him likable (think, say, Andrew Garcia). It’s not really a shock vote. It’s a surprise, too, but both found themselves in the middle of the perfect Idol storm of bad singing from others, being not as likable as the rest of the field, and the fluke of the calendar (this probably would not have happened any other week except this one.)

What should we expect next week? The big question mark is whether the pimped favorites – Katie Stevens and Andrew Garcia – really are worthy of their supposed favorite status. Neither really distinguished themselves this week; they’ll be under severe pressure to succeed this week. I would not be surprised if one of them does not make it into the top 12.

Here’s something to keep in mind. Almost every year, someone stands out head and shoulders over the rest of the field  in their first week. Sometimes it’s someone we hadn’t heard before (case in point: Allison Iraheta), sometimes it’s a favorite confirming why they were a favorite in the first place. This year? None of that. NFL-style parity has arrived on American Idol.

The preseason buzz had the girls being worse than the guys this year. Based on last night, we’d have to agree. That might have less to do with the girls being good and more with the guys being utter disasters, though. Wednesday night was one of the most cringeworthy episodes in recent memory.

I’ve heaped a lot of praise on persons “making songs their own”. Todrick Hall, though, went a wee bit too far. If you’re going to go change a song that drastically, you’d better have the chops to make it work. Whether its good vocals, or connecting emotionally with an audience, you have to make the audience forget the original exists. Doing that with Kelly Clarkson, of all people, on the Idol stage? Todrick had to be really, really good to get away with that. But he wasn’t. He was okay,  but not much more than that. The reaction to him was, “what on earth was that?”, not “wow, that was really good.” He reminds me a lot of the previous night’s leadoff singer, who also sang competently but chose the wrong song to sing.

Aaron Kelly didn’t really sing poorly, but he didn’t exactly sing well either. To use one of my favorite phrases when it comes to so-so performances: it was musical wallpaper. It was decent, but not really anything I’d call memorable. It was just there. That said, it was one of the better performances of the night, which is saying something.

Whatever the girls were drinking last night that made them pick songs so poorly, Jermaine Sellers had some too. The song and arrangement didn’t particularly make sense, and the judges were right: he was trying too hard. The singing was iffy at best, but worse for Jermaine it felt entirely emotionally disconnected. He could have been reading the lyrics off a teleprompter. One odd thing about all the older comments: the song dates from 1988, and was popularized in 1990. It’s not that old by Idol standards.

Tim Urban is here only because Chris Golightly was, well, an idiot. Unlike last year’s last-minute replacement, Felicia Barton, who proved she should have advanced in the first place, Tim showed exactly why he got cut. One word: disaster. Two words: utter mess. Kris Allen couldn’t make Apologize all that palatable last year, and Tim wasn’t anywhere near in that category. Bad vocals, poor song choice… no. Just no.

For Joe Munoz, you could take everything I said about Aaron Kelly and repeat it. He was better than Aaron Kelly, but just as uninteresting.

The judges have been noticably saner this year. Maybe it’s because without Paula around, there’s nothing in the Coke cups anymore. Tyler Grady sang pretty well, and truth be told he was probably one of the best of the night. There was just a trace of trying too hard, and while I don’t completely agree with the judges, I can see why they said why they said.

We haven’t had a real love-it-or-hate-it contestant yet among the guys. Lee Dwyze might be it. Half of people are going to love his laid-back, casual vibe. The other half will think it’s vocally lazy. Truthfully, it’s somewhere in between – I’ll be interested to see what he comes up with next week. Still, he did exactly what he set out to do, and you could do a lot worse in the top 24. Minor aside: is it just me, or he looks just like Tory Belleci from Mythbusters?

John Park…. where do we begin? It was just not good. Heck, it was quite bad. Dull, dreary, sleep-inducing… it wasn’t quite a trainwreck, but in some ways it was worse: it was utterly dull.

From everything we’ve seen, Michael Lynche is a nice guy. He should have some friends advising him, right? Someone should have told him he could have done much better. It wasn’t a bad song, and overall Michael was better than most of the guys this night. Not much of a complement, but it is one. Still, the song was not particularly a big challenge, and it didn’t highlight his strengths – whatever they were.

Alex Lambert has to be one of the most nervous contestants in the history of Idol. That’s saying something. The vocals were awful, the stage presence was awkward… poor Alex was clearly out of his league. There was nothing he could do.

Casey James was good, but not as good as most people seem to think. It was a polished performance, but like Michael earlier it wasn’t particularly challenging, and for an emotional song it was strangely wooden in parts. Let’s not even mention the fact that Casey seems to be another eye-effer. Oh boy.

Like the girls night, the pimp spot went to one of the preseason favorites – Andrew Garcia. I’m not seeing the appeal here either. Again, he seems to be a nice, perfectly ordinary guy. The singing, however, was neither good nor bad. Very middle of the road, to be honest. Apparently, Andrew’s done this very same song on Youtube. There’s some logic to picking a song you’re already familiar with, but what plays well on Youtube sometimes doesn’t translate well to the bigger stage.

So how do we rank the top 12 guys?

1. Tyler Grady
2. Casey James
3. Lee Dwyze
4. Michael Lynche
5. Joe Munoz
6. Andrew Garcia
7. Aaron Kelly
8. Todrick Hall
9. Jermaine Sellers
10. John Park
11. Alex Lambert
12. Tim Urban

The only ones I’d call anywhere near good where Tyler, Casey, and Lee. The next four were reasonable, but all were quite deeply flawed. The rest? Solidly in train wreck territory. Almost half of all performances being dismal failures? Idol audiences are used to semifinal futility, but this has to be some sort of record.

Calling this week’s boots for the guys is going to be very, very, hard. A lot of the trainwrecks (John Park and Tim Urban, in particular) seem to have built at least some fanbase support this early. It could be enough to bail them out – particularly Tim, whose comments from Simon are sure to enrage his fans.

With that in mind, these picks aren’t much more than guesses.

TIG picks: Jermaine Sellers and Michael Lynche to go home.

Historically, the first actual competition night of Idol has not been a great one. By that standard, the top 12 girls actually did fairly well – sure, there were a couple of trainwrecks, a few middling/forgettable songs, but overall it was a respectable effort. Certainly, it went down smoother than last year’s opener, or the one two years before that. Let’s run down all the performances.

Aside from being able to sing, to do well on Idol you have to be able to pick good songs. Poor Paige Miles was a perfect example: her vocals of All Right Now were pretty good; for the top 24 I’d call it a solid effort. However… she chose such a lousy song it was hard to tell. It wasn’t particularly memorable, it was just… there. In Idol-land, that’s worse then being a bad singer. Simon may actually have been a little too optimistic for Paige.

Paige wasn’t the only one suffering from Bad Song Choice-itis. Ashley Rodriguez, if anything, had a worse case. Of course, at least Paige could sing. Ashley… couldn’t. This was like walking into a den of hungry lions armed with nothing more sophisticated than a slightly sharpened wooden stick. If she had picked anyone other than a diva-type of singer like Leona Lewis, she might at least have avoided trainwreck status. However, she did. And that was enough to put her well and truly into disaster status.

Heart isn’t quite in the same degree-of-difficulty area as Leona/Mariah/Whitney, but it’s not that far off, either. What Heart songs tend to do on the Idol stage is make an elite singer look really good, and embarrass anyone else. Unfortunately, Janell Wheeler isn’t really an elite singer; by Idol standards she’s solidly average. It was competent karaoke, but neither just “competent” nor “karaoke” will do. If she makes it to the top 12, I’d be surprised.

Lily Scott was, by far, the most intriguing contestant of the night. Out of anyone in this field, she may well have the best appreciation of where she is as an artist. The vocals on Fixing a Hole were middling at best, but it didn’t matter as much as it normally would because the whole performance was sensible, fit together, and felt real. Keep an eye on her – she could get further than people expect if she plays her cards right.

Katelyn Epperly was also quite intriguing. I don’t know if it’s a one-time thing due to her outfit and song choice, but she came across as very old-fashioned. Unlike Lily, who did better than her vocals really deserved, Katelyn was actually not as good as she could be. Her vocals, overall, were very respectable – she needs some work when she reaches for the power notes, but that’s about it. She could go very far.

The judges were very, very, kind to Haeley Vaughn. “Verging on,” Simon? It was far beyond that. It was as complete a disaster as we’ve ever seen on the Idol stage. Nothing about it made any sense. It was a bad song choice – the song doesn’t suit Haeley, either in style or lyrics. The arrangement was nails-on-chalkboard bad. Her vocals were screechy. Who in the world thought this was a good idea? What were they on?

If Haeley Vaughn was disastrous, Lacey Brown was… weird. The vocals weren’t really bad, they were strange. One can see why she didn’t make it last year (aside from the blatant manipulation then). It was really the type of performance than leaves one scratching their head and asking, “what was that?”

Michelle Delamor was really asking to be either a giant success or a giant flop. Somehow, she managed to get away with neither. The rearrangement worked around her lack of pure power (last-second glory note aside), but her great vocal control during the subtler sections of the song mostly carried the day. It was a competent performance, but that’s about it. It wasn’t a disastrously bad song choice, but there’s a good amount of potential there.

The word I’d use to describe Didi Benami: subtle. It was well-executed – very well-executed, in fact – but is subtle really the way to go in your first go-around with America? I’m not so sure. There was a very strong indy-singer feel to Didi, and she’s really on the bubble as far as the top 12 is concerned. Let’s not take away anything she did, though: that kind of subtlety and vocal control is a rare thing (especially on the Idol stage).

The first legitimately good and well-rounded performance of the night: Siobhan Magnus. The vocals were good, but more importantly it perfectly complemented the song. She was able to connect with the song and audience. That’s really what you’re looking for particularly this early in the show. It just didn’t have that one aha! moment that sets good performances from the great.

Far and away, the best executed performance of the night was from Crystal Bowersox. It was, dare I say it, a pro-level performance. You don’t expect that this early in the show. However…. Simon is right: it wasn’t a very original performance. Take away Alanis’s own vocal stylings, add in Crystal’s… and that’s about what you had here. You can’t take away from what she did, though: it was a good performance, with great vocals and good stage presence.

For all the hype she received since the season began, Katie Stevens was a huge disappointment. It’s not that she was bad, but she was middling at best. Fundamentally, though, she made her task much harder than it ought to be. Like most 16/17-year-olds, she doesn’t do subtle well. So why do Michael Buble? She ended up trying to turn a non-power song into one, with a very mixed result. Her pre-show popularity should get her through this week, but beyond that I’m not so sure.

Here our rankings for the night:

1. Siobhan Magnus
2. Crystal Bowersox
3. Lily Scott
4. Didi Benami
5. Katelyn Epperly
6. Michelle Delamor
7. Katie Stevens
8. Paige Miles
9. Janell Wheeler
10. Lacey Brown
11. Ashley Rodriguez
12. Haeley Vaughn

More or less you had about four kinds of performances: the good-but-not-great (Siobhan and Crystal); the good-but-with-serious flaws (Lily, Didi, and Katelyn), the okay-but-not-much-more (Michelle and Katie), and the trainwrecks (Janell on downwards). Paige is really in a zone of her own – her execution was right around Michelle and Katie, but overall her bad song choice just dragged her down too much.

Overall, it was an okay episode, as I said above. True, there were four true trainwrecks in the show, but that’s kind of normal this early in. The other singers did make up for it, but there were too many maddeningly bad song choices and too much untapped potential overall to call it a good episode. Still, it’s not a bad way to start the season for real.

Calling the pick here isn’t as easy as it might seem, though. If you look at the What Not to Sing numbers, there’s a strong tendency for one of the bootees on results night to be legitimately worst, but the other vote to be someone in the midfield. With that in mind, one pick is obvious: Haeley Vaughn. The other pick? Harder to say.  is vulnerable – going by the count of pre-show followers on the social networks, Michelle has a weak fanbase. Simon’s comments might well have caused those few fans to relax. Neither was her performance good enough to win lots of people over. On the other hand, Paige just didn’t sing all that well, and she has fanbase issues as well. With that in mind:

TIG pick: Haeley and Paige to go home.