American Idol fans happy that the show brought Luke Bryan on board to be a judge can thank…Blake Shelton! The Voice veteran coach told KIX921.com that he helped Luke navigate his deal with the show.
Blake tells us exclusively: “I actually spoke to him for months about, you know, he was gonna be a judge on American Idol and he was in talks with them and I kept giving him ideas about how to go back at ’em as far as negotiating cause I know a little bit about this now, and so I’m sure that ABC’s network people, they probably hate my ass over there (laughs), but I’ve been doing it long enough I wanted them to treat him right, you know, so hopefully that all worked out for him.”
Well, if the rumor that Luke is making a $7 million dollar payday to sit next to Lionel Richie and Katy Perry (she makes a cool 25 million) is true, it’s considerably less than Blake’s reported 13 million a season to be a coach on The Voice.
But, according to the same report, Luke was initially offered only $2.5 million dollars by network executives to join the show. If true, he definitely needed all the help he could get negotiating for a better deal. Blake Shelton to the rescue? Maybe Blake was grateful that Luke agreed to help him mentor his team ahead of the Battle Rounds on season 12 of The Voice.
