Christina and Blake appeared to have solid ideas of what they wanted. In many cases, it seemed like their decisions were made before the knockout rounds started. And unlike Monday night, when the people who did something a little different made it through, last night it was the people who played it straight. Those who took risks in arrangement and song choice did not stay. (Christina’ Fighter is not a risky song choice, no matter how difficult to sing.) In some cases I disagreed with their decisions, but overall, think all the teams are strong going into the live shows.

The problem with the knockout rounds is the same as my problem with the battles. By having contestants go head to head, the coaches do NOT end up with the strongest teams. Sometimes, a person who wows is sent home because they went up against someone just a little bit stronger while the very next battle, someone mediocre stays because their opponent was just a little bit worse. This was more apparent on team Cee Lo than team Adam, but it was there.

I do think they ended with good teams, just not the strongest teams they could have had.

Final night of the battle rounds! It did not disappoint. Every battle they showed was good. Even the battle that had a clear winner had two really strong performances. On some level, though, the drama was diminished by no one other than Christina having any steals left.  

I am a little bummed that the knockout rounds will once again be head to head competition. Unless the coaches decide to treat this like a basketball tournament pairing their best singers against the worst, there’s still a good chance that the teams won’t actually end up with the 5 best singers left.

Last night’s episode was a little disappointing. I didn’t think the “Whataya Want from Me” performance was good. It made me wish a coach could choose no one. I also wasn’t a huge fan of the “Free Your Mind” performance (though both of those singers were good), as it seemed like the girls were screaming the song. I remember the original version of that song- it doesn’t need to be screamed. It made me wonder how bad the three battles they didn’t show us were. But the battle rounds are almost over, and soon we’ll see the new knockout round.

Christina used her first steal last night. That was the biggest news from The Voice. There were some difficult decisions for the judges, at least one time when I would have chosen differently than the coach (but I understand the decision), etc. It was a pretty typical night for the battle rounds. There were no standout performances. There might have been a bad performance, but they chose not to show us two battles, so we don’t know for certain. What we do know is that the teams are almost full, and soon it will be time for the knockout rounds.

Not quite certain what I think about The Voice not showing all the battle rounds. I know that there’s the knock out round this year, which means we have one more round in the same number of shows, but I have to wonder why the extra time wasn’t taken from the Blind Auditions.

I was okay with it when I thought I could log into the website to see the full battles. But no, it was just the same short clip from the show last night. Do we expect the winners of those battles to fall in the knockout round?

We missed the first half of The Voice last night, but I watched the performances we missed online this morning. C was especially disappointed that we missed Santeria last night as that’s one of his favorite songs.

What I like most about the battle rounds this year is the steal. I’ve commented in past years on the fact that sometimes, a coach manages to put two of their best people up against each other and a really good singer gets knocked out of the competition too early. The steal allows for that person to have the chance to stick around.