While this week's results may have shocked "American Idol" observers, we had an inkling that Melinda Doolittle was in major trouble. Searches on the humble singer never took flight, and her amazing pipes just didn't bring in the Buzz.

After Tuesday's three song extravaganza, judge Simon Cowell declared that he wanted Melinda to make the finale. Although his bold opinion may have mobilized a few voters, the former backup singer still trailed Blake and Jordin in searches by a wide margin.

Over the last week, Blake Lewis pulled down five times as many searches as Doolittle. Fellow diva Jordin Sparks outranked Melinda in Buzz by a factor of four. In another important popularity indicator, Melinda only drew 20% of her searches from teens. Compare that to the 31% notched by Jordin or the amazing 55% brought in by Blake, and you'll see that Doolittle needed to do more to connect with that all-important voting bloc.

That said, we weren't going to bet against Melinda's amazing voice and predict an early ouster based solely on Buzz. But according to search interest, this result was a long time coming. And we should know better than to be shocked by the tendencies of a fickle voting public.