Blake Shelton hit his first major stumbling block on season 23 of The Voice on Tuesday, when one of his team members had to drop out of the competition.
Host Carson Daly first made the announcement during the final night of the Battle Rounds, sharing with the crowd, "Team Blake's Alex Whalen could not be with us tonight, so in this case, his Battle partner will be singing solo."
That left Neil Salsich onstage by himself, but it didn't seem to faze him. He impressed Blake and fellow coaches Kelly Clarkson, Niall Horan and Chance the Rapper with his energetic rendition of Marvin Gaye's "I Heard It Through the Grapevine."
"Alex had personal reasons that he had to bow out of the competition," Blake shared. "It's never easy to see artists going home, but Neil has a ton of charisma. He did a great job today."
He also poked fun at an old frenemy when he praised Neil for going with the flow with his performance, noting, "I told him backstage, if you lose this Battle, it will be the worst fail in history. I mean, like, Adam Levine-levels of failure."
ET spoke with the season 23 coaches ahead of the premiere, who all shared how excited they were to be on the show for Blake's last go-round.
"I texted him," Kelly shared. "If he was gonna do a last season, I wanted to make sure I was there."
However, the talk show host insisted that she won't be letting nostalgia affect her competitive nature.
"If [Blake] wins, I am very happy for him, because that is super cool to win on the last season and he's literally the show, from its conception," she conceded. "But, like, I'm not, like, rooting for him to win. I'll be happy for him if he does, but I'm obviously trying to win myself."
As for the show's new coaches, Niall and Chance said they were ready to put in the work against the Team Blake dynasty.
"It's been awesome," Chance said of joining the show. "Kelly's very, very sweet, very nice to me. And Blake is... here."
The Voice airs Mondays at 8 p.m. PT/ET and Tuesdays at 9 p.m. PT/ET on NBC.
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