Luke Bryan has spoken out in support of Carrie Underwood . Luke publicly threw his support behind the star after country music legend Garth Brooks made the surprising decision to take his name out of consideration for the prestigious Entertainer of the Year (EOTY) award at the 2020 CMA Awards after he was heavily criticized for taking home the award last November over the “Before He Cheats” singer.
The American Idol judge, who’s won the award twice before in 2014 and 2015, spoke out about his thoughts on the honor and made it pretty clear that he thinks it’s about time Carrie was awarded the gong.
“My thought is, if we go for some long period of time and Carrie Underwood never wins a CMA Entertainer of the Year, that’s quite disturbing for me,” Luke said, per Taste of Country .
“She’s definitely… she’s done everything you can do to win, in my opinion,” he added of the star, and also noted that he thinks the same about Eric Church.
Both the “Drinking Alone” singer and Eric were nominated for EOTY at the 2019 ceremony alongside Keith Urban and Chris Stapleton. After Garth was announced as the winner, he and the association were both met with some major backlash from fans, which is what caused the “Friends in Low Places” singer to announce earlier this week that he didn’t want to win again after taking it home seven times in his lengthy career.
During a virtual press conference, he admitted that winning in 2019 actually wasn’t so fun because of the less than impressed messages he received across social media. He also confessed that he too thought the mom-of-two would be announced as the winner during the ceremony, which she co-hosted with Dolly Parton and Reba McEntire to celebrate the women of the genre.
“I’m expecting to give a standing ovation to [her]. I mean, this is her night. And when they said my name, then I was like, I’m lost here because I don’t know what to say,” he said this week.
As for Luke, he also opened up in the new interview about his past wins and how he hasn’t always agreed with the people who have been named the winner of the biggest honor at the long-running ceremony.
“I truly believe that when I won, I was deserving. Hell, I really felt like the best entertainer that year,” he admitted. “And there’s been years where I felt like the best and I didn’t win, but that’s just the way it goes.”
The 2020 CMA Awards nominees are yet to be announced.