T.J. Holmes and Amy Robach claimed they knew Matt James had plans for a future with Rachael Kirkconnell before “something changed” ahead of their shocking split.
During the Wednesday, January 29, episode of their “Amy and T.J.” podcast, Holmes, 47, alleged that James, 33, discussed proposing to Kirkconnell, 28, adding, “Matt obviously wasn’t fooling her or trying to trick her. I had plenty of conversations with this dude.”
Holmes felt comfortable sharing more personal insight now that Kirkconnell has broken her silence.
“Now that she said it, I feel more comfortable saying it. He’s talked about marrying this woman. He’s talked about them having kids,” Holmes claimed. “He talked about it plenty privately. [I] had this conversation tons of times with this dude.”
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After news broke about James and Kirkconnell’s breakup, Holmes realized “something changed” between the duo. “Something changed along the way,” he noted. “And her argument is she didn’t know about it. She didn’t even think he knew the breakup was going to come.”
James surprised Bachelor fans earlier this month when he announced via Instagram that he and Kirkconnell had parted ways. Kirkconnell offered her side of the story on the Tuesday, January 28, episode of the “Call Her Daddy” podcast.
“He said that at the end of the day there were just qualities about me that he worries about having in a wife. At the end of the day, there are things that we aren’t compatible with and the whole accountability and saying sorry and all that was really the main thing,” she recalled about what led to the split. “It was just one of those things where he, I think, just had this realization that ‘I should want to propose to you by this time. Like, at this point in our relationship, I should be wanting those things and I should be ready for that. But I’m not still, I still don’t feel like we’re ready or I don’t feel like I’m ready. I don’t know if I ever see myself proposing to you. I can’t actually see myself married to you.’”
Holmes, however, assumed that James and Kirkconnell knew there were issues in their relationship.
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“Certainly, some of these things have been on his mind and talked about [between them]. You’re always looking at the person you’ve been in with for a relationship,” Holmes added before addressing his own relationship with Robach, 51. “We’ve been together coming up on three years now. I assure you, I’ve had plenty of thoughts about you being my wife.”
Earlier in the episode, Holmes acknowledged that he seemed to be “defending” James, saying, “I will defend Matt but I can defend Matt without s—ting on Rachel. I can defend him and have my heart go out to him without taking anything away from her experience.”
He continued: “If Matt was in front of me right now, I would say, ‘Damn, bro, what were you thinking with that [breakup announcement] post? Why did you not give it a beat?’ And he might have an answer.”
Robach, for her part, speculated whether James had “an epiphany” shortly before pulling the plug.
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“Maybe he had an aha moment. Maybe there was just clarity where he thought, ‘You know what? I don’t want more nights like that. I don’t want days like that. I don’t want that.’ We can’t get in his head,” she shared. “Something had to have changed. Something had to have clicked. Maybe spending three weeks nonstop with someone — maybe everyone should do that. Spend three weeks with someone 24 hours a day. And you might have clarity that you didn’t have before.”
In response, Holmes quipped that he and Robach are “the best couple ever” because they are always together. Robach suggested that they should take that as a sign that they “go to the courthouse.”
“We have withstood that test — but it’s a test a lot of people don’t go through,” she concluded. “I think at the end of the day, a year from now or six months from now or five years from now, there will be clarity.”
