CMA Awards 2012: Tim Allen Tells Blake Shelton He Wants To “Tap” The Blonde On Stage – Not Knowing It Was Miranda Lambert

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Awkward…

We’ve seen our fair share of awkward moments from the CMA Awards over the years. Some of them are awkward because the performers or presenters go rogue, like when Alan Jackson pulled off his protest performance of George Jones’ “Choices” after producers tried to cut George’s performance time. But those usually just end up being awkward for the producers who got called out on their own show.

Then you have the moments that are awkward for the audience because they’re so incredibly cringey. You can throw pretty much every joke Luke Bryan’s made during his time as host into this category, along with the forced country/pop collabs that you know are only in there because the network thinks it will help their ratings. (It never helps their ratings. But keep trying, I’m sure it’ll work next time).

And then you have these little behind-the-scenes stories about awkward moments between the guests, and they might be some of my favorite stories from the awards shows.

Of course one thing that happens when you have shows like the CMA Awards is that celebrities from outside of country music come in and have to try to act like they’re there because they’re big fans of country music. Like when Ashton Kutcher put on a cowboy hat and butchered a George Strait song at the ACM Awards back in 2012.

But when they don’t really know anything about country music, you can have these hilariously awkward situations like the one between Blake Shelton and Tim Allen at the 2012 CMA Awards.

To set the scene a little bit, actor Tim Allen was at the awards show to present the award for Entertainer of the Year alongside Reba McEntire. His new television show, Last Man Standing, had debuted on ABC the previous year, so I assume the network thought the awards show was a good way to promote another one of their shows instead of actually getting another country artist to present the night’s biggest award.

But anyway, Blake Shelton was one of the biggest stars in country music at the time, and was nominated for Entertainer of the Year along with Male Vocalist of the Year, Single of the Year, and Song of the Year for “Over You,” which he had written with his then-wife, Miranda Lambert.

That’s an important point in this whole story: Blake and Miranda were obviously still married, and were quite the power couple in country music at the time.

Well Tim Allen was seated behind Blake during the awards show, and the two got to chatting during the show when a hot blonde singer comes on stage. But Tim, who clearly doesn’t know much about country music, has no idea that Blake and Miranda are married.

Tim told the story of the awkward conversation that followed during an appearance on The Ellen Degeneres Show:

“I’m watching right behind Blake Shelton, who wouldn’t move, and he’s the largest man on the planet, I can’t see anything. I’m actually irritated with the guy.

He turns around I happened to a fan of that show ‘The Voice,’ and I happen to be of his on that show so we started a conversation.”

Here’s where it gets awkward:

“Then a woman comes up, and you probably know this, and everybody else knows it, but I didn’t know this… Miranda Lambert. So she’s up there rocking out with the crazy one, some song about her being nuts and tattoos and booze.

I was like, ‘I love this woman’ and he turns around and says ‘Boy, I’d love to tap that’ and I said ‘Me too!’

And then I get that look. And he goes, ‘That’s my wife!’ And like a comic I said, ‘Let me finish…’

So we haven’t spoken since… but she’s really good.”

Yikes.

Well to make things even more awkward, Tim Allen would go on to present the Entertainer of the Year award that night to…Blake Shelton. After telling him that he wanted to sleep with his wife.

Hilarious.

Maybe that’s why the CMA Awards should invite actual country music artists and fans instead of random celebrities. But then again we wouldn’t get awkward moments like this if they did.

The 2025 CMA Awards will be held November 19 at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville. Lainey Wilson will be hosting the show solo this year, with performances from artists like Luke Combs, Ella Langley, Zach Top, Stephen Wilson Jr., Megan Moroney, Shaboozey, and BigXthaPlug.