Joey Graziadei is ready to find his true love as the new Bachelor!
The 28-year-old tennis pro from Collegeville, Pennsylvania was announced as the lead for The Bachelor season 28, which will air in 2024, by Jesse Palmer on Monday’s Bachelorette finale.
Graziadei said he was “surreal” to be the next Bachelor.
“It’s sinking in very slowly but I’m trying my best just to stay present, enjoy it, but this is crazy,” Graziadei said.
“I mean, I’ll be the first person to say this is wild. I never expected this at all, didn’t know this is what my life is turning at this moment. So yeah, crazy stuff, but I’m excited.”
The court-master was one of the final two on Charity Lawson’s season of The Bachelorette, but he was heartbroken in the finale when Lawson chose Dotun Olubeko over him.
Palmer, 44, asked Graziadei if he was ready for love after his breakup with Lawson.
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“I’m more ready than I was in that moment,” Graziadei said.
“For me, it was just, you have to take some time to get a little bit more closure. Watching Dotun and Charity’s connection was enough for me.”
Graziadei told Palmer what he was looking for in a future partner, “Someone that’s just themselves that I can truthfully be a partner with. I want someone that challenges me. I want someone that I can challenge. I just want someone to do life with. I just want someone that’s going to be my person.”
Palmer introduced Graziadei to the first woman from his season, Leia, who was in the audience of After the Final Rose.
“I think we have a lot in common, so I’m excited to kind of explore that,” she said to Graziadei.
The 28-year-old was a popular contestant from the beginning and seemed to be a strong contender for Lawson’s heart at the end of the season. He and Lawson, 27, said “I love yous” during Fantasy Suite week and spent the night together.
“I can do that for the rest of my life for sure,” he said to the cameras later.
At the end of his last date with Lawson, Graziadei was confident about proposing. But when he was about to propose, Lawson told him she had found “deeper with someone else.”
“It won’t make sense in this moment and it’s hard. It’s hard to get these words out because the truth is, Joey, that I am in love with you,” she said.
After they bid goodbye, Graziadei told the cameras how much he wanted to find love.
“I want love bad,” he said. “I think it’s just showing me how badly I want to be with someone else and get an opportunity to share life with them because that’s all I can think of. I just want to ask the universe, when is it going to happen to me?”
After the emotional moment, Lawson quoted PEOPLE it was hard to reject Graziadei.
“Seeing Joey was not easy, and saying goodbye was really hard for me,” the Georgia native said.
“The emotions just overcame me, rightfully so. Throughout this whole journey for me, saying goodbye to anyone was not an easy thing to do, but especially at that point when you have formed some connection, that was difficult for me. I don’t want to be the person that has to contribute to someone else’s pain, but it was necessary.”
Despite that, she and Olubeko, 30, think Graziadei will be a great Bachelor.
“We truly wish him nothing but the best,” she said.
“We saw how much of a lover boy Joey is and how much he wants his person. I do believe that he is going to have no problem finding that. He is an incredible person. We’re both rooting for him and rooting for his success.”
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Olubeko also said he found Graziadei to be “very intentional” and thinks that will help him on his quest for love.
“I think that’s going to lend very well to the show,” the integrative medicine special said, adding that he and Lawson are “both excited to watch that journey.”
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