American Idol: The Good, the Bad, and the Overrated

According to a poll released by AOL Television - conducted May 9-16 and receiving more than 1.3 million votes - American Idol viewers see Carrie Underwood as the all-time best winner, reports Reuters in Los Angeles.

That blue-eyed, dreadlocked, lyric-forgetting Jason Castro is the most overrated contestant and that Kelly Clarkson is the show's second best winner, were other results of the poll.

The poll also took into account performances from the current season, which wraps up with its finale this week. Series finalists, the nubile, smiley David Archuleta and the alluringly aloof rocker David Cook, are neck and neck in terms of votes regarding the season's best performances. Archuleta's rendition of John Lennon's "Imagine" and Cook's performance of Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean" both earned 35 percent of the votes.

Irish singer Carly Smithson caused quite a stir with 63 percent of voters who felt that singers with previous record contracts should not be allowed to compete on the show. Another contestant from across the pond, the Aussie-native Michael Johns, was voted as the contestant most likely to succeed, despite being eliminated from the show.

More than half of those polled also said that they purchase contestant performances from iTunes, this being the first year in the entire run of the Fox-aired show that downloads from iTunes are available.

The final performances in the "David vs. David" competition will air this Tuesday, and the winner - who receives a recording contract - will be announced Wednesday.