Diehard fans of American Idol winner Taylor Hicks were no doubt disappointed to learn that the hokey singer was unceremoniously dropped from Sony-BMG imprint J Records early this week. While for most of us Hicks' flirtation with relevancy ended as soon as his stint on Idol did, the details of the poor-selling crooner's love life apparently still hold a rather curious fascination over his small but rabid fanbase, as we briefly chronicled in Radar's February 2008 issue.

For the 99 percent of you unfamiliar with the minutiae of Hicks' post-Idol existence, a quick recap (read the full story here): In May 2007, Hicks was spotted frolicking incognito in the Hawaiian surf with a pixie-cut blonde hard-body. Photos of said frolicking soon surfaced on TMZ, which Hicks' camp flaunted as proof that their man was, in fact, a heterosexual. (He'd never been linked to a female before). The woman was subsequently identified as one Caroline Lyders, an anchor on a local Milwaukee television network.

Shortly after Lyders was named, however, Hicks fans with a seemingly endless supply of free time on their hands started analyzing photos of the woman on the beach and on-air shots of Lyders, eventually coming to the conclusion that they were two different people. Among the reasons trotted out to buttress the claim were that Lyders and the beach bunny had different mouths, ear lobes, ankle birthmarks, and neck sizes.

The obvious question: If it's true, why the subterfuge? Hicksian conspiracy theorists allege that the singer's PR team freaked out when their wholesome, People-approved bachelor was busted with some floozy on a booze-and-sex fueled weekend in the tropics, and thus drafted the respectable, career-oriented Lyders to play the role of steady girlfriend. His rep would remain intact, she'd benefit from the publicity, and no one would be the wiser.

To create the illusion, Hicks' camp started offering up Mr. "Soul Patrol" and Lyders for media appearances, forcing them to attend events together, and even tipping off paparazzi for photo ops. They also—and here's where it gets good—supposedly worked with an insider at the Splash photo agency to insert pics of Lyders into the original batch of Hicks beach photos, and digitally elongated Lyders' legs in other pictures to make her look more like the taller Hawaii skank—according to theories, mind you.

Now, to the naked eye, Lyders and the mystery women look damn near identical. Radar's crack art department, which has no shortage of experience with photoshopping, claims that none of the supposedly altered Lyders photos have been touched. And the original blonde? Nowhere to be found.

Of course, none of this has stopped believers in the bait-and-switch from pursing their story with the tenacity of 9/11 truth-seekers. Just yesterday, we received this e-mail from a tipster who claims to have seen Hicks with the mystery blonde at a casino in San Diego at 2 a.m. on the morning of May 7, 2007:

"Taylor was playing blackjack in the high roller room and the woman was standing next to him. The woman was tall with very short blonde hair ... She had a great figure with long legs, was wearing little shorts and a tank top I think that tied in the back. When the beach photos came out and they named her Caroline Lyders, I just assumed OK that's who she was. But later when all this controversy started coming out on the net and on the fan sites it became obvious she wasn't Caroline, but she was definitely the woman on the beach. The casino woman looked older than Caroline, maybe late 30s, and was definitely way taller. I just want to add I am absolutely CERTAIN without a doubt that was not Caroline Lyders, but looked very similar."

Hicks' PR folks have no comment. Lyders is no longer with WISN, but according to a Nexis search she was on air the morning of May 7. The two are supposedly still a couple.