Week 5: ‘Dancing With the Stars’ next celeb to go is ... (VIDEO)

“Dancing With the Stars” no doubt has its reasons for the hard-to-follow way it conducts its eliminations. But I, for one, don’t get it.

Why, during the first week that it switched from a two-night to a one-night affair, did it rush in an immediate elimination, then two weeks later have no elimination at all?

Beats me, but there was no elimination on Monday, when each remaining dancer got a temporary new partner.

“Switch-up” week featured vote-dictated partner swapping and a whole menu of unusual dance styles, including Charleston, Broadway, Bollywood, reggae, jitterbug and flamenco.

That was the best part of the episode for me. In all these seasons of “Dancing With the Stars,” dedicated fans have seen enough cha cha cha to put them to sleep sleep sleep. But burlesque? Disco? Now that is some good stuff.

Not surprisingly, at the end of the night, agile Alfonso Ribeiro was in the lead and poor Michael Waltrip, who got his lowest scores ever, was at the bottom.

I predict he’ll be the next to go. Tommy Chong will be after that. And then the real unpredictability can begin.

Did anyone else get the feeling during Monday’s episode that the producers may have made several mismatches this season? The chemistry between Bethany Mota and Mark Ballas was thick, and Derek “Derek Dynasty” Hough and Sadie Robertson also made a compelling pair.

I also thought Cheryl Burke brought the best out of Ribeiro, and Witney Carson made Waltrip seem almost passable.

The judges, joined this week by Jessie J, were not in a generous mood, though, and 9’s were hard to come by on Monday. Now that I think about it, they were pretty stingy with 8’s, too.

So what do you think? Will Waltrip waltz away? Will the dancers be able to refocus after their switch-ups? And when in the name of all things holy is Len coming back?

Let me know what you thought.

This story was originally published October 13, 2014 at 10:53 PM with the headline "Week 5: ‘Dancing With the Stars’ next celeb to go is ... (VIDEO)."