Land of the Real People

KC most eligible bachelor off the market!
Late one afternoon, Joel Burton effortlessly curls a 90-pound barbell at 24 Hour Fitness off Ward Parkway. Mirrored walls catch his Abercrombian reflection: trim, tan and built. He has blue eyes and a blond frock of messy-on-purpose hair. He has sheared off all visible body hair. Decked in a fitted black tank top and cut-off sweats, he stands confidently, as though ready for his laid-back close-up. He barely breaks a sweat.

No wonder he was cast to play the role of KC's most eligible bachelor. But six months since his appearance on Elimidate, he's still trying to shake that reputation.

"How was St. Patrick's Day?" asks a brunette cruising by.

"Fine. I didn't drink," he says.

"Didn't drink? Why not?" She coos.

"I'm trying to be a good boy," he says, flashing a big, toothy smile.

Before his Elimidate appearance in the fall of 2005, Burton was blowing a year to "have fun and chill" after getting a business degree from University of Missouri-Kansas City. He and his older brother and a high school buddy from his hometown of Moberly, Missouri, rented a small house off Harrison and decorated the pad Animal House-style. The living room held a wet bar, and the floor was open and uncluttered, ideal for mingling.

Between sets with the barbells, Burton bounces up and down to exercise his calves. He says he didn't audition for the show. Recruiters had staked out local meat markets for undiscovered talent. They plucked him from the singles scene on a Wednesday night at Charlie Hooper's in Brookside, where he was on a double date.

He switches to "supersets," alternating between biceps curls and triceps presses. His initials, JAB, tattooed in script on one shoulder, flex with him.

Burton took Elimidate's ultimate alpha-male challenge, dating four women and dumping three to find the one worth keeping. He never expected to find love. He just wanted to see how outrageous he could be. Like a method actor, he says he took his own persona and amped it. "It was the lifestyle I lived at the time," he says. "They wanted a party-animal guy, and that's what I gave them."

His appearance had more plot than most Elimidate episodes. Burton proclaimed that he would disprove Kansas City's reputation as a bad place for dating. Riding on a party bus from the River Market toward the Plaza, he ditched the wallflower and the prude. He and his final two dates jumped into the J.C. Nichols Fountain, where he peeled his shirt open. In the end, he chose the wildest one, but the affair proceeded no further. There was never a closed-door rendezvous, and the two parted ways after taping stopped.

Meanwhile, he had landed a job as a bartender at the Blue Moose in Prairie Village, part of his continued quest to be a slacker. When the show aired in September, Burton threw a bash at his pad. Among those who came was a petite blonde, his new belle. She's part of his effort to settle down and, he says, "do the girlfriend thing."

"She thought it was funny," he says. He also emphasizes that his behavior shouldn't count because it was before he met her. "I'm more reserved now," he says.

The show was enough to make him a familiar face and send his nightlife status skyrocketing — even if most who recognize him can't figure out how they know him.

At the gym, a redheaded fitness instructor walks by and drapes a 24 Hour Fitness poster like a towel over Burton's shoulder. Burton checks out the promo's spokesman, Olympic skier and NFL hopeful Jeremy Bloom.

"Who's that? Jeremy Bloom?" he asks rhetorically. "I'm jealous. I want to do the NFL, and he is!"

The redhead holds the poster up to Burton's chest, as if comparing their physiques. Burton smiles.

"It's just not in the cards. I'm all right about it," he jokes of his pro-ball dreams.

Earlier this month, he decided that he was ready to get serious about a career, too. He landed his first sales job at Dick Smith Ford in Lee's Summit. He left Elimidate off his résumé.