Jordin becomes first ‘Duplicate Idol’

But Sparks’s track record with the former is spotty, and she’s given no indication that she’s interested in the latter. That makes it unavoidable that “Idol” would have to return to the well with Sparks. And while her performance of Martina McBride’s “A Broken Wing” revealed a voice that could sit comfortably alongside less-twangy country singers like Faith Hill, following in Clarkson’s footsteps was clearly the path of least resistance.

Slide show   ‘Idol’ crowns a champ “American Idol” Jordin Sparks and some of the singers she bested along the way in season six.

If her win courts redundancy, however, there are advantages that Sparks has over Clarkson. Her age is one. At 17, Sparks is the youngest winner in the show’s history, which potentially makes her the most malleable Idol ever.

Her inexperience is a factor there, as she’s basically still a high school student without the same sort of real-world responsibilities and frustrations faced by the next two youngest winners, Clarkson and single mother Fantasia. As a result, she might not know how to fight for what she wants (or even know that she can). It’s also possible that she doesn’t know what that is yet.

That could make Sparks as much of a dream client for her new management company as Carrie Underwood was. But where Underwood arrived perfectly prepackaged, Sparks is essentially unmolded clay, a raw (but real) talent whose lack of seasoning is at once her greatest liability and her prime asset.

The other key advantage of Sparks being the new Kelly Clarkson is that it gives “Idol” one more Kelly Clarkson than it currently has. With her heavier and more rock-influenced second album “Breakaway,” the season one winner broke from the style she honed on the show. Then she broke from Idol completely, quietly distancing herself from the show almost the moment her contract expired. It was hard not to get the impression that her recent appearances on the “Idol Gives Back” broadcast and Wednesday night’s finale were no different from that of Gwen Stefani or Annie Lennox, just another superstar willing to help out and maybe promote her new record.

With Clarkson having gone all Miss Independent, a Sparks win becomes all the more attractive. It allows “Idol” to renew its Kelly Clarkson lease after watching it expire. It remains to be seen what direction Sparks’s career will take in the long term. But at the moment, for the first time in the show’s history, the winner already fits the crown.

Marc Hirsh is a writer in Somerville, Mass.

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