RHAP: We Know Survivor - Why ___ Lost: Survivor 48 Ep 12 with Sam Phalen

Episode Date: May 17, 2025

Why ___ Lost: Survivor 48 Ep 12 with Sam Phalen Shauhin had said he was in control of the tribe and IF he could maintain it, he’d win the game. How did he lose control? Or did he never truly have it? Did he fly too close to the sun, as he suggested in this […]

Getting your kids to school safely is important to you. It's important to us too. Toyota, for what matters most. When does fast grocery delivery through Instacart matter most? When your famous grainy mustard potato salad isn't so famous without the grainy mustard. When the barbecue's lit, but there's nothing to grill. When the in-laws decide that, actually, they will stay for dinner.

Instacart has all your groceries covered this summer. So download the app and get delivery in as fast as 60 minutes. Plus enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders. Service fees exclusions and terms apply. Instacart, groceries that over-deliver. If you lost survivor and you're feeling down, exclusions and terms apply. Instacart. Groceries that over-deliver. This is Y Blank Lost. This is Y Blank Lost. Oh baby, this is Y Blank Lost.

Welcome back to Y Blank Lost. I'm David Bloomberg and I would never bleep in your pancakes. With me, of course, is my co-host, who someone told me has an immunity idol. She's never shown me. And now I'm getting suspicious. Jessica Lewis is who's spreading these rumors. Is it maybe a Sam is Sam spreading these rumors? Well, let's let's ask him, because, of course, video viewers can see that we have a great guest with us from Survivor 47, my fellow original Chicago suburbanite, Sam Phelan. That's right. That's me. That's me. Yeah. Fellow Chicagoan suburbanite, fellow Illini fan David,

you know, getting ready to cheer and jeer the all of the Illini sports coming up this fall. So I'm happy to be here. Great. Great. We're happy to be here. Great. Great. We're happy to have you. And of course, you know, this weekend is the Cubs versus White Sox. Now, I heard that you were on some White Sox podcast recently or were doing something with the White Sox. So I have to ask you the same question that many people were asking

the new pope a couple weeks. Who are you a fan of? Yes, I will. I am, unfortunately, and admittedly, unfortunately, a diehard white sax fan. You know, I tell everybody that asks, you know, why a white sax fan? I said, listen, anybody that's in Chicago that is a white sax fan did not choose this life. This life chose them. And so my my father, being a white sax fan, his father, being a white sex and did not choose this life. This life chose them. And so my father being a white sex fan, his father being a white sex fan was passed down to me and that is where my loyalty lies.

And sometimes, as we'll learn when we go over the rules of a survivor, if you've got loyalty in the wrong place, it can be very, very dangerous for you. And that's not right. Yeah, I deal with that on a daily basis here. Well, as a Lifeline Cubs fan, I know pain also. And yeah, we'll have, you know, same thing. We passed it down to our kids. Now they're living in completely different cities where they will, you know, one of them is in what I call a mixed marriage. She, you know, he married a Cincinnati Reds fan.

Yes. It could be worse. It could be a Cardinal. It could be a. Oh, yeah. No, that that I would have forbidden. I would have said no to that. But they actually got married within like two days of you getting married. They got married at the Cincinnati Reds ballpark. Oh, wow. Yeah. The actual ceremony was at the ballpark.

It was. Well, everything was in the ballpark, but it was in the reception rooms. Oh, wow. Too difficult to do it on the field itself. That's amazing. They have lots of restrictions about getting married on the field. Like, no heels. You know, they don't need anyone poking holes in the field and stuff like that. And then it wouldn't have mattered anyway, even if they had planned it, because

it was the most torrential rainfall that Cincinnati had seen was that day. Just getting from the hotel across the street to the ballpark was an adventure. So, so yeah, it was, you know, but it was, it was fun. I wanted to bring all Cub stuff and hang it up, but I was told no. There are rules, David. There are rules. You should know this. Yes, I guess. But yeah, it's too bad that the that our JP had its live show in Chicago during Survivor 46 because you could have joined us at the Cubs game. Oh, I totally would have. I love it. Even as a white sack fan, I love a good Cubs game. I love I like Wrigley Field. I like the you know, and I agree. I was very bummed. 46 live show in Chicago.

Rob, what gives man? Like I'm trying to trying to go back home. Right. That's right. Now you say you love a good game. It was not a good game. But luckily we had fun in the in the stands. That's every time you go to Wrigley Field, right? People don't actually watch the game. Come on.

You give Cubs fans too much credit, David. Hey, we usually watch. But they were, yeah, they were a large group of players and survivor fans. And there was this group of kids in the section next to us who realized there were real live survivor players from that season sitting right near them. Awesome. So they came over and they were getting pictures with them. It was it was very cute, you know, with kids. It's a fun part of that.

I'm actually curious. I was going to ask Jess, like how how much do you feel like it is different now compared to when you played in terms of like the lore of like, oh, survivor player. Like when you were when your season was airing, how often was it that you were going places and getting recognized? Because certainly there was less like live events that a big group of survivor players would all be together at the same time.

And what I often found was that I could walk around Nashville during my season and absolutely nobody would ever say anything or had any idea. And it wasn't until I would be surrounded by three or four other people from the season that people would look at a group of people like, oh, I know who this group is. So did you what was your experience like when when you were playing? It was actually really strange because I would get recognized in the weirdest places. Like I was at the mall one time with my family

and all of a sudden this woman in like Victoria's Secret was like, oh my gosh, and like wanted a photo with me. And then so my family was like, oh, this is actually going to happen. Like, this is weird. But I do think that I actually was noticed or recognized more often. Like when I went to Boston a few times and there was people,

I was going to a concert and they were in line and they were losing their mind because they're like, oh my God. But it is interesting because I did some live events and that certainly changes the dynamic because you are surrounded by so many people and there's more of an understanding and you get recognized there for sure. But it was, it was very random. I would say like, I would like expect it to be more where I'm from, but it was actually more when I would go places. So I don't, you know, I don't know why that was, but the weirdest component of it all was when I would be recognized by,

cause I am, I am an attorney and when a potential juror recognized me, that was, that was an issue that I had to be prepared I did like prepare the judges for as well like please don't make them announce it like have them approach so that way they're not telling the whole room hey I saw her on Survivor yeah and then everyone is realizing it so it it was an interesting thing to kind of work through because you just never know you never know if you're going to be recognized. And also, I looked like hell when I was on the island and like, people are like,

oh, wait, you're like clean and not right swollen in your eyeballs. Like on the show. So it is a very interesting thing to go through because you just really never know when and if you're going to be recognized and how people are going to react. So it's but it is strange to travel places and then have people recognize you when you're going to be recognized and how people are going to react. So it's but it is strange to travel places and then have people recognize you when you're there. Some cities are some cities are more survivor, like just have bigger contingencies, survivor fans than other cities.

Like like you said, Nashville, there's like people all over the city that are. Everybody somebody in the city. So nobody really cared. Nobody really says anything. And then I get on a flight to Detroit and I like leave. And everywhere I walk around Detroit, there's like somebody that's like, oh, I watch Survivor and I didn't realize

Detroit was like number one Survivor City. But OK, I see. Yeah, so it is it is fun like that. Yeah, it's a good time. It is interesting because my son just was on a work trip in Nashville this past week, and he has previously said, you know, oh yeah, I was at this bar and this famous person walked in and this famous person walked in. And so yeah, there's, you know, but yeah, you know, at the Cubs game, I think most of

the kids recognized Hunter. Oh, yeah, I'll do it. Yeah, you know, they were sitting with a bunch of them, but I think Hunter was probably the most recognizable and most people. You know, the kids wanted to get pictures with him. Popular among the kids that. Yes. Yes. So. So, well, I rather doubt that Shaheen is a fan of Chicago sports teams. He should be, but we won't hold that against him as we evaluate his game.

We will follow our usual path of comparing his gameplay to my rules for winning that I originally wrote way back after season one and have been updating ever since, using all the non-spoiler information available to us from what we saw on TV, interviews, social media, and secret scenes. The newest published version of the rules can of course be found by going to robhizzwebsite.com slash yxlossfeed and clicking on the link bubble for the survivor rules. But before we address how Shaheen did in terms of the rules, we always have some other things to discuss. And we will, of course, have a lot to say about what happened in this episode once we get to the rules.

But hopefully the mob has put down their torches and pitchforks. Now that a move was made. Now, it wasn't the move people expected, nor the one that a lot of them wanted. But it was a move. And there was some significant strategy behind it. I think Charlie said it well, when he was on with Rob this week. He said the theme of the season is patience. And I wish some viewers had as much as the players, because I've been saying for a while now that people need to remember the players are there to do what's best for themselves,

not to make things entertaining. Yes. Yeah. Later on in Appendix A, we'll talk about whether or not this was indeed the best move for those who made it. But at least the editing of the story of the episode was decent this week without them pulling the rug out from under us or trying to shock us at tribal council. Just that weird Joe having a concussion moment. Insane. Yeah. We'll see when we go through everything. They actually provided us with a good amount of information this week, both about what happened in this episode

and what may happen in the finale. Yes. And I just want to say that while you were talking about how people, this wasn't the move that people necessarily expected or wanted, I do believe it was my prediction. I just want to throw that out there. Oh yes, it was.

See, and this, I was, you know, I was making my predictions this season. I have decided that I have taken on the the Jessica role. I go opposites. Because because I predicted Mary would go home week after week after week and she stayed safe. And then I think the one week that I didn't predict Mary would go home. Boom, gone.

And I predicted something big and interesting and fun would happen the prior week. And no, it was a regular week. So this week for this week, I just predicted a more boring, straightforward Mitch would go and the reverse happened So, you know, I just I just wanted to use my powers for good Oh, is that what it was? Yes

I just have to feel good about myself for a few minutes because I did predict Mary and then I did Shaheen not that I think either of them should have necessarily gone home, but I am terrible at my predictions and everybody knows this. So the fact that I was like, look at that, I was right. And I will say my mother was very upset. The Shaheen one. She was she was very upset. Do either of you have winter pick still alive? I think yes. Yeah, Jessica.

No, Jessica. Jessica lost hers in the first episode. First episode gone. Oh, first episode. First episode gone. Oh, first episode. I think this is why. And yet somehow it's a better winner pick than when she picked Rome on my season. Yeah. And that was a rock. I still have it. The rock. That was the rock that did it.

Because here's I have I have only ever picked one winner ever. And that was JT. However, years ago. Yes, I like I am so bad at this. And the problem is, is like I overthink everything. And that's why the year that I picked rocks and it was Rome, it was just like, I don't want to even think about it. And then I got Rome and it was like everyone was.

Rome was a we he was a full. Thing in and of itself, right? So he was. But yeah, so so bad choice. You know, I do have a tendency to pick the wrong rock. I will say that this is, that's another thing I have in my, in my past. So I'm not good at selecting winter picks. I'm not good at selecting rocks. So yeah, it's just all bad. It's definitely all bad. So I, I will never, so I So I always apologize to anyone.

If I select you as a winner, you're likely not going to win because of the butterfly effect. And it was completely true this time as well. And if they did win and then you pick them, they actually make them go back and refilm. Yes. Which is I don't know if people know that they actually do that, but that is how that is how they operate. They're like, we have to make sure that this butterfly effect is right. Everyone back out to Fiji. Jessica got it right. We got to engage things.

David, you have your winner pick. I well, technically, yes, Eva was my winner. OK, now, if you know right now, I think she has approximately a 0% chance of winning. To, you know, jump ahead and spoil what my predictions. Please, but one of my predictions won't be now. Of course, I will say in the past, I have done predictions where I have said they have no chance of winning. That was mostly based on editing in that case,

like when we did Survivor 41 one and we had the final five and I said, well, I'm only going to talk about four of them because Erica clearly cannot win based on her. And then when we got to Gabler's season to forty three, I said Gabler has zero percent chance of winning. Yeah, they I think they very quickly pivoted when they shifted to 90 minutes, how they edited the winners of the new era. Right. Because I think that even the Mary Ann story, which was different slightly from both Gabler

and Erica, but I think in the same realm of like somebody sort of coming out of nowhere in the last few episodes, the person that you thought clearly cannot win becomes the winner. And it was a lot of negative feedback, I feel like from the people watching the show about, you know, Erica specifically is the one that sticks out to me as. We just don't know what the winning story was for Erica. We don't know what that winning game was. We heard from all the jurors about why she was really deserving player. And everybody considered Erica to be a bad winner in the moment, mainly just because we hadn't seen it.

And that was not her fault. It was on sort of the way that the story was. Right. And then you saw a pretty staunch, like difference in D and 45 and Kenzie and 46. Like, I don't think that's how they tell winter stories anymore because of the way that they got that negative feedback early in the new era. Right. Yeah.

And it's good. They listen to something. To something. Yes. Some things. Um, now, uh, speaking of the, you know, the people who are headed to the end here and to Eva, I said two weeks ago that I was surprised anyone would believe the strong four were going to make it to the final four together.

Because speaking of editing, there were two scenes of Eva even a couple weeks ago, talking about how she was certain they were locked in and she wasn't concerned about anyone coming against them. And then this week, right off the bat, she had another similar confession about how she was in the science solid alliance and things would be simple. This was actually released as a sneak peek scene on YouTube. And I knew as soon as I saw it, something was going to happen. So I made a new prediction.

I threw aside my prediction and made a new one, which is always good. Because if you have two predictions, you double your chance. Right. But it's like if Eva were somehow to win this season, I would still claim credit for it from my preseason. Of course you would. Of course. But once I saw that sneak peek,

I was like, I don't know what's going to happen, but something is finally going to happen with this alliance. And it did, it wasn't specifically against her, but these supposedly solid alliances no more. Well, Sam, who was your winner pick? My winner pick. I also did not do very well.

My winner pick was Thomas. Oh, I love that. He was my backup. That was your problem. That was your problem. When Jessica lost Stephanie, she picked a second. Oh, okay. Well, not so it wasn't my fault. It was mine. Yeah. She picked a second. Oh, OK. Well, I know. So it wasn't my fault to be.

Yeah, it's mine. Yeah. I know it's so enjoyable. And I you know, it's one of those ones that Thomas goes home in the pre-merge. And I stand by it now that like they choose somebody else to idle out at that point. And Thomas still can probably win the game. I thought he was a really savvy player. And like just had like a magnetic social energy to him

and brought us a lot of fun confessional moments that would have been really fun to see get deep in the game. And I'm really curious how this post merge, which has been very, you know, down the chopping block sort of one, the pecking order falling in line. How a chaotic sort of messy, you know, in the best way possible player like Thomas affects the culture of the season. They're in the post merge.

Yeah. So they may have Bianca both right like him and Bianca were seemed to be a really fun duo and then Bianca gets hit with the tribe swap. And that's what really does her in with a lost vote. So but yeah, Thomas was my my preseason winner. Yeah, he was he was so enjoyable. I definitely, definitely loved him. So yes, there we are with Winner picks.

Not my strong suit. OK, now, another thing I do want to mention before we get to the rules is something I talk about not only here, but often on podcasts about other shows like the traders. When Kyle brought the information slash disinformation to Joe, Joe told us he had to pause and analyze things like body language. And if Kyle was looking him in the eye, and you know what, after all that pausing and body

language reading, he got it wrong. Which just goes to prove, support proving the point that I repeatedly make that if you believe and rely on this belief that you have the ability to read body language, you're usually just fooling yourself. Well, and I will say too, what I thought was fascinating in that moment and just going back and rewatching that scene,

Kyle looked so relaxed and so like almost even comfortable in that moment having that conversation with Joe and Joe did not. And I understand Joe's being like thrust all of this new information and he's and he's having to process it. But watching the body language between the two of them, it to me came across as almost very genuine of Kyle. Just be like, listen, I just need to tell you this. And Joe is the one I mean, Joe's response was exactly what Kyle wanted.

It was he created the paranoia and that and he knew Kyle knew exactly how to do it and what to say, because he he's seen the paranoia that Joe had previously and it was just kind of a fascinating moment to see Kyle pull off what Kyle was hoping to achieve and it was that paranoia but then Joe saying well I have to read body language and I need to figure this out and I need to pause which is fair he does need to do all of those things but in that I mean, Joe's eyes were fluttering so quickly and so fast. And he was like, I just really need to process all of this.

So I really did appreciate Kyle in that moment because the way that he presented it, it did not present as being untruthful and being not genuine. This is why lawyers are so dangerous. This is why you never tell anyone you're a lawyer. I know, I know. So, yeah, so I was I was very impressed with Kyle in that particular moment, for sure. Yeah, David, I find it very interesting what you what you said about like relying on reading body language, because I think it was one of the things that didn't end up making the cut. But at the Survivor after show, he was kind of talking about general rules that you would tell future players about, like, coming out here.

And you said, scheme and plot. Don't scheme and plot too much to be flexible. Exactly. I went down the list and yeah. But one of the things I told him was, you know, I came into the game thinking, I don't care about making friends. And yeah, but one of the things I told him was, you know, I came into the game thinking, I don't care about making friends. I'm very capable of lying. I can deceive and aren't ready for me.

And what I underestimated was the fact that everybody else was so capable of that, too. And just as good as I thought I was, and I felt like I was good. Other people were also very good. And there was no chance that I was going to go out there and get it right. One hundred percent of the time. And you can go back and look in survivor history and look at even people who are considered to be dominant winners of the game who played awesome games. And there are times that they are motivated based off of a bad social read

where they thought somebody was lying to them. That was not lying to them or they didn't trust something like I how many times in Kageyan does Tony sort of crash out because he thinks somebody's going against the alliance that is not going against the alliance. But he like reads too much into body language, right? It is a it is a thing that I think it's more important to exude confidence and comfortability, as Kyle does in this conversation with Joe, than it is think you have some radar for when people are lying to you.

Never once has somebody come into the game of Survivor said, I can always tell when people are lying to me, and then actually been good at it. It almost always is like you said, it's somebody on traders that's like, you know, as a police detective, you know, as a housewife who deals with liars all the time, I can tell when somebody's lying to me. And then they are just so wrong. And so I survivor and traders and all of these games are more about, I think, projecting comfort and projecting trust to the other people

so that you are not on the radar and then analyzing the actual facts and data that's in front of you and not trying to make a social read be the end all be all of your game. Why do fintechs like Float choose Visa? As a more trusted, more secure payments network, Visa provides scale, expertise, and innovative payment solutions. Learn more at visa.ca slash fintech.

Discover the exciting action of BetMGM Casino. Check out a wide variety of table games with a live dealer or enjoy over 3,000 games to choose from like Cash Eruption, UFC Gold Blitz. Make instant deposits or same-day withdrawals. Download the BetMGM Ontario app today. Visit betmgm.com for terms and conditions. 19 plus to wager, Ontario only. Please gamble responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connect Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. I love that you brought up Tony too,

because Tony actually talked about how differently he presented himself at Winners at War, and actually changed the way he stood and his stance and when he was, he wanted to make himself appear smaller. And he actually took that part of himself and changed it, because it is about how you project yourself, as opposed to what your abilities are, because people are judging you all the time with whatever you're doing when you're out there. And so however you are carrying yourself is going to really rule the day. And so I think that Tony is such a great person to bring up because he learned he definitely learned how to put himself on display in a particular way.

Survivors in information game like to me more more than it is like it is a social game, but it is not a social like I just I have a hard time finding examples of survivor history where somebody was like got their radar set off by a social read. And that's what allowed them to really swing the game. Right. It is more important to, as you said, project, like present yourself a certain way so that people trust you so that you can gather the information to make a logic based call based on the mechanics and the data that you have in front of you. Right.

And that's what Tony does so well on winners at war. It's what he does does really well in Kage on. It's what I honestly think somebody like Joe has done very well in this game on 48 is like we always see people coming to Joe every time they're trying to think about making a move. And I think that's obviously with the way that he has presented himself and the energy that he has shown the other people out on the island that make them comfortable coming to him. That is more essential than like,

whether or not he can suss out whether or not Kyle's lying because people also lie for absolutely no reason, which is like another factor is like Joe is doing the very logical thing of why is he coming to me with this information? Is it true? If it's not true, why is he making it up? Right? You're going down the line. Yeah. And sometimes there is no easy logic train that follows a player thinking people are chaotic. People do things just to do things. And I think it can be a little bit foolish to assume that there is a, you know, a path that makes sense to get to the bottom of things. And yeah, that's my thoughts on this whole situation, because like you say, we see this

whole episode sort of from Joe's perspective as he's like trying to find the truth. And it seems like he does his due diligence. He grills Shaheen. He asked the questions that you should always ask yourself in Survivor, he's very inquisitive and he still gets it wrong and makes the wrong call at the end of the day. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So just, you know, I will say it again, those of you who think you can read body language,

you can't. So the best idea is like you two just said, project your own. Remember that other people think they can read body language and will be wrong. So if you are not projecting column, if you are doing something, they are going to read your body language. I had a player who went out to the Traders Canada season one had seen my podcast and she had that in her mind about, okay, I'm not going to rely on body language. But then she was the first trader and she got caught out in some body language things. Like she was not doing enough of one thing or doing too much of another thing. And then they booted her fairly quickly. And so, you know, she remembered the first part, but then she got caught up in the second and

people were like, Oh, your eyes are watering or, you know, you're, you're shaking enough or not too much or whatever it was, you know? And so, yeah, it's, it's, you know, just something, but you have to be aware on both ends. Yeah, yeah, for sure. So, all right. Well, that is about all I have before we get to the rules, because I know we'll have a lot once we get to that point. Either of you have anything else you want to discuss before the rules?

Well, I do have a question just like not to go too deep down like this rabbit hole, because I'm sure you guys have talked about it at length. But what are what is what are the thoughts on the season here? Like, where where are we? Because I find 48 to be a very interesting case study, as Jessica has her old school survivor shirt on as a record here. It like this is giving old school vibes in a lot of ways. And it's interesting to me because a fan base that has sort of been like begging, bring back old school survivor, We want old school survivor. I've sort of had a hot take for a while. Like you don't

miss old school survivor. I promise you, you don't. You don't even like go back and watch a season that starts with a one. And they don't even show you half the people on the cast. They don't you have no idea where the votes are coming from. There's no strategy talk. It's a different show. It's focusing on location and adventure more than it is strategy, which when we do a podcast like this, right,

this is the world that exists in Survivor right now. It's talking about gameplay and strategy and social dynamics. So it's an interesting case study that finally we get this sort of old school feeling Survivor season and people don't seem to be super happy with it. And like the fact that there's not these constant shifting dynamics.

So where do you two fall in terms of 48? Have you enjoyed this season? I have. I mean, I will enjoy, you know, it's kind of like some people say about pizza, you know, even bad pizza is still. Sure. That's not true, by the way. I have found one place really really bad pizza but and and I know what some people say about Fiji pizza but the to me I mean I watch things differently than many other people do you know when I was watching those

seasons you know begin with a one and begin with a zero even, you know, essentially, if you do two digits, you know, when when you were but a young a young pup there, Sam, you know. I was writing these columns that are on the same topic as these podcasts are. So, you know, in in what a week or two, I will have been covering Survivor for 25 years. So the, the idea that these were, they were certainly different. You know, you go back and watch now they are very different, but if you're able to watch them for the strategy and pick it out and put aside everything else, you can now, yes, if you're watching today's survivor and this is what you're used to,

and then you go back and watch that, you're like, wow, this is very different. Where are the idols? Where are the other things that flip things around? Where are the players? Like you said, the main thing is that it's perplexing when you watch it. And it's like the challenge ends and they're like, all right, let's get rid of David because David was really weak in the challenge. And then somebody is like, or we could get rid of Jess because we don't like Jess. And then it's like, hmm.

And then they go to tribal and you're like, I don't know. I don't know where anybody stands on the David versus Jess thing. Like, who's with who? Who's like? And then the votes come out and it's like, oh, David went home. OK, next episode. But there's no real sort of breakdown. And like what survivor does really well now is show you the perspective, I think, of most of the players in the game and where their strategic allegiances are and the reasons

for voting people out and the long term plans. So it's a little bit easier to sort of assess the full strategy and game plan of most of the people in the game. And that really only exists for like two or three main characters in old school seasons. And similarly, 48 has been like, all right, I know what Joe and Eva are up to. I know what Kyle and Camilla are up to. I kind of know what Shaheen is up to and what he's doing. But throughout the post merge, it's been like, what's Mitch's deal? What's Star Wars? What's Mary's plan?

Like you don't know where these people are falling. I think the worst part is not asking the question because people asking the question, that's called job security, you know, for explaining why they lost. I think the worst part of it has been people, viewers, some viewers making assumptions. I haven't seen what Mitch's plan is, therefore Mitch has no plan. I haven't seen why nobody wanted to work with Mary, therefore they were stupid not to work with Mary. And in some cases, we have seen like I stupidly got into a discussion with someone on TikTok about Mary and and she was like, she was like, there was no reason for them not to work with Mary.

And I was like, well, actually, there were a bunch of reasons. And here they are. And then if you want the rest of them, we did a whole podcast about it. She's like, those are just your opinions. I'm like, no, I literally laid out the facts. And then this went back and forth until I blocked her for being stupid. But the thing is, it was just a matter of, you can't make assumptions that because we don't see it, and this is why I keep referring back, and will again, to Survivor 44, because we need to remember what happened in Survivor 44.

And I know a lot of viewers don't. A lot of your average Facebook viewers, you know, and who don't do any social media about Survivor don't remember or don't even know what really happened on 44. They may still truly believe if they even remember Jamie and Lauren, they may still truly believe Jamie and Lauren were just a couple of dummies who were, you know, sat there and did nothing all game and then got voted out, which is not at all true. Right. And so and we found that all out afterwards. And we found out some during the season when Jamie and Lauren got upset on social media. And the you know, what had actually happened, as I've talked about

is Carson and Jam Jam were actively working with them to make them feel like they were part of the real plan. And they just fooled them. And that happens on Survivor. And that I think is very similar to what is happening this season. And we'll talk, like I said, once we get to the rules, we will talk more about that because I think there are, well, I know that there are players this season who have been in the Jamie and Lauren situation. And I just think everybody needs to remember that whether you're a viewer, a fan, a podcaster, you need to remember that don't assume that just because you don't see someone like Mitch or Kyle or Shaheen doing something that they're just sitting there twiddling their thumbs. They're not. They're all doing something and you know, I've mentioned

this before that they're they're all playing their own game. Right. But if it's not part of the main storyline, we're just not going to see that game. Yeah. And I do think that that's a really important thing for viewers to remember. And I think it's something Sam and I have both lived through. When you're out there, you know everything that happened. And then when you're watching it come across your screen,

you're like, wait, they're not showing any of that? And I've mentioned on this podcast before, they removed an entire relationship of mine. I was incredibly close with Adam. Like he and I were like number ones, but then I was also with Ken. And instead they were like, we're gonna show Jessica's relationship with Ken

and not with Adam. So then at the end, when they're sitting there together, they'll be like this, oh moment. But unfortunately, they do that because they also have to tell a story. And so as viewers, you need to be mindful that it needs to be entertaining. But then we go back to this idea of Pagonging, right? Where old school survivor and this is what people did at the beginning. And that was old school survivor. That was Borneo. And that I love Borneo.

I'm like Borneo is like in my bones. It's like one of my it is my favorite season because that's where survivor came from. And that's where we learned alliances and strategy. But in a much more like. Not a rules context, right, like right? Like that was the first season. It was brand new. People were trying to figure it all out and you saw it developing.

And I think now you have so many players who are utilizing previous seasons and they're studying it and they're going back and they're trying to learn. Whereas opposed to like the beginning of Survivor, people were like, I'm going on this adventure and this will be great and fun. And they're not studying like they are now. And so you actually have those moments where people are trying to emulate players they've seen before and

they're trying to do things they've seen players do before. They're remembering what worked and what didn't work as opposed to I have to play the game based on what's happening around me, as opposed to what happened in another season. And so there's so many things that make it more difficult now to play the game of Survivor because there's so much information that players coming in have at their fingertips before they go out that they can almost be too inundated with ideas. And something David and I have talked about a lot on this podcast is you might have the best laid plans, but once you get out there, everyone has plans to right. And so your plans might not fit into what other people want to do. You might not say I've never had any plans. I don't know what you're

Yeah. So it's so there's so many components of it. And so for me, like watching 48, I can appreciate the fact that there was a strong alliance that was like, we're going to go through this game together and we're going to carry it through because I can respect that gameplay, that that idea of loyalty and that you do want to play with people and that you want to bring them all to the end. Like I can definitely get behind that. But as a viewer, yeah, it's not as exciting.

It's not as crazy and there's not all this stuff happening. But I still love it because I'm I'm OK with old school survivor. I really love old school survivor. But it is a different world for sure. And I do think that we are exposed to so much more aspects of the game now than we ever were back in the days of, you know, just print media and not social media like we have now. I think I think the interesting thing about this group and this season in particular is because I do think you're right that they are following sort of that old

school like model obviously of like we want to play with these people. But my curiosity is where the motivation for that is coming from for these players in particular, right? Because I think if you polled, right, the people that were out there, people that go on Survivor now do not have the same, I guess, moral standard for how they play the game that used to exist, right? People used to play the game legitimately saying, I hope I don't have to lie to anybody. I'm going to try to play with my friends and I'm OK with it. Like they put 18 people out there now and almost all of them are saying, I want to do whatever it takes for me to win.

And so what I find interesting is that they seem to be following and using loyalty and strength and honor as sort of the excuse for why they're doing what they're doing. But I believe that going you know, going into this episode, especially Shaheen, no better example of this than Shaheen. The hierarchy of the like, I think everybody sees themselves at the very top of the power rankings in terms of who wins at the end. And part of the reason that people are so fine with going with the status quo

is because they believe that they will win, right? Like we as a viewer have been told so much of like, oh, well, Joe wins if Joe gets to the end. That's what everybody's telling us on the screen. And we see a very interesting confessional in this episode where Shaheen says, if I sit there with Joe and Eva, I win hands down. And then Eva has a confessional later on saying, oh, makes sense for Shaheen says, if I sit there with Joe and Eva, I win hands down. And then Eva has a confessional later on saying, oh, makes sense for Shaheen to go against us. He knows he can't beat us at the end. And it's like a direct contradiction.

And Kyle is somehow very worried about sitting next to Mitch. And then you talk to Camilla, who is not worried at all about sitting next to Mitch. And, you know, when when I was playing on 47, it felt like there was a very clear idea of like, here are the people who can win. Here are the people who cannot win. I mean, it was literally laid out in your. Yeah, I mean, they literally. I mean, it was like, OK, you know, Genevieve and I can both win the game.

If we get there, Rachel is being labeled as like a non threat. But we know that Rachel can actually win if we get there. Rachel is being labeled as like a non threat, but we know that Rachel can actually win if Rachel gets there. The other people we feel good about if we're, if we're sitting next to them. And so it was this idea of like, okay, well, how do we make a move that gets us there with people who are in that group of people who can't win, right? You want to be one person's right. And me, Genevieve, Rachel all had the same idea of like, I would love to sit there without the other two of you in the game,

and that would be perfect for us. And so our strategy reflected that. And what's interesting is that I don't know where that lies with forty eighters. Like, I think Kyle thinks he can beat anybody in the game if he's there at the end. Camilla might feel that way. Joe feels that way. Eva has, you know, at least demonstrated some confidence in her game. If she gets to the end, Shaheen certainly felt that way.

So it's like you want to know why people aren't making a move. One of the other huge factors is like perception of how you're perceived, like being able to correctly perceive others, perceive you and where you're at on that totem pole. And a lot of people are gonna look delusional and one person's gonna be right at the end of the day. Yeah, I mean, a lot of this, some of this we'll get to like when we get to appendix A

talking about why people made the moves and whether it was the best move for them. But yes, you're right. I think all these people, if you're in an alliance and Shaheen says it, I have it mentioned in, I think, rule one, when we get there is Shaheen believed that not only could he beat his allies, but that they felt they could beat him, which is a perfect alliance to be. Why

would you ever want to change it? Yeah, again, this goes back to they are playing for themselves. They are not playing for our entertainment. It is entertaining, but they are playing to win the game. Yeah. Therefore, if they believe going with a solid group to the end is how they win, then that's what they're going to do. And especially you asked, you know, how did this get into the season?

I think it's just the, you know, seasons have. What's I don't know the word I'm looking for an ethos, a an overall concept. And when you put David and Joe and Eva all into a season. And you give put them in positions of power or they work their way into positions of power. Their moral viewpoint tends to be the one that at least apparently pervades the season and everyone worries about that. I think it also we've heard this from other, from players.

We heard it specifically from Shaheen in his interviews. It also doesn't help that they just saw 46 where, you know, Charlie was penalized for going against his ally. Now I would argue that Charlie was also penalized because people made random decisions on the jury, like, what are you going to do with your money? But aside from that, it, you know, it was a season where everybody kept saying, I have to turn on my number one. I was like, why? And I think a lot of them went in saying, why did they, why did they have to turn on their number one? What was the point of that? Yeah.

But also you could see it in other ways. Like we have talked about this. We keep hearing people being described as chaotic and the word chaos keeps coming up. Well, what does that mean? We kept wondering, why is this person care? Why are they saying to the core group? Chaos means not letting us get our group to the end.

Yeah, chaos is one chaos is very it's like one of those. It's similar to being like, oh, this person wins at the end. They have a great story. It's it's a reason to vote somebody out when you're like looking to justify it to the other people in the game. It's like, oh, well, we have to vote Mitch out because what a great story. I mean, everybody votes. I mean, it was it was Kyle on my season.

I was like I was never worried that Kyle would win the game if he was at the end of the end of the game. I I just didn't think he would have had like the strategic resume or the ability to really talk up his resume at final tribal. Or I would have been worried sitting next to Kyle. But Kyle's an awesome dude and has a really awesome, like really awesome story. He was out there for his family that he did, that he talked about. And so when people were looking for a reason to get rid of Kyle, they just were like, well, hey, man, you know, you can't sit next to Kyle.

None of us can sit next to Kyle. And there's a couple of moments where I'm like, really? But you know, it's what people tell themselves and it becomes like the, you know, the what, just like the renowned viewpoint is that nobody can beat Kyle because you're looking for a reason and an excuse to vote this player out. Same way it's like, Star, what reason do we have to vote out Star?

If you can't think of one, well, you know, Star's trying to cause all kinds of chaos. So like we just have you mean going against the status quo is what you. Yes. And so, yes. Yeah. Mary's eating all the coconuts. Right. Right. She's got to go because that's just she's taking all the food. It's the way you never can eat all the coke.

Like day 21. How dare you eat all the coconuts with five. Right. Left the game. Like, come on. Yes. I mean, we heard Eva's stomach grumbling, growling on that thing. I was like, oh, she's gone a day without a feast, you know. And so but but yeah, it's it's just a matter of. And I think a lot of it is you don't know what the jury is going to be voting on. You know, especially you watch previous seasons. And like I said, 46, that jury was chaos.

You had Maria voting against her tightest ally, you had Q voting on what you're doing with the money. I don't even remember what some of the other people were. And I'm not in any way suggesting Kenzie didn't deserve to win. I'm not in any way suggesting Kenzie didn't deserve to win. I'm just saying every juror can bring in their own and they just saw that. Yeah. And so Mitch does have a great story. Eva has a great story. Joe has a great story. You know, if you if you want to make it, everybody has a great story that you got gassed on the show. So yeah, exactly

because they have a great story. Exactly. You're an interesting person that has a story to tell, which is why you're on Survivor. Yes. Exactly. Yes. Shocking. Oh my gosh. There's a background here. There's a story to talk about. Yeah. All right. Well, we will have plenty more to get into. And of course, there were other things going on that I have or will be putting into my YouTube shorts at David Bloomberg TV. And so, you know, we should move along. I could already see the people saying it's 45 minutes in and they haven't gotten to the rules. Of course, I'm on a podcast.

So like we're going to be on. All right. Hey, it happens. There was there's a lot to talk about in this episode. Yeah, there is a lot. Now, I do want to mention before we get to how Shaheen did that the rules we're about to discuss come in a more colorful form. And that is as a poster. So you can go to Rob has website dot com slash YX Lost Feeds.

Scroll down to the poster, click on it and order it, and our shipping department will get one right out to you. Right. Or you can keep scrolling, or rather, and you can keep scrolling, and get the poster on a t-shirt so you can wear it everywhere, much like I am. Or you can keep scrolling, you get the checklist on a T shirt. And of course this on the back, as you will see next week, it talks about Y blank one, uh, you know, which is the reverse of the Y blank lost, uh, checklist. So, uh, again, go to rob has a website.com slash YX lost feed and get all of. Your Y blank lost needs.

Back in episode seven, Shaheen said he was in pretty good control of the tribe, and if he could maintain that control, he would win this game. That was a really big if even then. But how did he lose control? Or did he ever truly have it? In this episode, he talked about the possibility of flying too close to the sun. Is that what happened?

Or was it as Camilla said, his demise came because he fed Joe? Let's see what we could figure out as we dig in because at RHAP, we know survivor and we know why Shaheen lost. The first and most important rule is of course, to scheme and plot. And we know that Shaheen was doing this. He's been one of the most active strategists this season from the start. Right away, he had a number one in Joe. He had the California girls with Joe, who I kept forgetting

that Joe was a California girl. I love the California. And then he left the swap tribe minus one Thomas, but supposedly plus Kyle and Camilla. He said in episode seven, he was in the middle of anything, of everything, and any move would have to be made using him. He followed our Ghostbusters advice and told Dalton Ross, I'm going to be a part of whatever Alliance wants me to be a part of it.

And more importantly, in this particular season, he noted in his interviews that he never said the words honor and integrity. He was aligned with them. He, you know, joined with them. But as he added to Dalton, I know in this game, you have to backstab. And that's not all he knew. He even tried giving a lesson in tribal council after David talked about being public with his alliance. And Shaheen noted, if someone wants to take advantage of that, that is the way survivor is played. Not that David would have listened. I love that he actually acknowledged the fact that he never used the words integrity and loyalty because it is kind of a moment for him if he does make it to the final three

and someone wants to throw that in his face like, oh, well, you said that you were going to be or you were part of this group. And he could actually say, no, I never promised that I never said I was with this group. But I never I didn't utter those words. And that wasn't necessarily what I was about. I was surrounded by it. And I was with it. But I wasn't necessarily all in on the honesty and integrity. So I thought that was really incredible when he mentioned that in his exit interviews, I thought, you know what, that's fascinating because he never really, he didn't,

he wasn't someone who was like carrying that on a sign, walking around the island. So I really thought that that was such a poignant thing for him to even recognize and realize that he would be able to then make that argument if he was in the final three, which just goes to show how deeply like into the strategy he was when it came to this game, because he was thinking of all of the aspects

and not just that surface component. It was how many ways I can make this work for me even all the way down to the final three. Yep. Shaheen to me is one of the players that I was really keeping my eye on as a potential winner of the season. Because in a season that has been sort of defined by this core group, this honor and integrity group, I've enjoyed, I always love when a player has their cake and eats it too, right and Shaw Haines ability to be in this group. That's like, hey guys, we're never going to backstab each other

and then knowing that he has both the wherewithal and the relationships and you know enough ammunition to make that move if necessary. And I you know was one of the players in that majority alliance that I do feel like has the killer instinct to make that move. Positioned him in a spot that I thought was was very advantageous for him. Obviously, he sort of botched that positioning here late late in the game and didn't get across the finish line.

But certainly scheming and plotting check mark towards Shaheen and how he positioned himself in this mid-merge. Yeah, he instigated or he was part of a number of moves through the season, some of which we saw at the time, some in flashback and some not at all, quite frankly. In the moment, we saw him, you know, work on getting Chrissy out instead of Camilla, getting Star out instead of Mary,

etc. Now those were things he did as part of a group effort, but he was still in the thick of it. In flashback, we saw him helping to get David out by planting those seeds about how David had been playing, saying he had too many people in his back pocket and controlled who talked to whom. It would have been interesting if he had made it to final three with someone like Kyle to see who would have been able to truly take credit for those moves since they were group

efforts. Yeah. And Shaheen even told Mike Bloom, my gameplay surrounded building consensus so that my alliance would continue to go through. And of course, we never had to worry about how that would shake out. So in the end, it doesn't matter. What does is that Shaheen was in there making moves,

even if they weren't the moves that some in the view and the audience wanted him to make. Right, yeah. One of my big things here is I wish Shaheen would have made the final tribal council because I think it would have been just really, really interesting. The risk in what you just said and what Shaheen quoted is that when you build consensus and survivor players all have main character syndrome or they believe that they are the main character

and they believe that they are the best survivor player to ever walk the face of the earth. They give themselves credit for things that they didn't actually do, especially when they're sitting on the jury. And so it would have been interesting for Shaheen to make it to final tribal council and then tell a jury of his peers that all the moves that they believe they did were actually his doing and his like manipulation and see if that was something that got an eye roll or something that got a tip of the hat and a vote for a million dollars. Yes. Yeah.

It is always fascinating to see the response to that because there there there is something to be said about pointing at someone on the jury and saying I had to put you there because of X, Y and Z. And and seeing what their response to that is. Like, are they going to be like, oh, I was so much of a threat and that's why you had to put me over here or are they going to look at it and go, no, that actually wasn't you. That was somebody else. And now you are trying to to claim credit for it.

And and that's where some people might say it's a bit of a juror. Some people might not. It all depends on on how they're perceiving what you're saying. And can you really support the arguments that you're making? I think Shaheen would have been a very fascinating person to hear in that final three, because I do think main character syndrome that is spot on what we see happening. And I think it would have been just incredible arguments to see Shaheen put forth as to why these moves were his as opposed to anyone else's.

People go back to Ponderosa and like a little peek behind the curtain of what happens when somebody goes back to Ponderosa. Not to flex, but from what I've heard, because I wasn't actually there. Yeah, I can I can support what you're about. But people sort of pull the mask off as far as like everything that they had working in the game. And that is, of course, always from the perspective of that player who as we talked about earlier with Mitch and with all like everybody has their own game, their own reason and intentionality for doing things. And they sort of explain those things.

And so one of the risks that survivor players face is if you are relying on other people to be part of your moves, right, those people then can get voted out to go to the jury and claim those moves as being their own masterpiece, their own thing that they were working on. I know I like it was something that came back to bite me a little bit on my season when like some of the things that I had really like put in some legwork to put into play, you know, relied on some other players in the game. And so those people have taken full credit for those moves at Ponderosa. And it becomes a little bit difficult to be like,

no, everything that you heard was wrong. I was actually the one that was in charge of that move. And so I think often what a jury looks for is like, it's the reason people ask the question, what did you by yourself do, right? They're looking for something that they can attribute to you and you alone that had agency over the game. And so, you know, things like idle plays and immunity wins are obviously individual accomplishments

that people can hang their hat on. So just as we've said, like this debate coach that is Shaheen sitting at the end with a resume that was like, I did a bunch of moves that were a consensus for a majority group. How is that perceived by the jury would have been very fun. Right, which also, and not to jump ahead myself here,

which also makes this move of getting Shaheen out so clear for Kyle and Camilla that they can claim it. They can say it. They fooled Joe and Eva. Yes. Nobody else did. They did it. And some of the other things that they'll say if they make it to the end, I'm sure Shaheen will be like, no, you didn't do that. I did, you know, but this nobody else can lay claim to it. Right. Right. Now, as far as Shaheen himself, I've of course said for a while now that he was doing more

than we saw. And I even figured that he was almost certainly scheming with at least Mitch to keep him on board as they move forward. I also noted that he was almost certainly doing all he could to B.S. Mitch in terms of what the actual plans were. And it seems like that was indeed the case because he was perfectly happy to vote Mitch out here. He told Mike Bloom, building consensus with people on the bottom

requires a pretty deaf touch. It requires a connection with them that they would feel real. And you see Mitch say that in the last episode, he says, I thought that at the six, we would make a move. Well, that's my gameplay. I made him feel like if you wait, we'll make a move together. But I made a lot of people feel like that. And then of course, he added that he planned. He always planned to stay true to Joe and Eva. So it was indeed similar to the Survivor 44 situation that I mentioned earlier. And a few weeks ago of Jam Jam and Carson making Lauren and Jamie feel like they had a path

to the end when they never really did. Yeah, yeah. That was his, his handling of Mitch, I think is really quite phenomenal because to make someone feel that significant and to make them be willing to hold off and wait, like when we get to six, trust me, when we get to six, and you build that narrative in that person's brain,

so then that becomes Mitch's mantra, right? Where it's like, ooh, when we get to six. And then you even saw this episode when they're at the hammock, and Mitch is actually reminding Shaheen of that. Like you talked about us getting to the six. We're at the six.

Now it's time. And I, and you see that moment, you're like, Oh, this is really quite fascinating because Mitch really does truly believe he is with Shaheen 100%. And now's their time to actually like take the game over. And Shaheen's like, yeah, uh-huh. Sure. And then he's talking to everybody else about voting Mitch out. So a really incredible moment to see that your game is really like what the work that you're putting in the long term game is actually you're seeing that you're

seeing the effect of that long term game that Shaheen was playing. Yeah, the no moves, lack of moves in Survivor as we brought up when you have like some of these old school seasons. Steven Fishback says this all the time. I think it's just like a wonderful sort of way to summarize this. But it's often masked by like really good gameplay from those at the top, which does not come through in episodes. Right. Like if somebody is refusing to turn on a majority alliance,

when you go back and you watch Blood vs. Water and you're like, why is nobody voting out Tyson? Oh, my goodness. Why is nobody voting out, you know, Tony and winners at war? Oh, my good. It is because those people are doing such a good job in their social game, making people feel like they're more prioritized in the relationship hierarchy than they actually are. So this is something that I think Shaheen and Joe both have done a lot of work on this season with,

with, you know, Mitch as like a prime example of somebody who clearly feels like there is a path for him that we as the viewers are being told is not there. But in the moment, you know, the players from the top have done such a good job of making him feel that way. And I think Shaheen, as we saw, is was kind of the main person that was stringing Mitch along for a lot of this post merge game. Yeah, yeah. And that's why it gets, you know.

Repetitive and annoying to me, to be quite honest, when people say out there and say, they're not making moves. No, they have a plan. They're making moves. Again, their move is to wait to strike and they believe that they have the people to do it. Yeah, some of them are wrong, because in Survivor, always someone is wrong. There's only one winner.

The rest of them are all wrong in one way or another. So so but don't you want to say Mitch shouldn't have fallen for it? Well, okay. But you don't know what's been promised to him. You don't know what's going on. And quite frankly, Mitch could still win this game. We don't know. You know, so, you know, just like people were counting Kyle out, not two episodes ago. Like, oh my God, he's doing nothing. And now all of a sudden, everybody's like, oh, go Kyle. And Survivor fans are nothing if not fickle.

But what you have to remember is something else that our repeat guest, Dr. Jeremy Faust, has said a number of times, which is, these are all professionals. I would argue this season, maybe not a hundred percent true, but most of them are, most of these people know what they're doing. That they're not just coming here, okay, exclude David,

I'll just say it out loud. They're not just coming here to you know, okay, exclude David, I'll just say it out loud. You know, they're not just coming here to actually be loyal and honest and everything else. Now, you Sam just gave Joe, maybe a bit more credit than I would. I don't know how much he is truly actively manipulating people. I think Joe is being Joe. I think people are gravitating to Joe. I think that he is being Joe. I think people are gravitating to Joe. I think that he is being himself. I don't think he is as actively manipulating.

I yeah, I don't think it's like from Joe's perspective. I don't think it's what Shaheen is doing right. Shaheen is like, Hey Mitch, at six, we're going to make a move. Right. Like hang with me. I don't think Joe was doing that. Right. But I do think Joe is making Mitch feel like he's one of the boys. Like like it's like, I don't think Mitch was doing that. Right. But I do think Joe is making Mitch feel like he's one of the boys. Like, like it's like, I don't think Mitch sees, like,

the fact that there is a strong four and Mitch. Right. I think Joe and his relationship with Joe and then his one off relationship with Shaheen as well has has allowed him to feel like, oh, I'm just as close with Joe as Kyle is with Joe. And from like Joe's perspective, that's clearly not right case. But I do show, as you said, has been very like approachable and has built good relationships with people to the point where he's made somebody like Mitch feel comfortable enough with him,

where they're able to sit on the beach and Joe's able to say, you know, Mary's going to vote for me. I'm thinking about I'm thinking about tossing a vote at somebody. Yeah, it's going. Who? Yeah. And never in his brain does it register like, no, you're probably the who. Yes. Yes. OK, Joe, sure, man. Like do that. And because he feels comfortable with him. So, yes. Yeah. Yeah.

And I will say also, you know, while Joe is not we almost sound like we're talking like this is the Joe podcast. That'll be next week. One way or the other. That'll be next. Yeah. I said that I said that on Blue Sky. I said, we'll be talking about Camilla next week and a couple of people not clicking that it was the finale. We're like, wow, that's rude to say that Camilla's next week and a couple people not clicking that it was the finale were like, wow, that's rude to say

that Camilla's next week, you know, like no one way or the other, we'll be talking about all the rest. But Joe, whatever else he may be doing or not doing, he is willing to benefit from what Shaheen and the others were doing. You know, he may not have been actively fooling Mitch, but he told Mitch, we'll get down to the six and see what happens, knowing full well that in his mind, what happens

is Mitch goes. Yes. So, yeah. Yeah. Now, speaking of Joe, in addition to working with those on the bottom, Shaheen was, of course, very close to Joe, the man seemingly on top. And we knew from the start he called Joe his number one. I think we all know he's Joe's number.

He was Joe's number two to Eva. I don't think there was ever any real doubt about that. Still, Shaheen said in interviews that one thing we didn't see much of on the show was how close he and Joe really were and how they had strategic discussions every day, sometimes in the middle of the night as well. It's a little weird that they didn't show it, but I suspect they just felt it was easier to show the duo of Joe and Eva without further complicating things. There are some hints like when Eva goes off to get her her special trinket and Shaheen sees it and immediately goes and wakes Joe and all of our first inclination was

Why would he wake Joe who is Eva's tightest ally? Yeah, the reason is because he's also Shaheen's tightest ally. You know? And so, you know, and Jessica, you mentioned earlier that the edit can totally remove a close alliance. This didn't remove it, but it certainly removed a lot of the context of it. Yes.

I do want to talk about that Eva moment for just really quick too. That was something else that Shaheen kind of worked through in one of his exit interviews as to why he handled that moment the way that he did. And I really, again, this just shows the levels at which Shaheen's brain was processing this game. And I appreciated it so much because he worked through all the permutations of if I do X, then this could be the result. And so he ultimately handled that situation in a way because he was testing Eva

and wanted to see what Eva was going to do. So he would have the ability to then go to Joe and say, see, she's not being honest with us, if that's what ended up happening. And so I really loved that part of his consideration, because all of us as viewers are thinking the same thing. Why the hell are you going to Joe? Well, it makes sense that he's going to Joe,

because he knows how close Eva is with Joe, and he knows how close he is with Joe. And if he can throw Eva under the bus to Joe, and if Eva really is Joe's number one, and then there's a little bit of tension there, there's a lie that's happening, there's some dishonesty, when your whole idea is loyalty and integrity and honesty, then that only helps Shaheen. So again, it's just one more example of how deeply Shaheen was thinking about everything

he was doing in this game, even in a moment like that, when you would the common response would be, why didn't he just follow Eva? Why did he do what he did? Well, there was a reason for it. And he explained it so incredibly well at that in that interview. And I think to his credit as well, the way that he told Joe, I think it proved to be a good job by him, right? Because, you know, we know the relationship and sort of the how protective of Eva Joe is. And so there's a lot of worlds where Shaheen approaches Joe. And he's a little bit more accusatory of Eva or he's a little bit sussed out by Eva. He's a little bit uneasy. Right.

And that sets Joe off to now be like Shaheen. No, no, go get this guy out of here. Right. So he clearly approached it in a way that didn't set off any radars and red flags for Joe and also allowed him to put that like he put it in front of Joe so that if Eva was holding something and hiding something and not telling them the both of them would know together. Yes. But he approached it in a delicate enough way where it didn't make him look like he

was coming after Eva or being too accusatory. So it was a nice subtle maneuvering by him. Yeah. Yes, very much. Now, one big question, and some of this we've already addressed, but it has been why Shaheen didn't actually follow through with his promises to others and take out Joe. But like I said, we just discussed this. He truly considered Joe his number one ally, and more than that, he felt he could beat Joe at the end. So why ever make a move against him?

And so, yeah, a lot of this we already discussed that, you know, I was planning on talking about here. So basically, you know, go back and listen to that apply it to one here. But he had no reason to vote out his number one ally in a group that was loyalty based when he felt he could win and he thought that they all felt they could beat him. So in his mind, he was in a prime position. And from his perspective, I do believe he was right. It just would have been interesting to see, like we said, what would happen. But as much as he was scheming and plotting, Kyle and

Camilla outplayed him from start to finish. Yeah, it began on the swap tribe when they pretended not to be working together but got Thomas out with the idol play and great acting performance that completely fooled everyone there. After pulling that, Kyle and Camilla seemingly made new bonds with those two over that shared history moment, shared family history moment. But it wasn't long before Kyle and Camilla were ready to get rid of Shaheen and planted the idol story, and it didn't catch on the first time. And they indeed ended up working with Shaheen to get rid of

David and move forward as part of the six, the newly revised six. It was all still simmering until they brought it back to a boil this week. Shaheen never had any idea that Kyle and Camilla were trying to get him voted out days ago, weeks ago for us watching. He thought they were working in sync all this time and indeed said in interviews that he and Camilla had been working together in a secret alliance. The main problem for him was that it was clearly a secondary alliance to the one that she had with Kyle.

And the plan that was put in motion this week, which we'll dive into more in Appendix A, was, as Shaheen told Mike Bloom, an amazing move, genius lie, and really well pulled off blindside. Yeah. And this is why the secret alliances are so much fun because the fact that Camilla had a secret alliance with Shaheen and that was something that was maybe like being questioned by other players. So then when Joe was hearing this from Camilla, it just adds to the possibility that this is true.

And so that's why I just really appreciate this idea that people think they have secret alliances and but people are kind of a little sus about it. And then they hear something like, wait, that actually makes sense. So again, this is why there are so many levels to all of the gameplay that we saw this particular episode because all of these backstories and these little components we're now seeing come through and it's it's having a huge impact on the game and the decision that people are because all of these backstories and these little components were now seeing come through. And it's it's having a huge impact on the game and the decision that people are making ultimately with who's going to be voted out.

Yeah, this was my this was my big fear about Shaheen as we were starting to see this post merge unfold. We got a lot of confessionals from him about his relationship with Camilla and how he felt like I'm the relationship guy. I'm Shaheen, the guy that has Mitch. I'm Shaheen, the guy that a star. I'm Shaheen, the guy that has Camilla. We even saw, you know, him being as as you said earlier, David,

one of the key pieces in getting the vote off of Camilla when Camilla was taking some heat because it was important for him to preserve that relationship. And he's sort of talking to Kyle about like, bro, we're in the middle, like, if we keep Camilla, this is good. And I think that that ultimately was the big thing that Shaheen miscalculated here was he misjudged how close him and Camilla actually were and where Camilla's allegiance really lied that that Kyle and Camilla secret duo. really lied that that Kyle and Camilla secret duo, apparently has they've they've done a really, really good job as we've seen, keeping it under wraps from everybody. And I think Shaheen's miscalculation there, he probably felt like

he had a little bit longer of a leash than he actually did because he thought he had Camilla in his pocket here at six. Yeah, yeah. Even the people who have said, oh, well, I knew they were working together, have said, but I didn't know to what extent. Yeah. You know, they didn't know. Nobody knew they were number ones, even if you had an inkling

that they were together. Right. That's all it was. You know. Yeah. OK, well, we can move on to the second rule, which says not to scheme apply too much and to keep your scheming secret. Shaheen had some problems here that led to Kyle and Camilla in particular wanting to target him because way back in episode four. Kyle identified Shaheen as the sneakiest California girl, and we know that had a lot to do with him searching Kyle's bag

while Camilla sat there pretending she was with them. I understand Shaheen thought Kyle and Camilla weren't working together, but searching someone's bag should only be done in front of the people you absolutely 100 percent trust. Absolutely. Yes. And especially in this case, if he had found some, let's say he found an idol. That would have essentially been telling Camilla, guess what? You're next because we can't vote for cotton.

And that one point, that one decision had repercussions that literally lasted the rest of the game. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. This is sorry. This is the go. Sorry. Go ahead, Jess. I was just I was when you when you decide to do something like that. That's a big that's a big move. Searching someone's stuff.

It's not it's not fun. It feels scary. And you're like, I shouldn't be doing this. I'm not supposed to be touching someone's things. But it happens. And so if you're going to make that decision, yeah, you have to make sure the right people are around you when you do it. And if they're not, then you buy yourself or something,

because it's going to be a hard thing for you to come back from for sure. Yeah. I think we got this confessional from Shaheen where you talked about Icarus time, right? Is he flying too close to the sun? And I would make the argument, I don't think he did that in this week's strategic circuit. His whole throwing out the name to Eva, Kyle uses it as fuel of like, well, now I can turn on Shaheen. But I don't think that's really what did Shaheen in. And I think based on Shaheen's exit press, where he talked about what that conversation

actually looked like between him and Kyle, I don't believe that was Shaheen's problem, but I have been sort of watching this relationship as as the game is unfolded. And I haven't been able to get over a confessional that Kyle had about Shaheen when they got to the swap tribe. And he talked about how he was considering making a move against Shaheen, and he made up this idol fabrication. And maybe they need to keep Cedric and vote out Shaheen because. He's looking over his shoulder at Shaheen, right?

And that's a feeling I can really, really relate to from my time on the island and unfortunately unfortunately is something that doesn't go away. There are people on the island that can do something to you that breaks your trust and fair or unfair. You sort of have that looking over your shoulder, uncomfortable, walking on eggshells, feeling with them throughout the rest of the game. And so even if Shaheen says everything right to Kyle, even if he's proven his loyalty time over time over time, that feeling of this guy's sneaky, he went through my bag, this guy, this guy went through my bag and was was, you know, he was willing to cut me back then. That doesn't go away. And so, you know, an example from when I played was

when when we ended up voting out Annika at our fifth, the Fifth Tribal Council right before we got to like the merge at Tory stage of the game, there was sort of this debate. You know, Sierra and I were positioned where we could have either taken out Andy or taken out Annika and we had our pick. And, you know, I had some reasons for wanting Annika to go and Andy to stay. One of them being, you know, keeping Andy around solidified myself another round where we could always just get rid of Andy the next time.

But Annika was also somebody who I had heard a few rumors about how she was playing that made me uncomfortable. Right. It was the idea that she told Kyle and Rome on her journey that Sierra and I are running the tribe. And that information made its way back to me. The fact that she had talked at length with people about doing an all girls thing at the merge and had told Sierra about that, who had informed me that that was her intention.

And so it started to make me feel like I was not part of her long-term plans and she had found the title with me. And so I had this, you know, looking over my shoulder feeling and to this day, Annika and I have talked about it and she doesn't think she would have turned on me anytime soon in the game, but it didn't stop me from being fearful of it and wanting to get rid of that variable.

And so the flying too close to the sun that Shaheen did, the scheming too much that you brought up, David, he did weeks and weeks and weeks ago when he was searching through Kyle's bag at the merge trial or the swap trial and not anything that he did at the sanctuary. Yeah. And I think we can apply that general principle to lots of people this season. You know, people are like, why won't Mitch and Camilla work with Mary and star? And it's like, oh, you mean Mary who two weeks ago tried to get Camilla out and last week tried to get Mitch out? Gee, I can't understand why they wouldn't want to work with them. Right. And, you know, and again, yes, like you said, I think the bag search, it was, it was something

that was done and planted that. And it was an indicator of a bigger issue that overall Shaheen just seemed to be schemier. Now, it's a low bar to be schemier than Joe, Eva and David, but he was the one that Kyle and Camilla worried about. And, you know, they felt they were playing chicken with him, as they discussed this episode, because they assumed they presumed he would make a move because that's the type of guy he is, much like you presumed based on the information you had that Anika would come after you.

They thought, well, Shaheen is the type of guy he's going to make a move. Right. And even when he brought up the stuff about Eva, Kyle felt it could be a fake to catch him and, you know, cause them to make a move too soon. Right. And the funny thing is, trying wasn't even thinking that way. We talked about this. He was by this point in the game, he was in old school, take your alliance to the end mode because he felt that's what was best for him. Now he was busy cutting other allies, which contributed to it. You know, I'm, they presume there was more afoot because. Okay.

He made a plan with Mitch. He was planning to cut Mitch. He made a plan with Camilla. Kyle knew who was supposed to be in the final four and Camilla was not one of them. And so, yeah, eventually there was a plan to get, you know, for Shaheen to, I guess, get rid of Kyle and final four fire making would have been the way to do it.

But he had this, you know, much like you said with your situation with Anika, it wasn't his plan to do anything anytime immediate. But the aura of that was already out there. And it just it doesn't go away. That's what I can't emphasize enough to people is like multiple rounds can go. People can demonstrate trust over and over again. And it's honestly a sign of respect. like multiple rounds can go. People can demonstrate trust over and over again.

And it's honestly a sign of respect. Like, you know, that was my thing about with Anika that like I talked about with talk to her about after the game was like, it came from a sign of I knew you were so capable that that feeling wasn't going to go away for me. It wasn't going like. And I think this is similar with Kyle and Shaheen, right? Like even when Shaheen is doing everything possible to be like, four of us get to the end,

Kyle is still like, can't be, he's too good of a player. He's got something up his sleeve. Yeah. Well, and it's also one of those interesting components to think about, well, and if Shaheen is telling me these things and I know that he's, that he's scheming and plotting, what is he telling other people as well? And I, and you are putting all of those things together. Like I know he went through my bag.

He doesn't know that I know that he went through my bag. So he's not telling me that. So then you begin to question, well, what's he telling other people? And what is he saying to other people? So if he's making these promises to me, he must be making promises to other people. So yes, when you have that one little inkling that something is amiss and then it's confirmed by something that that person does, it never goes away. It never does because this is a game for a million dollars and people are trying to win a game for a million dollars and they are going to

do whatever they need to do. And that is going to include lying to you and being deceptive and being dishonest. So those feelings, yes, you have to listen to them because they don't go away and they can snowball. And if you are feeling it, other people could be feeling it too. And if they are, then you need to use those people to make a move against that person, because then it puts you in a better position. As we saw, if no one felt this way about Shaheen, he doesn't go home this week, right? Yeah. But because you're able to rally the other people,

you know the other people are feeling that same way. Mitch is someone who was supposed to be with Shaheen. We're coming to six, we're going to make a move. Now all of a sudden, Mitch is also voting for Shaheen. So that I think also speaks to the types of ideas people had in their head about Shaheen when this was all coming together as a plan. Yeah. There are very few things that you can be certain of in life, but you can always be sure the sun will rise each morning.

You can bet your bottom dollar that you'll always need air to breathe and water to drink. And of course, you can rest assured that with Public Mobile's 5G subscription phone plans, you'll pay the same thing every month. With all of the mysteries that life has to offer, a few certainties can really go a long way. Subscribe today for the peace of mind you've been searching for. Public Mobile. Different is calling. The Hot Honey McRisbee is so back at McDonald's.

With juicy 100% Canadian-raised seasoned chicken, shredded lettuce, crispy jalapenos, and that completely craveable hot honey sauce, it's a sweet heat repeat you don't want to miss. Get your Hot Honey McRisbee today. Available for a limited time only at McDonald's. Get your hot honey McCrispy today. Available for a limited time only at McDonald's. Samsung Vision AI televisions transform screens

into intelligent solutions from the shows that make us laugh to those that make us cry. Now, your TV knows you more than ever, whether it's reviving old memories with AI upscaling or seamless hands-free control with universal gestures. This isn't just television, it's a whole new vision. Because it isn't just about what's on, it's about who's watching. Learn more about Samsung Vision AI televisions at Samsung.com.

Spring is here and you can now get almost anything you need delivered with Uber Eats. What do we mean by almost? You can't get a well-groomed lawn delivered, but you can get chicken parmesan delivered. Sunshine? No. Some wine? Yes. Get almost almost anything delivered with Uber Eats.

Order now. Alcohol in select markets. See app for details. The other aspect that that Shaheen had, we we saw him going over every plan with Joe and then Kyle in this episode. And my initial thought was he was over scheming by discussing all of this. But then he said in interviews that he did that with Joe all the time. Now, I still think it appeared to raise Joe's suspicions.

Well, suspicion a bit even before Kyle and Camilla made their play. Cause I just don't think Joe's mind works that way in the game. He had a path forward. That was it. Why worry about all these other options? It's hard to say from that short scene, but as far as this discussion with Kyle, you know, like you said, Sam, this flying too close to the sun moment, he said that we only saw one small part. He ran through every possible option, including even the option

of Kyle voting him out. But he was trying to show Kyle that if he did that, Kyle would become the next threat and targeted. What he didn't count on was Kyle planning to vote him out without making it look like he was the one voting him out. He accidentally helped Kyle in that way. Yeah. I also want to mention before we leave this rule that while we'll discuss Shaheen's flexibility in a moment, I already brought this up somewhat that you know, Mitch and Camilla knew what was going on. And I think the other problem was Kyle and Camilla knew what Shaheen was doing with those

multiple side alliances. So that meant that they could use all that information and like tell Mitch, hey, he's been saying he's with you. He's been saying he's with you. He's planning to vote you out tonight. You were never part of his plan. And so, you know, I don't think, and again, we'll talk about this in like a minute.

I don't think that Shaheen ever expected to actually use those side relationships, but the fact that he had them and was lying to them contributed to that reputation as being the sneakiest person there. Yep. Yeah, 100%. So let's just follow that right into the third rule,

which tells players to be flexible. Sam, how do you think Shaheen did here? You know, I think he did well. I think when you look at the actual. Low of what Shaheen did in the game, right? Like you would say, maybe he was a little too rigid because he had these side alliances that he never actually ended up using. But I think that's probably a little bit too.

Of a closed minded view of his game. Yeah, I think Shaheen was perfectly willing and perfectly flexible to use those relationships. I just don't think it made sense for him in his mind based on where he was. And so while you could look back and say maybe at the final seven, Shaheen should have made a move using Mary and using Mitch. And like he could have could have struck while the iron was hot. Maybe he goes home at six anyway, because now one of the tallest poppies

just made another big move against one of the other tall poppies. And now he's the big threat that everybody obviously has to take out. So I don't think flexibility is an issue with Shaheen's game for me. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. And the same thing we were saying, you take out your shield and all of a sudden all the arrows are hitting you instead. You know. Yeah. and, you know, it gave him the opportunity, having these side alliances gave him the opportunity.

If something happened to change things up, if in his mind, let's say Joe did something even more amazing and it was clear Joe was going to win. Well, now he had the option of finding a way to take Joe out. Yeah. So the problem, I think, for him came is maybe the presumption that people wouldn't talk to each other and also not knowing Camilla was even in a stronger alliance with Kyle than she

was with him. And I do think this is where being overly flexible can hurt if you don't know who those people are truly loyal to and that the answer is that they're loyal to you. When I compared the situation to Survivor 44 with Jam Jam and Carson having apparent side alliances with Jamie and Lauren, the premise rested on Jam Jam and Carson completely fooling the other two into believing they were the true allies. Part of that was, remember in 44, we saw Jam Jam and Carolyn arguing.

We saw Carson involved in some of those arguments. And so it did not look like they were necessarily a cohesive three. It was easy to sell the idea that they were not a cohesive three. And so people didn't talk. That was not going to be the case with Camilla here for sure. And I think Mitch as well, once they got to this point, and he realized he was next to be served up on a platter. Yeah.

Yeah. All right. Well, we could go to the fourth rule, which tells players not to let their emotions control him. And this was certainly an emotional episode with letters from home and then Joe going out on the beach and everything else. But Jessica, do you think Shaheen played emotionally? No, I think what Shaheen did was he played

with other people's emotions, which I always do kind of appreciate when you see that happening in a game like this where he's recognizing what is going to affect other people and how it's going to affect other people and how it's going to affect other people. He seemed very much to be aware of the emotional response that Joe was going to have to certain things, but he misread the effect that it was going to have on the game itself, because when they had that discussion and Joe came to him, he was reading that as Joe's emotional response

to what he had just been through with the loved ones letters and with his sister, as opposed to what was happening in the game. And so I don't think that he struggled here with the emotional, like making anything as an emotional response. I think it was always very strategic and what he thought was going to further his own game. But I do think that he misread the emotional reactions that some people might have to the things that he was

doing like Mitch, where he's convincing Mitch that you're with me and we're going to make a move at six. And then suddenly that's not what's happening. Well, now Mitch is mad at Shaheen, right? And so that's going to have a reaction and there's going to be a response by Mitch. So I think that he was very like regimented in strategic gameplay thinking and the decisions he was making.

But those strategic gameplay decisions can have an emotional impact on other people. And you need to be cognizant of what impact that can have on your own game, which I think is what we ultimately saw happen to Shaheen. I also don't believe that Shaheen was was overly emotional or too emotional at all. I think if there's a thing that you can say for Shaheen, and I'm not for one doing this, but I think delusional would be a better word than illogical.

But if we were to look at his game, right, like Shaheen was not tied to Joe because he believed he just couldn't turn on Joe. He's got too much of a connection to him. He wasn't turning on Joe because he thought he could beat Joe right or wrong, correct or delusional. I, you know, we will never know because Shaheen didn't make it to the final tribal council. But I think all of the moves that he made tracked based on the logic of where he saw himself.

And, and so I don't, yeah, I don't think emotion was an issue for him. Some of his social reads could have been off. How much people valued him or were in with him might have been a little bit off at times. But I certainly think based on the standpoint that he was coming from, very logical decision-making throughout the game for a guy that, as we've talked about,

was savvy and pretty flexible in most of his strategic thinking. Yeah, I agree. I think Shaheen felt the emotion, shared emotion, saw motions. I don't think he let them interfere in his plans. And, you know, we even saw him say in this episode that just because Joe got a letter from his kids, that doesn't mean he won't go after him. Now, of course, he wasn't going after him,

but that was for strategic reasons in his mind, not emotional reasons. Right. So we hear the fifth rule, which reminds players they need to pretend to be nice and play the social game. So Sam, following up on what you said about social reads and stuff, how do you think Shaheen did in this area? Say it again. Pretend to be nice.

Play the social game. Yeah, I think this is Joe. I am sorry. I think the Shaheen's maybe best rule. I think this is the rule that you probably did the best was was pretending to be nice. And, you know, it goes to those those people on the bottom that you assumed were not part of Shaheen's plans that we know, you know, we're not part of Shaheen's plans, but his ability to sort of keep them in the fold and make them believe that he was with them by being nice to them and catering to his relationship with them,

kept him safe for a while and gave him a lot of different options. You know, I don't think this is what got him sent home at all. And I think I think it goes without saying, right, when there is an alliance of people who are built on like emotional connection and strength and loyalty, that a guy who we know is not planning to be super loyal and is very strategic and doesn't really care about like honor and integrity for him to convince that group that he is with them and has like a shared level of thinking with them is a pretty good part.

It's a pretty good testament to Shaheen's ability to play nice and make people think that he's for real. Yeah. One of the things that he talked about himself in his exit press, too, included having agency with everybody, which I think that we definitely saw that his ability to convince so many people that he was playing with them allowed him to have so much more agency in this game because they truly believed he was with them.

I mean, I I know we've already mentioned it, but to go back to Mitch, I mean, he really had a stronghold on Mitch so much so that Mitch was convinced. This is this is our time. We're at six and this is going to happen. You really do need to have some type of an ability to connect with someone in such a way to make them feel that comfortable, to make them hold off on maybe committing a particular move

because no, no, we have to wait, we have to wait until it's the right time. So that really gave him control over the game. So his social connections helped him control the pace of the game when things were going to be happening. It maybe put the brakes on a few people. So, no, no, no, we don't need to do that yet. Let's hold off.

And that's all from his ability to connect with people in a particular way and make them feel as if they were that much more close to him than they really were. Yeah, I agree with you both. He seemed to be in a great position socially. He was a friend of pretty much everyone. Whatever might have happened, if he had made it to final tribal council, I don't think a single person would have been like, I'm voting against him because I'm mad at him.

Yes. Which may happen with, you know, like Joe, for example. You know, even someone like David was mad at. Joe, not Shaheen for what happened. And I think that Shaheen had good relationships all around and worked at least some of them for that strategic advantage that you just talked about. All right. Well, the sixth rule warns against being too much of a threat. Shaheen certainly believed he was the biggest threat left in the game. We've already talked about this.

He told Mike Bloom, I thought that I had the best shot to win of the people that were remaining. And when you take out the person that is best in the game, that's the thing you're supposed to do on Survivor, right? That's how the game is supposed to go. Sorry for bringing up bad memories, Sam. You know, he's right about the last part, and it's good to see him say that even when he's out of the game. You know, that's why you don't want to be seen as the biggest threat. Yeah.

And, you know, he even recognized back in episode seven that when the big threats say they want to face each other in the end, they always decide to come after each other earlier than that, which is exactly what Kyle did here. Shaheen thought he could wait, apparently, till final four. But Kyle wasn't going to let that happen. I mean, that's why he thought they were in this game of chicken because he assumed Shaheen was thinking the same way. And certainly Camilla wasn't going to wait.

She knew she was out at five at best. And I think a big part of the reason Shaheen was okay waiting was what we've already discussed a number of times. He thought he could beat anyone at the end. So it didn't matter. I don't need to take anyone out. I can win. Right. But he didn't fully take into account that the others might worry about him either at the end or think he might do something before them. So they had to strike first. So he had his own viewpoint, but he wasn't able to necessarily put himself in their mindset.

Yeah. Mm hmm. I I will say, I don't know if Shaheen's reason for going home here is because he was perceived as the biggest threat in the game, at least from the story that we were told in the episode. Right. This seemed like a move motivated from Kyle with the idea, not that like we need to take out Shaheen, but we need to find a way to separate ourselves from Joe and Shawshank was a way of doing that. Right. Like the idea of taking out Shaheen, forcing Joe and Eva

to eat one of their own with a concoction of a story that Camilla and I make up undermined. Yeah, he used the word undermine Joe so many times, like we need to undermine Joe's game. And so I think it's interesting, like, I feel like this was a move against Joe by Kyle that he was sort of prepping himself. Right. And Camilla, too. Right. But they are preparing themselves to go up against Joe at final tribal council and trying to give themselves as much ammunition as possible to win. And he was sort of in the way of that sort of path.

And so I don't I don't know how much of this was, you were the biggest threat left in the game and other people picked up on it. Maybe that is what Kyle was able to sell Joe on, was able to sell Eva on in order to get votes on to Shaheen is that he's coming after you and he has an idol at six and Shaheen is such a big threat, we have to take him out. But Kyle's motivation felt like it was more,

how do I make Joe weaker, not how do I take out a strong, like the strongest player to me? Yeah, I'll jump a little bit ahead to appendix A here and we'll discuss it more when we get there. But I think it's a combination. I think by itself, Kyle had felt Shaheen was a threat since way back, since the bag had felt Shaheen was a threat since way back, since

the bag. Yes, he was a threat. But do you think he felt Shaheen was a threat to win or a threat to his game? To him. Yeah, exactly. Yes. He was a threat in a different way. I don't know that he felt Shaheen was a threat to win, but he was a threat to Kyle to the

end. Yeah, he was certainly a threat to Camilla making it to the end because the plan was to vote Camilla off at five. Yeah. And so, yeah, he was a threat in a in a different way. You know, there are different ways to be a threat here. And yet he. You know, it wasn't that, oh, I don't know that I can beat Shaheen in a final three scenario, it's that I don't even want to, I don't know that I get to a final three

scenario Shaheen in it. Yeah. Yeah. And that's what I think it's interesting to always think about. Like these threat levels can come in in different ways. And for Kyle and Camilla, it's this guy's a threat to us actually making it to the final three. So if we want to make it to the final three, we need to strike before he strikes

because we know that that's what Shaheen is going to do. We know that Shaheen is talking to everybody. We know that Shaheen is forming a relationship with everybody. And we have to figure out how to convince his number one, Joe, to actually go against him too. So we can find ourselves in the final three. I thought it was really interesting that one of Kyle's reasons for this move was I figured out a way for you and I to get to final three.

Like, that's what he was telling Camilla, which is such an interesting thing to to discuss with someone. It's not like, oh, I just I figured out a way to get rid of this person. It's like, no, no, no, I figured out how we're going to get to the final three. And that is what this move really boils down to. It's not so much that they didn't think that they could sit next to him in the end. It was more so like we need to get to the end. And this guy is going to be in our way because he's going to make a move on us first.

And this, again, goes back to that like secret relationship component. Kyle had all of the information because the four had been the thing, right? And Camilla is not part of that four. So he knows Camilla is out at five and Camilla knows she's out at five because she's getting this information from Kyle. So it's just a really interesting dynamic to see kind of spin through because you have so many people who are talking to each other and then sharing that information with the other person and the other person doesn't necessarily know that this information is being shared. So I just love that Kyle found himself in the center of this and figured out a way

to take all of that information and utilize it to further his game and throw everybody else off, but still not look like he was the the bad guy in the situation ultimately. So overall, yeah, certainly a threat directly to Kyle and Camilla. It's funny that everybody like everybody in the game seems to be positioning themselves to like and come and. Comfortable, more comfortable than the viewers are

sitting next to Joe and Eva. And it's like, but if everybody's comfortable sitting next to Joe and Eva, it's like, hey, Kyle and Shaheen both can't sit next to Joe and Eva at the final three. Like one of you. Right. And if Shaheen and this is, you know, I'm sure we'll get into this. But I think this is another miscalculation on his part is the idea that he makes the the conclusion comes to the conclusion during this episode while he's thinking through his options of the best option is to keep Eva because Eva next to Joe at the end makes Joe more beatable than Eva stumping for Joe as a locked in jury vote if she's on the jury.

But if Shaheen is able to come to that conclusion, Kyle is probably also able to come to that conclusion. And if and so if you think it makes sense to sit next to both Joe and Eva, both you and Kyle cannot do that. And so this is this is Kyle's using the numbers that he has with Camilla still in the game and then the extra vote and Mitch around at six to make that move before he puts himself in a dangerous spot at five. Where Camilla's losing vote. Yeah.

Okay. All right. Well, we can move to the seventh rule, which covers idols and advantages in game mechanics. And Shaheen didn't have any actual idols or trinkets himself. And indeed he told Rob he didn't spend much time searching because he didn't want any additional suspicion on him. Uh, so he stayed around camp to build relationships. Uh, now this is interesting.

I was going to bring this up earlier. I think this is also something that contributed to the old school vibe was that not many people were searching for idols. It was almost as if they didn't exist because like the only person who has one is Eva who doesn't need it. I will also say, and I've seen this kind of talked about recently with this season, why are people not searching for idols, yada yada. This is not new, by the way, the fact that there is not a merge idol. Frankly, this is one of my biggest frustrations with my season.

New era, there are no post merge idols. They don't exist. There have been two post merge idols in the entire new era of Survivor. Jake O'Kane in Survivor 45 gets a very public clue. There is an idol in the game, but there's an advantage in the game. Go find it, blah, blah, blah. And then announcement to people that there was an idol in the game. And then there's Rachel getting the idol at the auction in the, her food on 47. So it was a secret, but you had to buy the item

at the auction in order to have any chance of finding this idol. It it was a secret, but you had to buy the item at the auction in order to have any chance of finding this idol. It was not a hidden idol somewhere around camp. Those are the only two post merge idols. Every other idol that has existed post merge in the new era is a pre merge idol that has been carried over. And then an idol that was either played and re hidden. Right? Like that's what we saw in 46 is people that had, you know, Tiff brings in the Yanu Idol. Hunter brings in his idol. Both of them go home with the idol in their pocket.

Those idols get re hidden. And that's why we end up having you with an idol and Venus with an idol. Right. But there is not an example of just, you know, pre new era when it used to be each tribe has an idol and then there's going to be one hidden somewhere on the merge beach that doesn't exist. So I don't blame the 48 players for like, I bet you there's not one hidden. Right. Like, you know, it is not a this doesn't happen in the new era, unless there's a very specific circumstance that announces it to people. Which I mean, I think that's good.

It was probably a reaction to the feeling that there was too much going on very early in the new era. There were all sorts of trinkets and things being thrown around. But even I mean, even then, if you look at forty one, forty two, like there are no idols that emerge that are not pre like Mary Ann finds an idol, which is a re hidden idol in the post. And that's the one that she keeps private. Everybody else's idol is their pre merge. Yeah, I think it's it's the feeling from the pre merge

that so much is happening in the pre merge that it just carries over, you know, kind of like you talked about the view of Shaheen, you know, or other people. It's the feeling that carries over. Plus, I think on this season, the other thing that contributes to it. I wouldn't have even brought this up if Shaheen himself had not said I didn't search for an idol very much, because I think we could all agree if people are out there searching and they don't find anything unless it is a contributor to a storyline. They don't show it. They're not going to show

10 minutes of someone looking for an idol and not finding it unless it means someone catches them looking for an idol and therefore votes them out for that reason or something like that. So the fact that we don't see people looking for an idol doesn't necessarily mean anything. In this season, and especially for Shaheen, it does because he confirmed it. But you know, now the main thing related to this rule with him, of course, which we mentioned in the second rule, was him going through Kyle's bag right in front of Camilla, you know, building that huge amount of suspicion. The funny thing is he didn't even do a full job of searching because he didn't find Kyle's idol, which was hidden in his shoes. If you're going to search like that in front of everyone, or almost everyone, you need to do a thorough job.

Yeah. He said he doesn't even remember there being shoes in there. Well, I don't know if there were shoes in the bag or if there were shoes elsewhere. Like he had his bag and his shoes. If I were on Survivor, I would not put my shoes in my bag. Don't put your shoes in your bag. I mean, yeah, I'm surprised. I'm surprised Kyle even had the idol somewhere in the bag. Like, I don't know if I ever had my idol in the bag on 47.

And that includes after the idol had no power. Right. Like I still was trying to keep this decoy idol in my back pocket in the bag on 47. And that includes after the idol had no power, right? Like I still was trying to keep this decoy idol in my back pocket to potentially use at, you know, when everything hit the fan, I could like throw out a fake idol because I have the paperwork for it. Yeah.

You know, even that I didn't want sitting around in my bag. I kept it on my person 100% of the time. And especially early on at Gata, I believe I was walking around. I walked around in my socks a lot. I didn't have shoes on a lot of the time. I would walk around the island, but I always kept the idol in my sock so that it was in a spot that nobody would find it and I couldn't lose it. It couldn't pocket. It might fall out of the pocket, right? Like there's there's some danger there. It's not going to fall out of the pocket, right? Like there's there's some danger there. It's not gonna fall out of my stock. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, the, of course, while he

didn't actually have an idol Shaheen didn't have an idol related to what you just said, Kyle and Camilla's plan involved convincing Joe and Eva that he did. And, you know, Charlie brought up on the recap podcast that if Joe had said something to Shaheen, Shaheen could have said, Okay, well, search me to prove that I don't have an idol. But there are problems with this that you just mentioned, Sam, which is, okay, you can search all you want.

That doesn't necessarily mean you're going to find anything. Right? I mean, you know, I'm Jessica and your season. Well, was it your season or was it Winners at War where Adam had the crotch idol? Oh, that was winners. Oh, no, no, no, that was mine. Yes, that was yours. I know. Yeah. Yes.

You know, I'm sorry. No matter how much Joe searches Shaheen, he's not going to do a TSA pat down of his crotch. That's's not going to do a TSA pat down of his crotch. That's just not going to happen. And so, you know, you could hide it in other places. Like you said, Sam, you could hide it either. I mean, he could have made him take off his socks, I suppose, or Shaheen could have volunteered, but you could dig a hole and hide it somewhere.

It doesn't have to be anywhere on your person in your stuff. But also we later found out in the interview, Shaheen had some fake idols he had made that were in his bag. So if this whole theoretical situation had happened, he could he have said, well, look in my bag. Oh, those are fake idols. I mean, it would have been this whole situation that still would not have looked good for him.

And of course, Joe would have had to tell Shaheen for any of this to come into play, but Joe telling him would have also set him off to play an idol if he actually had one. Yeah, and I was really curious about this whole like discussion of he's got an idol and how like, is that really necessary? Is that overkill? Is that too much? But I think that they found just the right person to feed this information to because they gave it to Joe, right? And Joe responded the way that they anticipated he would. And I love that they had that read on Joe because I do think that telling someone information

like this can be very dangerous. Like, oh no, he showed me an idol. And if Joe had been a different type of player, he might've handled that information reveal a little bit differently, as opposed to having the emotional response that he did and then the paranoia setting in and then feeling like he was going to be able to figure it all out.

Because the questions he actually asked Shaheen were not great questions. He's trying to like really like put someone in there like, I need to address this with you. We need to talk about this. We need to go because he could have blown up everybody's game in that moment. I mean, Joe could have blown up Camilla. He could have blown up Kyle and he really could have just turned it into a whole thing. And he didn't because he didn't ask the questions the way that he necessarily should have.

He really confused Shaheen and then cause Shaheen to talk to everybody else about, I don't know what's going on with Joe, but he was just here saying all of these things to me. And so it was a really interesting moment to watch because I do think that if it had been presented to a different type of player, we might not have had this response about this title that doesn't actually exist. And Shaheen didn't even know was part of the story

of Shaheen. Yeah, well, speaking of that, we can move into Appendix A, which discusses players keeping their end goals in mind when voting. And when I say speaking of that, we'll get to that in a minute. But it talks about them playing, you know, keeping their end goals in mind when voting. And we talk about voting out the weak, then the strong, then the weak, then the strong.

And we are, of course, in the phase of voting out strong players, those who will threaten your chances at the end or your chance of getting to the end. And that definitely described Shaheen, especially from the viewpoint of Kyle and Camilla. We talked about the sum already. Now, the question is whether they all made the right move. I think we could easily say that Mitch definitely did, not only because he was the other choice, but also because he realized, I'm sure that Shaheen had been leading him down the garden path all this time. So then now let's look at Joe and Eva next. Rob suggested I know it all that Joe should have

just maintained the status quo and voted out Mitch because following that path would have benefited him. And but but well, what he was saying was that if Shaheen did then plan to target one of them later, he wouldn't have the numbers. But there's a few problems here. Joe doesn't really seem to think about things in that strategic fashion, even though he said he looks moves ahead. I don't think he looks moves ahead in the same way. Plus, who's to say that if Joe and Eva didn't make this move with Kyle and Camilla now, those two wouldn't have just decided to join up with Shaheen against Joe or Eva to get those numbers. You do have the I mean, you do have the idea that Eva has an idol in her pocket at five. If you just go with the status quo, you vote out Mitch.

Now you have the two of you at five. Right. So even in the worst case scenario where Kyle and Camilla were to flip and go with Mitch against you. Right. If one of you can win immunity, which, like, looks pretty good with the way Joe's going. Like you potentially have a golden ticket to four and a way of like exposing the truth. I'll say this, too, because this was a thought that I had that I was talking with Omar Zahir about earlier in the week when we were recapping the episode together.

But the real move, if Joe was a real if Joe was a season 47 player, the way the way to actually out this truth would have been to split his vote with Eva. It right. If Kyle and Camilla are splitting their votes between Mitch and Shaheen and then Mitch and Shaheen are splitting their votes between Mitch and Shaheen, you know, you and Camilla can split your votes between Mitch and Shaheen as well. That would have resulted in either a 3-3 tie in which you know Shaheen is with you and

actually voting for Mitch. But if Shaheen chooses to put his whole game on the line and make a big move against Eva, he goes home in a 3-2-1 where his vote is going on Eva in that world. So that could have been the way for Joe and Eva to see the real truth by making like a little creative vote split. But alas, you know. Yeah. I mean, I think that there are a couple other things at play here. I like that idea. I don't think it's one he ever would have thought of. But I think that one of the things that was going on was it was more about violating trust,

which is obviously a big Joe no, no. And if Shaheen had decided to turn on Eva this vote, if he played his alleged idol cleverly, then you could have a situation and I having just heard your idea, I'm not being able to process all of the math right now. But it could have happened where Eva would have been knocked out potentially. And so I think that latter part was the driving factor. Because of what Kyle told Joe regarding how Shaheen had supposedly flipped. And I think it's supported by Camilla having voted for Mitch,

which I'm sure she did to maintain the ruse that they needed a backup just in case Shaheen did indeed use the target or use the idol and target Eva with his own vote. So so in Joe's mind, I don't think he had the luxury that Rob described of proceeding with the vote against Mitch, or at least Joe didn't think that he had that luxury. Yeah, I feel like Joe's approach was very much this or that. And there was no, I mean, that creative mechanism,

thought process, you just came up with Sam is incredible, but that was not the way Joe is approaching this game. It was really like, it's either going to be this decision or that decision. Like I have to pick Kyle or Shaheen. Like who do I believe? Who do I believe in this moment? And that's it. It's not about I'm going to try to come up with a creative mechanism

by which I can be certain 100% as to who's on my side, because that's not the way Joe's mind works in this game. It is very much like loyalty, but that would have been a phenomenal thing to see, like transpire like, oh, my God, talk about a creative like vote split for sure. It's what Kyle and Camilla have done really well this season, I think, is coming up with those like creative vote splits mechanisms to ensure their safety. And like no, no better example than the California girls versus Kyle and Camilla, when, you know, they not only deploy an idol,

they also deploy Camilla's extra vote in a way that undeniably protects both of them, because Kyle has the extra vote and Kyle plays the idol. Even if they put three votes on Camilla and the California girls do them, they still have three votes going against Thomas and are both protected in the case of a rock draw and a you know, in the deadlock. And so it is things like that of figuring out. Right. Especially when you get to smaller groups like this, a small six person tribe at like the beginning of a new era season or this late in the game

when you've got six players left, right? Like, how can we really creatively manipulate these numbers to find the truth in it? And actually, this is something that we did. We were going to do. We actually ended up not using at the final eight of Survivor 47, when the consensus vote was everybody was going to vote Kyle, right? And Genevieve and I had a conversation where we were a little bit bummed that it was just going to be Kyle, but we really

couldn't do anything about it. But the one thing that frustrated us more than anything was the fact that Rachel had gone on a journey that day. And we didn't know she had come back and told us that she lost her vote, which we did not believe whatsoever. We were pretty certain that she actually had something and we just needed a way to prove it. And the one thing that a unanimous vote on Kyle does is allows Rachel to hide the fact of whether or not she voted by doing a dog pile on one person.

And so there was a lot of thought of like, how can we split this vote that requires Jeff to read so many Kyle votes, right? Like if we vote with Kyle and we put three votes on teeny right now, all of a sudden, Jeff actually has to read the five full votes that go against Kyle at the final eight. And we can verifiably prove that Rachel voted at this tribal council. And I think those are the things that like the real savvy players at this stage in the game. Like you have to be thinking about that. And they're like, there literally was Joe was talking so much about how this was so important for him

to get right and for him to identify what was true. There was a way to protect yourself from being wrong. And to your point, that's not how he's thinking about the game. He's thinking about it from a kind of vibes based more than like a mechanic based. Yeah. I mean, we're two hours in, so I don't want to do a deep dive. I still feel like there was a way if Mitch did have an idol. That Joe doing something not Mitch, sorry.

Oh, if Shaheen had an idol, yeah, that that if Joe had tried to get clever in the way you describe, Eva still could have ended up going out. Well, it depends who he believes he has and who he doesn't have. Right. And who might leak information to Shaheen. And so in order for Shaheen to play that title, if you would have to know Mitch is voting for Shaheen, right?

And if he knew Mitch was voting for Shaheen, then there's something he can do there because Shaheen only has one vote in that scenario. But if you're uncertain where Mitch lies, then you cannot do what I, you know, so there's a possibility there too that he just didn't know what Mitch was gonna do. And so that is what kept him from doing anything. Yeah, this is, what he did was the safest path

to keep him, well, to keep Eva in the game. Not the right path, but it was the safest path. Yes, you know now moving on from those two. What about the prime movers and shakers Kyle and Camilla? I think we have more to talk about for them. Obviously because they were the ones who came up with and pushed the scheme. Now to start, let's remember that they've wanted to go after Shaheen for a long time

and planted the initial seeds way back in episode seven. It took a while for those seeds to sprout, but their garden finally bore fruit. During the days leading up to this, they'd been biding their time for the right opportunity and it finally came. It wasn't just that Shaheen gave Kyle the perfect true-ish story in terms of him mentioning Eva as a potential target. I think that Kyle and Camilla would have made this move no matter what. You brought that up, Sam.

I think it did give Kyle a better way to think about it. Something he could say truthfully, you know, bury lies in the truth or bury the truth lies either way. You know, rather, it was the position and the point of the game that they were in. Specifically, I think Kyle figured out, okay, I'm in the final four Alliance. I'm not in the final four Alliance. I'm not in the final three Alliance. And so even if Shaheen didn't come at him in the game of chicken, any of the three, you know, could at that point put him into fire making with the hope that he loses. And of course, we discussed Camilla would be gone by then.

But as Kyle told Camilla when he ran up to her in the jungle after the reward, the move guaranteed them both final four and that at least one of them would get the final three. And even beyond that, as Kyle described the rest of the plan, people like Mary and Star had said Joe was running the game. But we've already mentioned this. This plan undercuts that claim because Kyle and or Camilla could say they were actually running things got Joe to turn on his close ally Shaheen and then Camilla added to us that people see Joe is Eva as this big duo in the game. But Kyle and Camilla are the duo or rather Joe and Eva are a duo that's just sitting

there her and Kyle are a duo that are working the game hard. Yes. I think as far as Kyle and Camille are concerned, and this was a fantastic move for them for all of the reasons that you've just asserted and that it gives them something to really point to that people have seen, because that's, I think, a big issue

when you are in the final three is if they don't see the moves that you're making, if other people don't know that that's what you've done, then anyone is Sam mentioned can take credit for it. Like, no, no, that was actually me. This one 100% is theirs and there's alone and they are going to be able to say that and it will come with truth because people will look around and go, oh, no, that is actually what happened. And so I think that that gives them a really great argument to make because it is something that is now going to be visual because they have seen the effect of it. And if either of them is sitting there, they will certainly

be able to point to this as a, as a big move that they created and they maintained and they made happen. Yeah, I think, you know, not only is this a great move, I think this is a winning move. I think one of Kyle and Camilla won the game in this week's episode, quite frankly. Like I would be very surprised if one of them is not the sole survivor of season 48 off of this. You know, all of the reasons that you just laid out, David, all of the reasons

that you just said, Jessica. But additionally, the other thing that we know that juries love juries love to kind of be surprised and have you like tell them something they didn't know. Right. Like they're getting all this information from the people that come come in to Ponderosa, right. They're they're slowly piecing together all of the things that happened in the game. And what this just did was it allowed Kyle or Camilla sitting at the end

to tell the jury something that they did not already know, basically holding the missing piece to what happened in the first merge and how we got to this final three. And additionally. We'll probably make Joe and Eva look a little bit stupid at the final three, which helps you as well. And like, I don't mean that in like a mean way, but let's think about people who have who have won the game in like impressive fashion at final tribal council.

Right. It's D saying, hey, Jerry, by the way, I actually Austin, Austin, you don't know this, but I did tell Julie, blah, blah, blah. And then Austin is like, oh, and right in front of the jury, it is clear Austin did not know about this very move that D did on her own. It's Maryanne revealing, I actually have this idol, which is something that will surprise you. But also, yeah, Mike, when I convinced you to play that idol on me at the final five and keep me safe, I didn't actually need you to do that. I just want like and that shows I have a little bit more information than the people sitting. Yes. And what Kyle and Camilla can do right now is wait for Joe and Eva to sit there and be like, well, we we had the numbers and we had to take out Shaheen

because he had an idol and he was coming for Eva. Well, actually, here's what really happened. Yeah. And you you demonstrate a very clear control of the game and of the two people sitting next to you. So when you look at the appendix here and you look at keep your end game in mind and make your vote count, this vote is going to count at the end. And like for the reason that you said of getting them to the end and giving them real tangible win equity, it's it's a chef's kiss move.

Like, I don't really have any notes about what they could have done differently. Yeah. And one thing that people I do want to address, because a lot of people in the moment of watching this, and maybe still now, a lot of viewers had the question, why not just go along with Shaheen's plan and Target Eva? For one thing, I'm not really sure it was a full grown plan.

I don't think Shaheen wanted to do that. Right. He said in interviews that they went over every possibility. And even if he had proposed it as an actual plan, Kyle had reason to distrust that he'd follow through as we discussed. Plus going against Eva violates the loyalty idea that we have talked about that was pervasive. And on top of that, Shaheen told Kyle, there's no point in voting Eva out

because she's not a threat to win and is a guaranteed vote for Joe on the jury. And I think Shaheen is right. You mentioned it earlier. If I were in their position, I wouldn't have a problem sitting by Eva. I don't think she's at all a threat to win at this point. Now, earlier this season, if you had asked me, I would have had a different answer. But as the season has progressed, I think if she makes it to final three, which I do believe she will, she's going to say they made it together as a group through honor and loyalty. And what the jury will hear is I got brought along by Joe.

And all of this is both a good reason to keep her and a good reason to believe Shaheen was never going to follow through with the supposed idea. Yeah. Yeah. Now, one question I saw come up a few times among viewers was why they added in the bit about Shaheen supposedly having an idol. And Jessica, you kind of brought this up a little earlier. Like, was that too much or was it perfect? I actually think it was pretty smart. about Shaheen supposedly having an idol. And Jessica, you kind of brought this up a little earlier, like was that too much or was it perfect? I actually think it was pretty smart and I think you landed in the same place

because not only for the reasons you mentioned, but it brings in Camilla as an apparent, independent, corroborating witness. Yes. It's like when the police question two different people to see, you know, they keep them separated to see how did this go down. You know, in Joe's mind, he was talking to Kyle and Camilla separately.

And oh, my God, they have the same story. It must have happened that way. They must have. It's not like they could have spoken to each other prior. And then it's also a callback to the Shaheen idol rumor they had started a while back, which would mean this makes it even worse for Shaheen in Joe's eyes because it means Shaheen had been hiding it from Joe all this time. And you know, Robin Stephen pointed out on Know It Alls that adding the idol aspect makes

it more difficult for Joe to fact check because he can't really say directly to Shaheen, hey, do you have an idol or else obviously Shaheen plays it. Now I do think with the way Joe was treating him, if Shaheen had an idol, he still might have played it with all this weirdness that was coming on there. But of course it didn't matter because the idol didn't exist. Yeah, it's a funny idea, you know, and like, this is similar to what we deployed when we were doing Operation Italy. It's this idea of you are world building is what you are doing, right? It is like people who are coming together for a plan and you have to make sure that all of your stories corroborate each other

without seeming intentionally calculated. And so you say, okay, well, and this is what we talked about, right? We spent an entire night at the sanctuary, stayed up all night with a bottle of wine in hand and we were just talking about what we could possibly do. And this was the idea, right? Okay, if I go back and I say this and I act like someone kicked my puppy and I'm all sad

and I'm like an outsider, how are people going to respond? Right? Okay, Andy, if you claim that Genevieve and I were up to something and we ran off and you think we might have an idol. What would the next reaction be, right? And who might they call? What response do we have to that to then elicit the next response that we want, which is a split vote, right?

And you factor that in. And I think that's exactly what Kyle and Camilla did here is like Kyle knew how to approach this conversation to Joe to then spark Joe having this conversation with Camilla did here is like, Kyle knew how to approach this conversation to Joe to then spark Joe having this conversation with Camilla and Camilla gave like sort of the perfect corroborating but not super calculated answer that made Joe start to think, oh, wow, hang on a lot is actually adding up here. And then he presses Shaheen and Shaheen looks a little bit weird. And next thing you know, you're working with a magical little plan that you,

you know, created out of thin air. So that it's very important is when you're thinking of like a really complicated plan and survivor, you have to think of like think of it as a world. You are building a world where this is reality to a particular person or group of people. You are trying to convince them that the reality they believe they're living in is not the actual reality. And you need to make sure that each and every variable is in line with

the new reality that you're painting. And so this is a great job of doing that by them. And it seems like Joe, who was not super quick to buy into this, only got more and more sold as the day went on because everything started to, to add up towards Shaheen being deceptive. Yeah. What they needed was a name for it. You know, you had project Italy, we can't refer to this easily as a name like project frame Shaheen, you know, or, or, you know, yeah, we got to, you you got to start naming big names.

Although I will say, you know, they hadn't seen Operation Italy. I'm sure, I'm sure in the future we will start to see people name, name big moves that they do. And as Rob and I talked about on one of my exit interviews from 47, we are fully expecting people to disgrace Operation Italy by naming their big moves that then blow up in their face and get them voted out of the game. So like Rob was saying, how many people are going to try to plot at the reward to like do Operation Italy 2.0 from now on and then just have it not work?

Probably a lot. You know, we see this overcorrection in Survivor all the time. So, yeah. All right. Well, finally, I want to follow up on something I said while discussing this appendix last week. And I had noted that a lot of people were complaining that this group, quote, isn't playing. And I pointed out, we pointed out that simply wasn't true. There were and they were and they still are all playing.

This is something I discussed a little earlier too, but they simply were not playing the way many viewers wanted them to play. We said it before, I said it before, they aren't playing for our entertainment. Here we are, just one episode later, and we're beginning to see the reason so many of them played the way they did. And it makes perfect sense. Sorry that voting Star and Mary out

seemed so boring to some viewers, but it hardly makes sense to work with people you don't trust when you have plans with others you do trust. Now, were some of those trusts broken? Absolutely. That happens in this game all the time. We talked about that earlier. But also a lot of the complaints were driven by the idea that Joe and Eva were unbeatable at the end.

They were just going to walk to the end and be handed the crown. And now we're seeing that at least from the perspectives of many of the players still there, that simply isn't the case. We won't know till next week who is right, but they're operating based on what they see and think is the best move for them, not for us. Yeah, absolutely. So that almost sounded like a conclusion, but we still have appendix B.

That was an conclusion to appendix A. Appendix B deals with the jury phase, and I think we have a very interesting situation here when it comes to the question of Eva, because we've already talked a couple of times about some reasons for not voting her out. But one that was specifically discussed was she's a guaranteed vote for Joe in the jury. And, Sam, you brought this up earlier. And Sam, you brought this up earlier. And so we have a situation where it may be ideal to keep Eva around. Just because she's not voting for Joe. Right now, survivor trivia is not my thing.

People know that. I cannot remember this having come up before. Like, OK, this vote might be close. We cannot have this person on the jury voting for him. So let's keep her here in the final three. Can either of you remember a situation like that? I don't know you on the spot. I don't think so.

I mean, I think there's always been those seasons where you might feel like you're trying to do the numbers and figure out where votes might fall, but this is so locked in. The easy example is blood versus water. San Juan del Sur specifically, where you dealt with a lot of combinations of loved ones still in the game at like the final seven. Right. And so there is that idea of, well, if you vote like these loved ones

are playing together and it's under the idea that, well, if you vote out Baylor, she's going to vote for Missy. If you vote out John, he's going to vote for Jacqueline. And so you'd like Natalie deals with that and sort of like her winter journeys. I'd rather sit next to both Missy and Baylor. But she has to weigh it like and it's actually a very similar situation, right? Because I asked this question on Wednesday when I was watching the episode. Is Joe more threatening, more threatening, better case to win with a locked in jury vote and an advocate in Eva

on the jury? Or with his resume being, I got myself and Eva to the end. Does having her there make his game look more impressive? Because that's something Natalie talks about in San Juan del Sur in regards to Missy is Missy's argument at a final three is so much stronger sitting next to Baylor than it is with Baylor voted out of the game when Missy couldn't control it. And that's ultimately why Natalie settles on idling Baylor out of the game is this idea that I can beat Missy if Baylor's out because now Missy can't say I got me and my

daughter here. And so she sacrificed this locked in jury vote for Missy in order to sort of undermine Missy's game. And I thought that was a really interesting, you know, thing to weigh for these people that are thinking about Joe right now is like, if you view Eva as Joe's daughter, that he has like locked in as a jury vote that will never turn against him. Is his argument to win the game better if it's like I told Eva that I wasn't going to turn on her. This was my number one the whole time I got here and I got her there. Does that show more dominance or is like the threat of the jury vote being there? What you know, what scares people?

I mean, yeah, that's interesting. Now, obviously, let's say let's say that it's Joe and Eva and Kyle. Right. You know, if I'm Kyle in that situation and I think Kyle would immediately think of this, I say, no, you have Eva here because I allowed you to bring. Right. We could have voted Eva out. We decided Eva was not a threat and would just be a vote for you. So it's better to have her here.

And then you leave it up to the jury, which does the jury believe at that point? You know, so it is. But yeah, that's a very interesting comparison. I would just love to see like Joe and Eva against each other in fire. Me came because then it's going to be a struggle for Joe. I mean, Joe has said I will like he's like, I will ruin my own game for her. I will destroy my own game for her something to that effect. And does he really do that?

Or does he think about his kids in that moment? You know what? No, I am. I'm sorry, Eva, but I'm going to I'm going to still try to beat you. I there would be a fascinating thing. It would. A little spoiler for my prediction. I don't think there's any way anyone puts Joe in fire making. But, you know, yeah, that would be very interesting. I also think that's like the that is the one thing about the season.

People have been given the season a bad time. Some of it's maybe unwarranted. The whole like even Kyle had that confession, like, I don't want to hurt people, even if it means like not helping like my family out. I'm like, save it, man. Like, yeah, for me, like, do you want to go out? Like one, you signed up for it. But like, and I get it can be hard when you're there.

But like you do have to remind yourself, like, where is your loyalty? Right. Like your world is to the people that are back home. And as much as you might like these people, not want to hurt these people, want to make friends like. I'm sure Joe's kids would be very would be maybe a little bit more proud of him if he like maybe backstabbed like one person and paid for college than like, then if he like did not paid for college but was like a real good guy out there. Like that's, that's my opinion.

Yeah. Fantastic. That's great. Yeah. Thanks for being so loyal. Ah, that was awesome. Yeah. The student loan.

Thank God. Yeah, I'll see if the bank who holds my loan will accept this loyalty check. Right, right, right. Now, aside from that whole discussion, right now, I do think that the players are engaged in what Shaheen described as a delicate balance of who you can get to the final three with and who you can beat in the final three. We often say here on this podcast, you can't win if you don't get to the end, which is true. Obviously, we wouldn't say it otherwise.

But you also can't win if you don't get to if you do get to the end and nobody thinks you deserve it. Now, you know, we saw an example of that last season. I'm not going to you here, Sam, but with Andy, with Andy realizing at some point having the light bulb moment like, Oh, I can get to the end, but no one is going to give me the win. Yeah, I have to do something big. And that's when he spilled his whole story to Rachel. And Rachel was like, ha, thanks for that.

Bye, Andy. Yeah. I think it's the most challenging thing in like the entire game of of everything is to correctly assess like where you're at on on everybody else's radar. And some of it is not even resume stuff. Some of it is just vibes. Like you know, like what kind of aura that you have about yourself, whether or not you're a respected individual, right?

Like those are the things that go into whether or not you have a chance to win. And it can be, sure, it can be your resume on paper, but it can also be your just, you know, if you're a little bit messy around camp, if you're lazy, if if people don't, you know, Rob, I think I said this a few times. I think it's, you know, wonderfully put. I think people, they have to be OK losing to you. They have to be OK with their season being defined by you. And, you know, like when you look in the mirror,

you have to think to yourself, is everybody going to be happy if this season is known as Sam's season? If this season is known as David's season, right? Like, you have to ask that question. And if you think the answer is yes, then you're probably in an OK spot, right? But if you... if the answer is no, you have to do something to change that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And I think, you know, right now there is in a similar way, a mix of perceptions going on, you know, Shaheen, Kyle, Camilla, all indicated people seem to some people seem to think Joe is unbeatable. But then all three also thought they could beat him. And so to make that happen, the two remaining, they need to alter those perceptions, which is part of as we discussed, what the move again, Shaheen could accomplish for it. Yeah. Yeah. So, all right. Well, we have been going for a while here, but it is

about time to wrap things up. So Sam, what are your final thoughts on Shaheen? I mean, kind of what I opened with, I mean, Shaheen, I think was a, weirdly enough, I kind of would have loved to see Shaheen on a little bit of a different season or with a little bit of a different post-emerge makeup, because I think we're only really scratching the surface of what his potential as a player could have been.

I think in terms of like the amount of chaos and like connivingness and just like nice strategy that could have been deployed, I think Shaheen was very, very capable. Certainly positioned himself in the end game with some win equity and some potential outs to get there, which is ultimately what you're looking to do as a player. And his, you know, probably fatal flaw in the game is mismanaging or misjudging his relationship with Camilla and not seeing that Kyle and Camilla were really a duo and that the iron was hot for them to strike. I truly would love to be able to sit here and say it's because he fed Joe, because that would be really easy, right?

That would be the easy thing to say. And I think a lot of the viewers were like, why did he feed Joe? And I think we were all saying the same thing. But I think it goes back to the game that Shaheen was playing and what Sam has indicated throughout this podcast is he truly was the main character in his own story. And he thought for certain, no matter who he was sitting next to, he was winning. So feeding Joe was not why he went home.

He fed Joe because he thought, it doesn't matter that I feed Joe, I'm gonna beat him in the end anyway, so I can feed whoever I want. And Joe's a good guy and I'm close to Joe. And so he deserves his letters from home. I think that Shaheen really found himself to be in a position that he wasn't necessarily in, even though he thought he was.

He did have a lot of control over the people he was playing the game with, but he failed to recognize the amount of control that some of those people had over the games that they were also playing. This is where he ultimately was outplayed by Kyle and Camilla. He did not understand the relationship that those two had. He did not understand the amount of steps that they were taking to create this Shaheen entity that didn't necessarily exist but they wanted people to believe existed. And unfortunately for Shaheen, he gave them

the little nuggets that they needed to plant those seeds and to create those stories because there is something to be said about a point that David made that you can hide the lies within the truth, right? And so the things that Shaheen was doing, they were able to capitalize on and then add to. Because if someone is necessarily revisiting or looking into what they're being told, well, there is some truth there because these things are happening. So you have more to try to sort through and pick through. And when you have two people like Camilla and Kyle up against someone like Shaheen,

who does believe he has agency, who does believe he is working with everyone, if you give any of those individuals a reason to believe that Shaheen is working against them, it's going to hurt that much more. It's going to have that much more of an effect. And it's going to allow people like Kyle and Camilla to utilize it to their benefit. So I really think that Shaheen would have been an incredible person to watch in a final three. I think his belief in himself would have been so

much fun to watch and so much just incredible dynamics to see happening between who he put on the jury and who he was sitting next to. But unfortunately, he was outplayed by Kyle and Camilla. And Shaheen, we appreciate you. I'm so glad we got to know who the bearded guy was from the, you know, you know, that was that was a great little little nugget to also learn about you, Shaheen. Thank you for keeping the beard. So we know that it was you. But you were great to watch, super incredible. And those are my thoughts on Shaheen. Yeah, the title of this episode was Icarus Time and was taken from Shaheen's confessional when he talked about the possibility of flying too close to the sun. Is that what happened to him? In some ways, yes. But it wasn't

just one trip. It was a series of flights starting way back when he made the mistake of searching Kyle's bag in front of Camilla, immediately earning Kyle's permanent distrust. On top of that, he did other things to add to the feeling that he was among the sneakiest there. He had multiple alliances that he knew he wasn't gonna move forward with,

but which more importantly, Kyle and Camilla also knew he wasn't going to be loyal to meaning you never really knew where he his loyalties were and they probably weren't to Kyle in this episode. Mitch got mad at Shaheen for taking Joe on the reward, uh, saying in what world do you feed the most competitive person here? And Jessica, as you just said, the answer was you do it in the world where Shaheen never actually planned to target Joe and indeed wanted to go to the end with Joe. Despite what Camilla said about how if Shaheen lost, it would be because he fed Joe, it was more that he showed even more of his hand in doing so, not through the actual act

itself. Shaheen believes he was voted out because he was the biggest threat to win. While this may have played a role, it wasn't the full story. Rather, it was more that he was the biggest threat for preventing Kyle and Camilla to have a chance to win. Indeed, even having the chance to get to the final three. With Shaheen there, Camilla would most likely have gone in fifth place and the other three would have almost certainly tried to get Kyle out in fourth. In order for them both to have a chance, they had

to get rid of him now. And they had to do it in a way that didn't immediately look like they had turned on Joe and Eva, but gave them ammunition for final tribal council that they could use to show they were indeed secretly controlling things and fooled Joe and Eva into falling for their plan. Back in episode seven, Shaheen said he believed he was in control of the game at that time. And if I can maintain that control, I will win this game. I noted at the time and earlier today that it was a really big if, and that certainly came true. He did have a lot of control for a solid chunk of the game, but maintaining that control would have required that nobody else realize it. You can't play people

against each other if they find out you're playing them against each other. You can't bring your specific choice of people to the end if they see what you're doing. Shaheen didn't maintain that control in part because he never fully had it. Even when he said that, Kyle and Camilla's plotting against him had already begun. He just didn't know it. And indeed, he never found out until after he was gone. He'd been seen as scheming too much ever since the swap. And his threat level just kept growing until it was the perfect

time to take him out and try to claim the spot he expected to be in. And that is why Shaheen lost. All right. So before we get to our predictions for the finale, yes, we have more to go here. We want to remind everyone that the rules we just discussed are in poster form, in t-shirt, poster on a t-shirt form and checklist on a t-shirt form.

And of course, you can get those by going to robhezwebsite.com slash yxlostfeed. And of course, you can get those by going to Rob has website dot com slash Y X lost feed. Sam, where can people find you? You've mentioned a couple of times you've had thoughts going on and and the like. Where can people find you? Well, easiest place is going to be Twitter X dotcom at Sam underscore Phelan. I'm on Instagram as well at Sam Phelan there. Also go check out chat BCC, which, you know,

our friend Rob Sestrino, Stephen Fishback, Tyson Apostol, a whole number of survivor friends are over there with me. We're talking about Survivor every week, live during the episodes and the days leading up to the episodes. So it's a little bit of a group chat. You can crash the group chat and join us over at Chappy CC. And there's links to that at Rob is a website dot com as well.

But yes, go check out the the Twitter X feed as well and get all of my thoughts on Survivor and random sports takes and whatnot. What are the speaking of random sports takes if if people are fellow fans of the White Sox and maybe there's like two of them, you know, then where that's that's a fair that's a fair. Where can people find your thoughts on that? Yeah, we'll go check out Southside Showdown dot com. Southside Showdown dot com is where I will be continuing to write

all things Chicago White Sox and handling my new responsibilities with White Sox content as an editor and a writer over there So I got a lot of written content over there on Major League Baseball and mainly White Sox focused stuff at Southside Showdown dot com I forgot to mention earlier. I had an intern back when I was at work and and this intern to mention earlier, I had an intern back when I was at work and this intern, she was really great and we were at, it was a special program where at the end of the internship you have this dinner at the governor's mansion. The governor wasn't there but we used the mansion. And at this dinner, you know, we were all dressed up and everything and she comes in wearing white socks, earrings. She had worked for me for over three months.

We talked a lot. I knew she was from the Chicago area, grew up in the Chicago area, went to the University of Illinois for her master's degree, all this stuff. And I said to her, I said, well, we're white socks. You've never mentioned it. And she said, well, I knew you were a Cubs fan. I wasn't going to mention that until the internship was over. And I will say smart intern.

Well, I went out of my way to still hire her for a permanent position even after finding that all you do have a heart. Is a kind soul. Look at that. Yeah. Oh my goodness. Oh, do you want me to talk about where they can find me too? Sure. Okay, we'll do that.

I'm at Jessica Lewis 89 on both Blue Sky and Twitter. I'm also at Jessica Lewis six, seven, eight, nine on Instagram. I basically steal most of my content for Instagram from this guy. I should say I have to this guy over there. Everything's backwards because I am not. Thank you so much, Sam, for that.

So it's everything. Yeah, I'm all over the place. But I am certainly not on social media as much as I used to be. However, David Bloomberg has just taken it by storm and he is all over the place, so much so he has a Linktree account that allows you to see all of the places that you can find all of his content. So, David, take it away. Where can they find you? As as you said, Jessica, you can find all my various accounts

at Linktree slash David Bloomberg. You could find me directly on Blue Sky where I'm at David Bloomberg. I know Sam has an account on blue sky. He doesn't use it nearly as well. It went it went dormant on me. It went dormant. People didn't people didn't take to the blue sky like I thought they might. Well, a lot of them are a lot of them are.

We just need to get, you know, you need to bring those people over. Bring them over. A lot of big brother people are moving over. A lot of them are resistant. A lot of, you people are moving over. A lot of them are resistant. A lot of, you know, there's there's kind of a war going on right now. A lot of the live updaters are already planning to be on Blue Sky and get out of, you know, the. X place. And but aside from that, you know, I have been posting at least three,

sometimes more reality TV short videos every day on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram, where I'm at David Bloomberg TV right now. They're almost all Survivor 48. I expect that will continue for about a couple of weeks, plus some from a genius game in the UK and a couple from the Amazing Race as well. And I had one, I posted on TikTok, the clip of Jessica telling her story about what she did in the jury last week that put what David did to shame. And it blew up on TikTok. So people really enjoyed that.

Over 70,000 views on TikTok for that clip right there. But in addition, I mentioned I have some clips from Genius Game. I'm also co-hosting the Trade Our Podcast coverage of that show. The episode four recap is already available wherever you get podcasts or on YouTube. All right, so.

We can move on to our predictions, and I know we're over two and a half almost two and a half minutes, two and a half hours here. Yes, we are. So yes, it is the finale. Which means the previews aren't going to tell us a damn thing. So, yeah, we saw a quick clip of Camilla apparently suggesting to Kyle that they shouldn't go to the end together. My Spidey senses immediately tingled.

I think that's an out of context clip where she's talking about what someone else is saying and just laying it to Kyle. But either way, I really don't think they're going to go through the whole game together and then turn on each other in quite that way. So let's just, you know, I just have to go with what I believe will happen. I should be making Jessica do this

and she got her prediction right, but I'll still go ahead and- I'll do it, I mean, whatever you want to do. But I think this episode gave me a lot more in terms of what at least some of the players are thinking when it comes to Joe and Eva, plus what Kyle and Camilla will say if they get to final tribal count. So we've discussed some of that already. First, unfortunately, I do think Mitch will be voted out in fifth place. I don't see how he makes it past there unless he wins immunity or I mean, but you know, who knows it's possible in this in

this season. It's possible. At Final Four, you know, if if I were betting in a casino in Las Vegas, I'd put money that Joe wins immunity. And I think he puts Kyle against Camilla, you know, something that I previously mentioned that Rob predicted earlier. I still think that'll happen as well. I think it's interesting because even if Kyle or Camilla win the final immunity challenge, and this was something I talked about earlier. Can you really put Joe in fire making? Because as much as I say, winning in fire making should not be seen by the jury as any sort of a big move.

Unfortunately, some do see it that way. Yeah. And I could see some people in this jury. Not enough. Not enough people. Sorry, Sam. Sorry, Sam. I don't know, David. Not enough. Not enough people. Sorry, Sam. Sorry, Sam. I don't know, David. It's a really big move.

I think it's. Award the million dollars to the fireman. I hate to say it to you in this way, but yeah, you know, I don't think so. And, you know, but with Joe the fireman doing it on top of his personality and on top of everything else he's done, I think it would only add, add more shine to his shining armor. So do you even want to put Joe in fire? Make it that I don't know, especially if they believe they can be. So that aside, I think we will end up with Joe, Eva, and Kyle

in the final three. And that's where I think Kyle's plan will come into play. He will point out everything he's done through the game to undercut Joe's claim that he was running things. Eva, I think is gonna be pretty much a non-factor, as I mentioned before. Joe and Kyle will fight it out. I don't think Joe will be able to out-argue

the secret lawyer. When he talks about loyalty and honesty, he's going to get pushback from the likes of David and Mary, maybe even Chrissy and Shaheen. When Kyle argues in favor of strategy, I think he'll get a positive reception from Shaheen and Chrissy and probably Mary and Starr. And I think Cedric will positive reception from Shaheen and Chrissy and probably Marion star And I think Cedric will probably side with him as well. So when it comes down with to it, I think Kyle's gonna win this game

All right Jessica Well, I think everything I agree with everything you're saying I think Mitch is gonna go out at five. Everyone's been talking about Mitch. No one wants to sit next to Mitch. I do think that there's something there that we're just not seeing, but we're hearing it a lot. So I do think I agree, Mitch is gonna go out at five.

I do think that Eva has her idol. I do think Joe's gonna win immunity. I mean, these are all like things that we can easily agree upon. I agree as well, relative to the Kyle and Camilla fire making, unfortunately, but this is where I just wanna throw a little wrench in the works.

I wanna say it's gonna be a Camilla win. And I wanna say that because there has been something about Camilla that has kind of permeated the entire season. I know Kyle has as well. Kyle has come from a different place though. Kyle has been more, he's been presented more as having more of an emotional response to certain things and struggling with this idea.

And I think it's going to be very hard for him to have to go up against Camilla in firemaking. We saw something very similar at Winners at War, right? Where there was like this relationship that we saw kind of developing throughout. And then they had to go against each other in fire making. So I just feel like we're going to see that same type of thing. But Camilla has come from more of a like,

in your face, like a little more strong, like this is the way I'm gonna be. And I wanna see that in that final tribal council for her. I want to see her be able to continue that. And that's been more of her story. She's a little bit of an underdog because she was never in that six, right? She was kind of in the six, but not really in the six.

So I think that that's going to help her story as well. So I'm gonna go with a Camilla here. That's what I think. I think I think you guys are both very, very much on it. Right. I think I think Mitch in fifth place just makes a little bit too much sense for everybody else in the game unless he wins immunity at the final five. And I do think we are due for Kyle and Camilla to make fire

against one another. And I think they make fire against one another. And whoever wins that fire making is going to win the game. That that ultimately is what I think this comes down to, what their secret duo, what this story comes down to. And David, I actually think I'm going to take that preview clip at face value. I think Camilla understands that her best chance of winning is with Kyle on the jury.

And, you know, I think if they're if she's saying that to him at the final four, you know, I'm not sure that it'll affect anything. Like, I think they both know, right. Having each other, their secret alliance member be an advocate for them that can corroborate their story on the jury rather than being next to them. Vying for jury votes is a better case scenario for each of them. Yeah, which is exactly why I think they end up in fire against one another with the winner winning.

I have been all over the Camilla win for the last three weeks or so, and I have swung over to David's side here, where I do believe it's going to be Kyle now. I this past week's episode, just the way that the Shaheen vote was sort of like told to us was through the eyes of Kyle as the driver, right? And it was another instance of this is a Kyle idea of how Kyle is going to undermine Joe at the final tribal council. And it gives Camilla more life in the game. But I just think the story of Kyle and Camilla that we've been told has been

largely through the eyes of Kyle so far this season, where I think it would be a little bit surprising to me if she was the one that ended up taking it home for the duo. How I picture it in my head is that she is like the person that helps him get there and win it for both of them. And if she's on the jury, that's certainly a good spot for her to be for Kyle to win. Sure. Okay.

All right. We have two Kyle, one Camilla, no Joe, no Eva, which if you had asked us in mid season, that would definitely not have been the right thing. Yeah. So, yeah, it'll be interesting to see how it all plays out. You know, one thing in Camilla's favor is she has an active blue sky. So, you know, so I wanted to do the entire final travel with her hood up.

She looks like she's in her little hood. Like, I just want to see her with her hood up and telling people how she ran them over with the bus and backed it up. You have to clarify, she needs her ponytail up like she needs the body she's on with the hood up so that she gets that little like weird like that football shaped head that's hilarious. It's amazing. It is great.

It is so you have no idea what you look like when you're out there and then you see yourself and you're like, Oh my God, what happened? Well, as we wrap up, I want to encourage people to check out the RJP Patron program at Rob has a website.com slash patron and get access to all the special podcasts that are put out just for patrons plus Facebook groups and discord. And do it right now because the lowest level, the $5 level is disappearing. Hurry up and get in there if that's what you want. It is disappearing. So get in there, become a patron at robhazwebsite.com slash patron.

And make sure you're subscribed to all the RHAP Survivor Podcasts by going to weknowsurvivor.com, selecting your podcast service of choice. You'll find all the great survivor content there from us, the Know-It-Alls, B&B, Club Kondo, Survivor Global, and much more. And I would like to thank everyone at RHAP for all of the incredible work that you provide, create the content, all of it. It is so impressive, not just for the editing

and the Why Blank Lost podcast and the work that you do for us, but again, for all of the delicious content that you just heard David Bloomberg speak about. Scott, Jess, Doug, thank you for the incredible work that you and the RHAP team conduct for all of that content. Thank you to Will from America for the theme song of this podcast that you hear on the audio version. It's lovely, it's catchy, we appreciate it greatly. And thank you, Sam. This has been so much fun, Sam. It's been so great having you here.

I might have set a record here too, almost three hours. Almost, Adam Klein might have the record with us, but you are very close, but it has been so much fun having you here. I'm just loving the fact that you joined us. I loved watching you and your season. And it's so nice to get another perspective from another player who's gone through this from start to finish on a full season. So thank you so much.

It's been a lovely time. Well, thank you so much for having me. I've had a great time as well. Any excuse to talk Survivor for nearly three hours. I'm in for it. So I love that. Good. Yes, let me add to that. Thank you so much, Sam. You know, this was a lot of fun. You know, we've we've talked about before my people don't know this. My son if he had made a different

choice of colleges could have been Sam's classmate in college. could have been Sam's classmate in college. It was down to two. But, you know, go, Linai, and, you know, go Cubs. Sorry, go Bears. I can at least say go Bears. Go Bears, there we go. It's all good. You could say that now that you're not, you know,

worried about any other teams that you might be. Yes, exactly. No, we're all in on the Bears this fall. That'll unite us very quickly. Yes, that Yes. Sounds like an SNL skit. Yeah. So yes, thank you. It was a lot of fun, Jessica. Thank you as always, of course, um, everyone else next week, it'll be the finale. We will need an extra day to pull everything together because we are talking about five different players. Yes. Probably watch for the podcast coming out sometime Saturday afternoon, I would guess,

unless we really need a lot of time. And then it could be a little later. But hey, you'll have a lot more time to listen before the next episode. I do want to say now, of course, I'll be mentioning it next episode. Expecting to be here. I will with Ovi for Why Blank Lost Big Brother. And then next season of Survivor will be the 10th anniversary season for Why Blank Lost. So we're looking for ways to make that even more special.

If anyone has any great ideas, let us know. But for now, we're getting prepared for the finale, and you can reach us all on various social media. So we will talk to you soon. Bye everyone. Bye! down. David and Jessica will turn it around. They'll break down the rules and they'll show you how. You blamed yourself and got voted out. This is why blank lost. This is why blank But like last