Big Brother 11: Why Ronnie Lost

As I’ve noted in these columns, the first three Big Brother evictees were not people I would have normally expected. Unfortunately, I cannot say the same about the fourth. That is, going in I thought Ronnie would make it further, but once he got into the game, it was pretty clear that he was like a meteorite hitting the Earth’s atmosphere – ablaze with heat and burning up quickly. It might seem obvious that Ronnie’s mistake was in scheming and plotting too much, but the obvious reasons are not always the right ones. In my interview with Ronnie, he gave me some of his own thoughts on why he was evicted. So we’ll look at what we saw and what he had to say and run it through the filter of What Big Brother 11 Houseguests Should Have Learned as we answer the question: Why did Ronnie lose?

The first rule, as Ronnie certainly knew, is to scheme and plot. And Ronnie did quite a bit of this! He almost immediately realized that the Brains could not go it alone and needed to team up with others in the house. As he told me, “I initially allied with Jessie because he is so absolutely different from myself. He brought all the physical strength that I lack. It was the best of both worlds.”

From the viewer’s perspective, it also looked like Ronnie was making alliances with the others in the house as well – the Offbeats and the Populars. Indeed, they were counting on him to save Braden when, in hindsight, it looks like he never intended to follow through with that particular promise.

Since we already know Ronnie did well in terms of the first rule, I don’t see the need to dwell on it any longer. Instead, let’s follow up immediately with the second rule, which warns against scheming and plotting too much.

I just mentioned how Ronnie promised to save Braden, even though it appears he never intended to follow through on that vow. That was his first mistake. From what I saw, there was no reason for Ronnie to make that promise knowing that he would be breaking that promise – especially when it happened so quickly. It’s one thing to play two alliances against each other, but the one doing so needs some sort of plausible deniability. Ronnie didn’t have that. It quickly became obvious who had flipped (though he had never actually been with the Braden side to begin with, so it wasn’t really “flipping”) and Ronnie painted a big target on his chest.

Even though Ronnie swore fealty to the Jessie/Natalie/Chima alliance (which at one point or another might have also included Russell and Michele), the way he handled the first eviction vote made it seem like he was completely untrustworthy. Natalie and Jessie actually showed quite a bit of game smarts when they realized that, despite the lynch mob mentality late in Ronnie’s HOH term, he really hadn’t lied to them – he had lied to the other side. But most of the houseguests were either on the other side or didn’t really care about the distinction – the appearance was that Ronnie was scheming too much.

One question that arises from this rule addresses backstabbing too soon. I’m not going to suggest that Ronnie went after Laura too soon, because she had pretty well figured him out. However, Ronnie did the opposite here – he failed to backstab soon enough. He wanted to get rid of Russell and it looked like he was going to do so, but he allowed himself to become convinced otherwise. Then Russell was the one who sent him packing just a couple weeks later. Indeed, even Ronnie himself told me, “The only real regret I could have game-wise is I should have backdoored Russ in week two.” He added that doing so could have made himself a target for Jessie, but I don’t really think that would have happened.

The third rule tells players to pretend to be nice. Despite the fact that Ronnie earned the nickname of “Rat” in the house, and further despite his exit comments to Michele, I don’t really think Ronnie had a general problem with this rule. From what we saw, he was fine in a social sense – those who called him “Rat” simply didn’t like his game play and took it personally. If anything, they were the ones not following this rule (as noted in Why Casey Lost).

However, Ronnie admitted to me that he didn’t follow the fourth rule, which says to avoid allowing your emotions to control you. Indeed, when I asked him why he lost, he listed this as the number one reason: “Ronnie lost because I let my passion for the game overstep the boundaries into my strategy and I ultimately lost because I let too many personal elements get into the game. I should have let things remain very professional.”

Both of those points, while not appearing to overlap, deal with emotions. Ronnie was so passionate about playing Big Brother that he overplayed the game, in part because, as he told me, “it was hard to counterbalance my passion and love for the game with my actual strategy.” In other words, he allowed his emotions to overcome his strategy. It’s not the way we usually see this rule violated – indeed, I can’t think of a time when it ever happened before – but there it is.

As for his statement about allowing personal elements into the game, I have to admit that I’m not entirely sure what he meant there. Yes, he and Michele had a huge falling out. And yes, he certainly had his fair share of enemies. But I don’t think either of those really led to his game demise.

One thing that certainly did was the fifth rule, which says not to be too much of a threat. After Ronnie showed himself to be a schemer – at least to half the house – they immediately believed they could not trust anything he said. As the rule notes, “if you are so untrustworthy that people don’t know which way you will vote, you may be perceived as a threat to them sticking around.” That’s certainly how Russell and some of his then-allies felt.

Of course, Russell also believed Ronnie to be a threat because he figured Ronnie would target him. And he was probably right. Unfortunately, when Ronnie had the chance to boot Russell, he chose not to do it, as we’ve already discussed. But I’m sure in Russell’s mind, the chances of that happening again were pretty slim.

The sixth rule tells players to be flexible. Among the other key points here is that players should not just align themselves with a single alliance. It seemed at first that Ronnie was following this rule, making inroads to both main groups in the house. But then, as we’ve discussed, he quickly showed his true alliance and alienated half the house. This left him with very minimal flexibility – there was no way Jeff or Jordan would ever believe him or align with him again, for example.

Ronnie at least certainly knew about the seventh rule, though. It says to trust almost nobody. While Ronnie did trust in his real allies, they didn’t do anything to backstab him. It’s clear he never really trusted Russell. As for Michele, while he did reveal some things to her and she turned those on him, that was on a personal level, not game-related (thus his anger at her), and didn’t contribute to his eviction.

So did Ronnie lose because of scheming and plotting too much? That was certainly a large contributor, but it was not the only reason. Those actions led to a failure in flexibility, which was a part of his eviction. But the overscheming was caused in part by an emotional response to playing the game. Another looming factor was Ronnie’s failure to backdoor Russell when he had the chance. We can certainly never say for sure what kind of change that would have made to the game, but I feel safe in saying that I wouldn’t have been writing “Why Ronnie Lost” this week (or last week) if he had followed through on the plan. So, ironically, a big factor in Ronnie’s eviction was not scheming and plotting enough! It’s rare that somebody is voted out for failing both the first and rules at the same time, but indeed those were the biggest reasons to explain why Ronnie lost.

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