Survivor: One World, The Big Picture, Episode 7 – Stick to Those Guns

Thus the power of initiative. Sometimes players are nervous of sticking their neck out by suggesting a name, but history shows that players are more nervous of questioning that vote. Particularly in the early part of the game, it seems that all you have to do is suggest a name for a majority to be on board with it, regardless of the reasoning.

By taking the initiative, Jay pushed the post-merge game in the direction he wanted it to go. Good for him… I'm just not sure he made the right decision. While it doesn't appear he had a particular connection with Jonas, Jonas would have worked with him. We haven't seen any specific deals made in new Salani, but I hope Jay has final three plans with a few different people. It's very much a numbers game.

Of course, the final option we have to consider is that it wasn't Jay's idea to vote off Jonas. While he almost certainly raised his name after Tribal Council, it's entirely possible that Jonas was discussed as a threat before the immunity challenge, and Jay was simply bringing up an already established plan.

Tangentially, I'm curious as to what would have happened had Colton's idol still been in the game. I suspect that new Salani would have stood strong, perhaps with Colton as their preferred target. Would they have tried to get the numbers for a split vote, to flush the idol safely? Or would they have played a guessing game, targeting the player who they think would be least likely to play the idol. Would they have gotten it right?

If Jay appeared to have no qualms about the vote, the same could not be said for Troyzan, who was rightly reluctant to vote out somebody he was so close to. While he didn't go so far as to give up one of his immunities (after all, such overt support of Jonas would destroy his standing in new Salani), he did warn Jonas of the plan. As David mentioned in his recap, South Pacific's Albert tweeted that this was jury management. Albert should know, since he used that tactic himself, but it should be noted that it backfired on Albert as the jury ended up feeling that Albert had only been interested in their votes, not in actually saving them.

If Troy shows a pattern of doing this, he might end up with the same fate, but he had a pre-existing relationship with Jonas, so warning him of the vote was a natural enough thing to do (though with Troy's knowledge of the game, I'm sure he was thinking of the jury as well). Strategically, it also made a lot of sense for Troy to keep Jonas, since Jonas was one more player in the game that he could work with, even if he was currently expendable. Jonas lived to regret voting off Bill; Troy might live to regret voting off Jonas.

What Troy did not do was come up with a viable plan to save Jonas. They made a half-hearted plan to vote off Kat which, according to Jonas, all the men agreed to. That would only have given them six votes, and Troy and Jay weren't actually committed to it anyway, if Jonas is right. They certainly didn't get on board with Jonas' suggestion of voting out Michael.

So if Troy wasn't going to help Jonas, why did he tell him? Was that his original intent? From Jonas' interview: "I get the feeling that if Michael wasn’t an issue then maybe I might not have been told I was going to go home." I'm not sure what he means by Michael being an issue, but the implication is that Troy got put on the spot and admitted to Jonas that he was being targeted. The outcome however is the same: Jonas wasn't blindsided.

In one respect, that didn't matter. He was still voted out. The main problem was that he went out swinging. I knew he knew he was doomed the moment he started stirring the pot at Tribal Council. With the probable exception of Tarzan, nobody changed their minds at Tribal Council. Even Leif (who was the second vote for Michael) was simply going along with the plan Jonas had put forward beforehand.

I doubt Jonas really expected he was going to change anybody's minds, but he was in a position where he might as well play all his cards, and that meant giving away information. He revealed his plans to vote out Michael, and he revealed the plan to vote out Kat. Suddenly, the other players have to go into damage control mode.

In this instance, I don't think it will have a long-term effect on the game. Michael will feel confident in his survival, and a concerted effort to reassure Kat should be successful. But after that display, I would caution all future Survivors to blindside former allies if at all possible.

Speaking of Leif, why did he vote with Jonas when nobody else would? Was he unaware that nobody else was voting for Michael? Or did he realize that if Jonas went, the next likely targets were the other non-Salanis, Tarzan and himself? Like Jonas, Leif might have considered a vote for Michael to be the last ditch effort to save himself.

While Jonas did not mention him as somebody he was close to, Leif was probably as close to Jonas as he was to anybody. He'd been on a tribe with him since day one, and easy-going Jonas must have shone in contrast to the abrasiveness of Colton and Tarzan. We've seen Leif apparently helping Jonas cook a few times. Was Jonas the person Leif trusted most in the game?

Leif's motivations are as mysterious to us as Jay's, so I'll leave further speculation until next week. Since Jay brought his name up alongside Jonas', and also mentioned him as somebody who does nothing around camp (which came as a surprise to me but I'm in no position to dispute it), he's definitely in a bad position. However, he's always been such a non-threat, I wouldn't be surprised if he had a stay of execution. I would be surprised if anybody took him to the finals.