Why ___ Lost Survivor 51 Ep 2

RHAP: We Know Survivor

The hosts break down why Survivor 51 contestant Ana was voted out in Episode 2, analyzing her gameplay through a set of strategic rules created by David Bloomberg. Jessica Lewis joins to examine Ana's

Key takeaways

• Rob attempted to vote himself out in a confessional to save Eric, completely misunderstanding the rules about self-voting and post-elimination travel logistics.
• Ana threw out multiple player names (Sharonda, Linnea, Kristen, Alexis) as decoy targets, which backfired when Alexis weaponized the gossip against her.

Main topics

• Survivor 51 Episode 2 gameplay analysis
• Ana's social game breakdown & name-throwing

Notable quotes

"I definitely played a little too hard, too quickly," and "I will always be causing chaos and mischief."

Conclusion

The episode provides a tactical breakdown of how Ana's lack of discipline in secrecy and emotional

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) If you lost Survivor and you're feeling down David and Jessica will turn it around They'll break down the rules and they'll show you how You played yourself and got voted out This is why Blank lost Speaker 1 (0:18) And this is why black lives will be This is why blind love Speaker 3 (0:33) Welcome back to the Survivor Edition of Why Blank Lost. I'm David Bloomberg, and while I always encourage players to study my rules, apparently some players don't even bother to read the official rules of the game. But I know my co-host Jessica Lewis went through everything with a fine-tooth comb before heading out to play. Speaker 2 (0:56) I did. And this is what I find so insanely shocking about this entire episode. Like, I feel like we went into like a world that never has really existed where people played this game, appearing to have no clue what it actually consists of. Rather shocking, rather shocking, because I will say they lay all of these rules out in a very, very, very long document for you to understand. entirely what you were getting yourself into. So I'm shocked. I'm shocked. I'm just shocked. Speaker 3 (1:29) Yes. And we will, of course, have some things to say about Rob in a moment. But of course, this podcast is primarily about Anna, which means we'll be talking about popcorn. Oh, wait, sorry. No, we'll compare her gameplay to a set of guiding rules for winning. I originally wrote way back after season one and have been updating ever since. We'll use 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 be found by going to robhazwebsite.com slash yxlossfeed and clicking on the link bubble for the survivor rules. Speaker 3 (2:07) But as I said, we have to address Rob first. Maybe we'll call this section, Why Rob Attempted to Lose. Speaker 2 (2:16) Oh, it's so bad. It's so bad. Speaker 3 (2:19) And I'm wearing this shirt. Now I realize audio people can't see it at all, obviously. Video people can only see the arrow. So let me just move my camera a little bit so you understand. It says, why you lost? And it points upwards. Speaker 3 (2:37) This is the shirt that both Anna and Rob should get. So now Rob didn't lose yet, but you know, we could pen pencil in, you know, almost. It's Speaker 2 (2:51) only Speaker 3 (2:51) a matter of time on Speaker 2 (2:52) that one. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Right. Speaker 3 (2:56) So I want to lay it all out because I know from comments on social media, some people are still confused as to what he was actually doing. We, of course, saw that he was in an emotional tailspin after they lost the challenge. He was missing his wife and kids and so on. So he mentioned something about writing his own name down in a confessional. Now, when I first watched it, I either missed it or I shrugged it off as a metaphor because obviously he can't do that. Right. No, he was being literal. And I'm happy the producer didn't stop him then in that confessional. I'm glad they let him attempt it because it was much more ridiculous this way. Speaker 2 (3:37) Yeah, but I'm also rather surprised that they didn't correct him in the confessional, because if there is one thing that happens in the confessionals is there is a lot of back and forth that you don't see. You only see the individual actually talking, but there are questions being posed. There are things being said about other players. There are not necessarily suggestions, but ideas of things like, have you considered this? Have you thought about that? There are times that I can remember in confessionals that I had where they might have said things to me that maybe they shouldn't have in regards to like what can and cannot be happening in the game. And they weren't anything that was part of the rules. It was something that was like, well. I was posing a question like, well, Jeff wouldn't let that happen. Jeff wouldn't do that. And I was being corrected by production that, oh, no, he would. And I was like, but you're not supposed to tell me those things like that. So like the fact that they didn't say, dude, you can't write your own name down. Like, is that really what you're thinking about doing? Like, you can't do like that's literally against the rules. And I'm I'm very surprised considering how structured the game is. And how significant the rules are that they didn't correct him there. Speaker 3 (4:59) It's not structured anymore. It's the open era. You can do anything. Anything can happen. Speaker 2 (5:04) Yeah, except write your own email. Speaker 3 (5:06) You still can't do that. You Speaker 2 (5:08) still can't do that. Speaker 3 (5:08) Break the rules. So I do wonder if the producer was like, well, he's obviously not going to do it, so I'm not going to bother saying anything. Or if they just shrugged it off and went, eh, it'll be a funny moment. I was Speaker 2 (5:24) stunned. As it was happening, Like I knew he had said that, but then it was like he was standing there like explaining it and then proceeded to make a very big R. And I was like, what is happening right now? Like, this is not. No, you've never Speaker 3 (5:41) had a Speaker 2 (5:41) survivor before? Speaker 2 (5:44) I mean, because here's the thing. In his pregame press, he talked about how he was a Survivor fan, that he had considered applying when he was much younger. But he's like, but now the more mature me, the older guy, I understand things better. I'm going to do better. I'm more controlled. So it's not like he is not, I wouldn't say he's a scholar of the game, but he's clearly watched it. He clearly has been a fan for quite some time. And everyone. who is a fan of Survivor, remembers the Christian Hubicki. debacle, right? That all of a sudden CBS was like, oh, hey, Christian, you have to vote for yourself. Speaker 3 (6:22) Well, they wouldn't have, according to the timeline, he wouldn't have seen that. Speaker 2 (6:27) Unless, Speaker 3 (6:28) unless, yes, unless they were shown. the rest of the season in pregame Ponderosa. Oh, Speaker 2 (6:35) that's fascinating. Thank you for clarifying that. Yeah, they were Speaker 3 (6:40) out there recording when that happened. Speaker 2 (6:44) Okay. Speaker 3 (6:45) Now, my theory, my own personal theory, which I have unfortunately not been able to confirm, is that they were shown it. Because otherwise, like, how did they know about the coin flip? Speaker 2 (6:59) Well, right. That's a very valid point, too. Speaker 3 (7:02) So I think that the likelihood is, in order to hype them up for playing, Speaker 3 (7:14) that they Speaker 2 (7:15) showed Speaker 3 (7:15) production showed them the end of 50 that they weren't able to see yet again Speaker 2 (7:20) interesting i have Speaker 3 (7:21) no confirmation of this but Speaker 2 (7:23) that is a very interesting way to consider they must have because yes they knew exactly what the coin flip was all about interesting well all of this is really just incredible to me. It's absolutely incredible to me. And I know that we're still talking about it and I just, and you were going to go through it and I'm not trying to cut you off. So I will let you continue your going through it and then I'll continue my commentary. Speaker 3 (7:47) Okay. So, yeah, basically the rest of what he was thinking was that the vote was going to be unanimous against Eric. So he wanted Eric to play his shot in the dark. And if that didn't hint, give Eric his idol. And then when all the votes were canceled, Rob's vote against himself would be the only one left and he'd be voted out. At least that's what he was trying to do. But there's so many things wrong with this plan. I mean, forget about what we already mentioned, that it's not allowed. Right. He seemed. to imagine that if he was voted out, he'd be headed back to his family. Thank you. No. Yeah, because you'd have gone to Ponderosa. So I guess if he didn't read the rule about not voting for himself, he obviously didn't read the one about what happens when you get voted out. Speaker 2 (8:34) But again, this is something in all of the years of Survivor, and I wouldn't call myself a scholar of Survivor, but I have watched every season. And I know that there was only one time. Oh, you're Speaker 3 (8:45) a Speaker 2 (8:45) scholar of Speaker 3 (8:46) Survivor. You're on this podcast. Speaker 2 (8:49) Well, I couldn't name all the winners from start to finish. I'll say like some people have Speaker 3 (8:54) trivia. That's trivia. That's OK. Speaker 2 (8:56) All right. Speaker 3 (8:56) Yeah. Yeah. Speaker 2 (8:57) But but I do believe that Jenna was the only player that was ever allowed to go home besides the one other individual, the snake. But didn't he get to go? Did he get to go back or something? Because the baby has been a few. Speaker 3 (9:10) So it's not common. Speaker 2 (9:12) But it usually is related to something else. Like there's a baby being born. There's a there's someone is actually potentially dying. You know, there's there's an emergency. Like I know Adam was told by production, like if you get voted out, we will send you home so that we can see your mom. So like those things do exist. But just because you're missing your family and you're sad. No, no, you continue to miss them for the entirety of the seven weeks. And it's not seven weeks anymore time that you're out there because you can't go home. Anyway, I Speaker 3 (9:42) think, yeah, I don't know what they do with the pregamers. For a while, they were flying them home when the jury came into Ponderosa. I don't know. Not the pregamers, the prejurors. I the pregamers was last season. The the. I don't know if they send them on a trip or if they just send them all home now. I don't think they send them home because Speaker 2 (10:07) then that spoils everything, right? Speaker 3 (10:10) It would. It would if you knew. But the idea is you're not, you know, their names aren't supposed to be out there yet. So, yeah, I don't know. I'm not I'm not sure. And there have been a few non-emergency situations, usually with returning players who like. either pre-negotiated it or through such a fit. Oh Speaker 2 (10:28) yeah. That's true. That Speaker 3 (10:30) production was like, fine, whatever. We'll just send you home. Speaker 3 (10:35) So, but yeah, it's not going to be for this first time guy who voted himself out. Right. Who's sad because he misses his family, Speaker 2 (10:42) which I understand you miss your family, but this is what you signed up for. Speaker 3 (10:47) Right. Now, the thing is, this all would have been easy to do for him if he had just like confided in someone like Eric. If you want to go, just tell people to vote you out. Instead, he came up with this cockamamie complicated idea. I'm still not sure why he originally told Eric he needed Eric's shot in the dark for the plan to work when he was still out in the jungle. He was like, you give me your shot in the dark and then I'll give it back to you when we get to tribal council. And Eric's like, what? Because that had nothing to do with anything. I still don't know what that was about. Yeah. Speaker 2 (11:25) And I'm curious if that was one of those those ideas where, oh, you're going to show me that you're loyal and that you're going to hand me what you have. So I know that you're going to listen to me when I tell you to do these things. Speaker 3 (11:37) Yeah, but it made no sense. No, none of it made. I'm not trying to Speaker 2 (11:41) listen. I'm trying to work through this, too, because like none of this made any sense. And also to think for a second that Eric would be like, oh, OK, so you're not going to tell me the plan, but I have to have full trust and faith in you and I have to listen to you and everything you're telling me at the time in tribal council when it's happening. Uh, no, thank you. Like, no, people don't do that in survivor either. They don't just like go, sure. I'll just completely trust you and, and blindly walk into something. I don't understand what's going on. Speaker 3 (12:12) There was also no point. Even when they got to tribal council and he told Eric, well, you play your shot in the dark. And if that doesn't work, then. Speaker 3 (12:23) Oh, wait. No, I do know why he did that. Never mind. Okay. I was going to say there was no point in having him play his shot in the dark. And literally it just occurred to me now. The reason is that way Eric doesn't get a vote. If Eric plays his shot in the dark, then there's no other vote. So the only vote that's left is Rob's vote for himself. Right. And that makes sense. Speaker 2 (12:43) But I think the reason- That finally Speaker 3 (12:44) just occurred to me right now. Speaker 2 (12:46) And I did have a question about that too, though, because, and this is one of those rules that if you play your shot in the dark and it doesn't hit, you still can have an idol played for you or play an idol. There's no, that doesn't stop. It's just your vote that's affected. Speaker 3 (13:03) See, Speaker 2 (13:03) rules, rules matter. Speaker 3 (13:05) Exactly. Speaker 3 (13:08) But again, OK, so he just overcomplicated it. He could have just told him, vote for me and I'll give you an idol. Speaker 2 (13:17) Yeah. Speaker 3 (13:18) Yep. Speaker 2 (13:20) Yeah. But Speaker 3 (13:21) of course, Eric wasn't going to believe him because it was so weird. It sounded ridiculous. It was ridiculous. And the other main reason was that Rob was completely out of the loop with the real plan that was happening. And Eric's allies needed his vote to make it happen. So, of course, he wasn't going to do that. Speaker 2 (13:41) Right. Now, all of this was just a fascinating. representation of someone who is completely clueless as to how the game of survivor is actually played. And I'm stunned that, you know, here we are season 51 and that someone would be so clueless. Like that, that to me is just what doesn't make any sense. I, I can understand players being confused early on when the game was new and things were just being developed and they were figuring things out. But now that's just. I don't know. Yeah. Speaker 3 (14:15) I Speaker 2 (14:16) don't know how you don't know that you can't do those things. Speaker 3 (14:19) I don't Speaker 2 (14:20) know. Speaker 3 (14:21) Now, I mentioned last week in our preview portion or our prediction portion that the CBS press release indicated a player would try something that's never been done before to save an ally. And I scoffed and I said, really? Come on. They're overblowing something silly. Everything's been tried. But no, he really did try something that's never been done before because there's a reason it's never been done. Speaker 2 (14:44) I can't do that. Can't. Graciousness. Speaker 3 (14:51) So one other thing I want to mention before we get to Anna and the rules is that I love how Survivor is showing players like Jelly celebrating when she found an idol and didn't have to deal with the stupid crap Survivor put into the game previously with the new era beware advantages. It's like they're telling us, look what we did. Look how happy she is. We did that. And it's like, no, she's happy that you undid things. Speaker 2 (15:17) Yes. Yes. And Rob said the same thing. He was very happy that there was no beware on his idol when he found it. She was like, I was reading for looking for fine print to make sure that this was actually just a legitimate idol. So yes, all of those things, like, thank you for giving us that back. That was, that was lovely to just have regular idols back in the game. That was great. Yes. Speaker 3 (15:37) I just think it's funny that survivor is like, congrats patting themselves on the back. Yeah. Taking away something that they never should have added. Speaker 2 (15:44) Oh no, I agree. They do that often. They do. Speaker 3 (15:51) Now, the other, well, before we get, like I said, to Anna, I know that you had something else you wanted to mention as well. Speaker 2 (15:59) Well, I'm really in a very interesting place right now with this entire cast. And it is because I don't know if we have just been inundated these past, I don't know, so many seasons at this point where there are like super duper Survivor fans, right? And we are hearing about the SuperDuper fandom and we're hearing about their knowledge of the game and they're openly sharing it with their tribe mates and talking about what this advantage might mean or where we are in the game. And I mean, we've seen it on like this reoccurring thing. There's been like this, a lot of SuperDuper fans. And I feel like this season, there's probably only two that really like jumped out at me as people that are like hardcore. Like I am, and you're one to pick. And and the girl that has and Kristen, thank you. The girl has a broken foot now. Like, Speaker 3 (16:53) I think I think there are probably a few other ones there. It's where you have the dividing line of what a, you know, super duper fan is. But yeah, I agree. Go ahead. Speaker 2 (17:04) Yeah. So I just but I feel like so maybe there might be more. Right. But for some reason. We aren't seeing even the super duper fans this season are not thrusting that upon everybody. They're not making it appear as if they are. They're not talking about it openly. It's almost like they they've determined or figured out that that's not really beneficial. If I act like I know everything about Survivor, we heard one comment about Eric and someone did say, well, Eric's a big fan and he wants to have a move. And so I'm curious if perhaps the players are starting to recognize that. openly acknowledging that you are a huge fan of survivor and that, you know, all of these things about survivor and, you know, all the people who won and, you know, all of these that they're realizing that's not a benefit. And so I just thought that that was an interesting little like side note, because this cast just seems kind of all over the place. Like it's very, I, like I, I was just, I was watching this going like, you've got. Some people that are screaming all the time, they're cutting their thumbs off. They're like, they're like, it's there. No one's voting together, but they're like, but we're still together. Even though we're not vote, we don't have to vote together to be together. And I'm just one and a half. You Speaker 3 (18:16) can't, you can't do a full thumbs up that half. Speaker 2 (18:20) Like when I heard them say that, like, we don't have to vote together to be together. I was like. What Speaker 3 (18:25) is Speaker 2 (18:25) going on? Like, and no one is upset that like that person didn't vote with them, but they're still like, well, we could still play together. Like, I know we voted differently, but we're still going to play together. And I'm going to tell you about my idol, even though we voted differently. I was just like, what is going on? Like, it just seems so unprecedented, I guess, as far as like this idea of maybe this is new era. I don't know. But I just feel like people are open Speaker 3 (18:52) era. Speaker 2 (18:53) Open era, excuse me, open era. And they really are open. That's the excuse Speaker 3 (18:56) for everything. That's the excuse for everything now. I mean, Devin said that to Brady too. Devin said, said it's the open era. We could do this. It's like, I don't care what Jeff names the era. It doesn't change how alliances work. Now, yes, they were on opposite ends of the first vote. They still seem to think they want to work together. I'm just waiting because that's obviously going to give