Board Thread:Survivor 43: San Andrés/@comment-26988174-20200522155832/@comment-26156957-20200522210638

Howdy Jay! I appreciate the simple questions so I hope you enjoy my response!

1. There are a couple of things that come to mind when applying learned lessons to future ORGs. The first is adopting a stronger leadership role with the people I consider my closest allies. I think I let Aaron and Abi play too passively throughout the beginning of the merge. I knew that Jim and Mackie would make a move against us eventually, but I think our fidelity towards them blinded our judgment (mine to a lesser extent) when the rest of the tribe had plans to strike against us first. I could’ve prevented Aaron from sharing his merge idol notes with Jim and Mackie while reiterating to Abi that she needed to trust me and Aaron more than anyone else since Jim and Mackie would be smart to not sit around until Final 5. Having done so, despite our poor odds as an A/A/A threesome, I think we could’ve adapted better and played with more versatility.

The other would be managing my threat level to avoid being such an easy target. This game, I owned this perception as I felt it best suited my game in the long run. Regardless of my position in the game, with every round, there was always an opportunity to alter the perception of me. Maybe if I downplayed this perception, we could’ve blindsided Mackie at the early merge instead of me relying on him early on and planning to take him out mid-merge. This threat status comes with a high-risk, high-reward tradeoff, so if Mackie does win, he clearly utilized this perception but better than me as he had more control of the entire tribe when I didn’t. Had I combined these two aspects this season, I think I could’ve had better control over my own fate and played a more dominant game.

2. For me, the most fun I’ve had during this game was at the first post-swap tribal when Rob got blindsided. When I first saw Jim and Mackie were on nuFlorencia, I was both excited and nervous since they were both such ORG legends but also potential swing votes. Furthermore, Mackie and I burned each other in a previous ORG so there was no telling if we could even work together again. On the night we swapped, Mackie revealed that Rob was shit-talking me and wanted to scoop him and Jim to blindside me or Aaron. So to prove this accusation, I approached Rob and began shading Mackie with his approval, and he immediately told Mackie everything. I found it so hilarious that my words were being circled back to me and Rob was essentially playing himself with Mackie supporting my endeavors to collaborate with him. Because of this, I forged allies I could rely on while serving Rob some much-needed comeuppance, which was the most satisfied I’ve ever felt in an ORG.

I hope to talk to you again real soon Jay!