Sam did good, but Rachel did too much to not win. Playing her idols and advantages at the right time, winning individual immunity challenges and playing double agent.
I’m so glad Rachel won! I think she does amazing in a returnee season especially based off of her exit interview answers. Her idol plays were excellent. The shot in the dark play was super innovative and her idol plays was, imo, one of the best there has been. She not only disguised it so well but also got everyone to sell her game to the jurors while she knew she would survive. Also, she has said she played the game she did (aka being more of a threat) because she knew she had the idol, which shows amazing strategy as she knew what she could do and couldn’t do.
Rachel deserved the win absolutely. She was marked as the top threat since before the actual merge and managed to get herself to the end and go from bottom of gata to having a well insulated option of alliances. Sam's game by comparison was losing all the power he had and then going along with the majority until someone else flipped to make a move. And then that move still didn't do what he wanted. I think the edit worked overtime to make sam look like more of a viable finalist than he was to make the finale more exciting
Tribal Council really showed why Sam should have won. He dismantled Rachel’s remarks like he already watched the last episode and knew what she was going to say. Rachel is a challenge beast, and getting advantages is not considered cheating. But strategically, she was behind Sam, even on the other end of some of Sam’s moves. He is smarter, and showed it a lot. Again, finding advantages is not something to be looked at as an easy way to the end. But Sam had none and was most voted for, out of the final 3. Sam should have won, but Rachel is fine. At least it’s not a Kenzie winning over Charlie again.
Sam had some pretty good answers in final tribal and he should of focused on how he scraped his way to the final and how he had the most votes and voted correctly every time
People are forgetting that Sam got carried strategically by Andy and Genevieve, he was almost voted out at the Kyle, sierra and Genevieve votes when he did nothing and was a sitting duck. I love Sam, but he was terrible strategically. He raised other peoples threat levels, but never did anything to lower his own.
@Kay - Once again, thanks for a season of great recaps! You're one of my favorites on bb as well... I don't always comment but I still want to say thank you! You are always appreciated! Happy holidays! 🎉🎅🎄
I’m happy Rachel won, the only other worthy winners would have been either Genevieve or Andy. Out of those 4, anyone other than Rachel winning would have been a major disappointment. I felt bad for Teeny, they may be the first person losing in fire who lost due to natural elements.
How come when a male player wins 4 immunity challenges, finds idols/advantages and plays them strategically, and has other players covering his back - he is a great player who deserves to win - but a woman is just "lucky?" Haven't we had enough of this crap?
@@owenbotelho5611 she found a clue. But how many people last season found an idol? How successful were they? Survivor 43 idol holders: Jeanine, Cody and Jesse Survivor 44 idol holders: Mathew, Brandon, Danny, Carolyn Survivor 45 idol holders: Austin, Julie, Sabiyah Survivor 46 idol holders: Jem, Hunter, Tiffany, Q I cant remember everyone off top but finding an idol has proven to be very unlucky.
if you were actually paying attention to what andy was saying, he was talking about how people dont look at players like that fondly because they lack the biggest element of survivor, the social game. he mentioned mike and ben. both of them dominated their seasons with idols and immunity wins and people dont think theyre good winners because of it. youre so old and bitter that you want to turn this into a gender debate when it never was about gender
I think Rachel definitely deserved the win here and she is 100% an amazing player, but with that being said if you actually look at her game it has a lot of pretty big holes in it, that keep it from being any higher than a low tier winning game. I think it really is a case of Rachel being a FAR better player than her winning game shows, and while yes she is 1000000% queen it doesn’t mean that her game is safe from criticism. Here’s how I would assess her game - Votes correctly in her first round but then she Doesn’t know she’s on the bottom for the entire pre merge and gets blindsided at the Anika boot, comes into the merge and is viewed as the leader of Gata despite being in the bottom and gets targeted because of it, gets saved 100% completely by luck at F12 in a spot where she can’t convince Gabe to do a move in his best interest, left out of F11, fails to save Sol at F10, has a very solid F9 and F8 where she actively builds a strong power structure around herself and is incredibly well positioned for these rounds while also taking out obvious targets, but then gets voted out if she loses F7 immunity, F6 gets voted out if she doesn’t play her idol, possibly goes out if she loses immunity at F5, solid F4. Wants to go to 5 with her women’s alliance where Caroline and Andy have said she goes out at 5 if she does. Long story short: is on the bottom for the entire game except 2 rounds, is saved completely by luck and gets benefited by luck much more than any new era winner, gets voted out every round from F7 on if she loses immunity or doesn’t have an idol. Middle merge is good but her early merge is absolutely terrible. Once again I 10000000% believe that’s she Is a much better player than her winning game shows, but I don’t understand why people are just ignoring all the flaws in her game and propping it up to be amazing when comparatively to other winners its not
I went into the episode thinking Rachel deserved to win. I went into tribal thinking Rachel deserved to win. But when I heard Sam make his case, I did a 180 and thought "if I was there, I'd vote for him". I think I just like the underdogs, which was Sam in my eyes. After the votes were read though, I accepted that Rachel was the deserving winner.
Rachel was unlucky at the merge when she when in a tribe that already together as a tribe. So Rachel was alone in the tribe vs 5 people that already together in the trible. Rachel was able to survive that unluck. That the name of the game survivor. When Rachel was in danger. Rachel always find a way to get out of the danger. That why Rachel deserve the win.
I love that the jury called out the "Rachel was just lucky" discussion during the deliberation, and that chaotic Andy got Rachel to diss Ben and Mike lmao.
The luck factor is not that she got her advantages, but how. She was literally given one on a platter at auction. The other was drawing a rock, as the game itself was ridiculously and suspiciously easy. The save by Sol is what triggered it, which Production planted to save her. Willing to bet had Sam or Kyle been in Rachels position at the tribal counsel, no advantage to Sol would have been given and they would have been booted. The way Rachel should have.
Survivor is a game show, and the producers cannot legally favor one player over another like that. There have been plenty of male players who got advantages and either used them foolishly, or overestimated their own place in the game and literally went home with an idol in their pocket - sometimes TWO idols. Rachel figured out the right time and way to use her advantages, which is a valid way to win the game. Sour grapes much?
people do that on every season… its literally part of the game and im sure rachel was not upset by it in the slightest, she even prbly did some of the same tactics 🤷
I find it hilarious that when Sam attacks her game, it's "disrespectful" but when Rachel attacks his, it's a great final tribal performance. They were both taking shots at each other and playing the game. Sam had an uphill battle and needed to poke as many holes in her game as he could.
@@ajl9772 it's disrespectful if ANYONE does it, Sam played a good game yes, but Sam was making put shots at Rachel and disparaging her game. If I was on the jury and saw that I would not vote for them
@radicalswampert7980 So you would have voted for Sue then? I'm going to assume you're not a lawyer 😆. These people are pleading their case for a million dollars. You gotta convince the jury why your game is better. Good luck doing that without saying negative things about the other people's games.
She was way too lucky. She did not hustle for all her advantages. She just lucked out. On the operation Italy episode, she should have played her block a vote advantage but did not even think of it. She was saved by Sol when she was going to be voted out. Her idol was acquired through luck. No, despite her wins, she should not have won. Best players this season were Geniveive and Sam. Then Caroline.
Anticlimactic winner of a mostly boring season. It was the George Costanza sitcom seasons of Survivor. Rachel had lots of luck in the season, if you can't acknowledge that you are being ridiculous. In Survivor, the best players don't always win.
The Producers handed her the game after the merge. They pulled her out of a guaranteed vote off and then gave her an immunity in fries. Sam was correct.
Jury is never wrong and Rachel deserved the win. That said, Sam deserved more recognition in my eyes. Rachel got A LOT of luck. Sol finding an advantage and choosing to save her, buying the auction item that happened to come with the idol clue, drawing the rock to get the block a vote. All of these were things outside of her control that without, she loses the game. Sam got himself to the end purely through game play. Good on Kyle for voting for him and giving him 2nd. I find it funny that by voting for Sam, Kyle cost Sue 25k. Guess he got the last laugh 😂.
Rachel made her own luck, she was always looking for opportunities. We can see this with her decision to not duo up with Andy since she read that being associated with him was not worth it, and when she tired to steal the rice from the challenge. Sol gave her the advantage because Rachel bonded with him, if Andy had found that advantage he probably wouldn't have given it to her. Also, if you're gonna talk about luck, Rachel also had absolute crud luck in the game, such as starting on the same tribe as Andy, or ending up in that awful Tuku tribal.
@thebumpercar1344 Plenty of people are looking for opportunities. The thing is, all 3 of the advantages she obtained weren't due to her looking for them, but getting them through chance. I doubt her bond with Sol had much to do with him giving her the safety without power. He did it to eliminate Tuku. Pretty much anyone who found it was gonna play it on her, no logical reason Andy wouldn't. There was no guaruntee anyone was ever gonna find it tho. Everyone was scared Tuku was gonna pick them off. Sam also started off on the same tribe with Andy and was able to use him as an ally that was supposedly a bad idea.
@@ajl9772 : Again, Rachel ended up being the sole non-Tuku on that tribal was bad luck, so her getting the Safety Without Power was just Sol and the universe balancing things out. If Andy or Gen had found that advantage, we don't know if they would have given it to Rachel. Also, Sam, Andy, and Sierra were lucky to be on the same team as Gen and Teeny, who were the actual ones who won that challenge. Rachel got her immunity idol because she recognized the opportunity, and managed to get the clue without anyone else finding out, even with Sol literally eyeing her food. She also managed to get the idol while Andy and most of the tribe was literally hanging out near the shelter. That was way harder than Sue's red paint idol, IMHO. Finally, Rachel recognized that giving Gen or Sam the block a vote was too dangerous, and decided to take the chance to go on the journey even if it would raise her threat level. She also had to go solve a very hard, very stressful puzzle to get the advantage. She was lucky to get drawn for it, but NOBODY else among the remaining players aside from Gen or Sam wanted to fight for it.
@thebumpercar1344 You're right, we don't know what Gen or Andy do. I guess she was really lucky one of them didn't find it 😆 You're really crediting Rachel with Sol not seeing the clue in her food? What kind of mind control did she do to do that? I'd rather have to get the idol Rachel did than the one Sue did. Sue did well to hide the evidence, but it's only a matter of time until someone finds out something was there. There is so much downtime at camp to get the idol Rachel did. She obviously felt comfortable doing it then or she could have waited for better opportunities. Everyone was sitting around talking and she knew no one could hear or see what she was doing. She recognized she should try to stop players she's targeting from getting an advantage? Good on Rachel for being the only one not dumb enough to let Sam or Gen from getting an advantage, but is that really so worthy of recognition? Seems like common sense to me. The puzzle was incredibly easy and simple. Rachel admits this. A kindergartener can do it with enough time. The countdown is stressful, so I'll credit her for getting it done in time, but I do think Sam and Gen could have gotten it done.
Yawn. Rachel didn't excite me. She was the only one that I didn't want to win, but, I knew she was going to win about 60% through. The most likable person wins, not the best players. Playing the game is a bit pointless in new era. Popularity contest now. To get an interesting season, they need to cast different. No more nice, quiet, passive people.
I was Team Rachel all along. Congratulations Rachel. You deserve it.
Sam did good, but Rachel did too much to not win. Playing her idols and advantages at the right time, winning individual immunity challenges and playing double agent.
Not practicing fire is like the people that go on Survivor and don’t know how to swim.
It would surprise you how many players don't start seriously practicing fire until the last few days.
Don't know how to swim. You mean like 2 time winner Sandra?
Some people work best on the fly.
Rachel deserved to win. On another note that, fire challenge was epic!
Rachel deserved the win IMO
What a satisfying conclusion! The fire-making challenge had me on the edge of my seat. So happy for Rachel. Thanks for the excellent recaps, Kay!
Jury is never wrong it’s weird how u think Rachel doesn’t deserve it
Yes the best player actually won this season.
I’m so glad Rachel won! I think she does amazing in a returnee season especially based off of her exit interview answers. Her idol plays were excellent. The shot in the dark play was super innovative and her idol plays was, imo, one of the best there has been. She not only disguised it so well but also got everyone to sell her game to the jurors while she knew she would survive. Also, she has said she played the game she did (aka being more of a threat) because she knew she had the idol, which shows amazing strategy as she knew what she could do and couldn’t do.
I’m glad that Rachel won and thought that she was the winner for the past several weeks. This was a good group of contestants!
Thank you Kay...Your recap was the BEST ❤❤❤❤❤
It is fair to say Rachel was "lucky", but her strategic abilities carried that luck into a win. Of the F3, Rachel was clearly the best player.
One of the most exciting seasons in a long time.
Yes it was❤
That wind...was Aysha karma
Aiysha's karma has been boomeranging on Teeny since ep 2.
😂 That was so rewarding. I was fine with Teeny until her bad attitude towards Sam came out.
I met u in bb26, stayed for survivor 47 & now excited for traitors 3!! thanks for your recaps.
Rachel deserved the win absolutely. She was marked as the top threat since before the actual merge and managed to get herself to the end and go from bottom of gata to having a well insulated option of alliances. Sam's game by comparison was losing all the power he had and then going along with the majority until someone else flipped to make a move. And then that move still didn't do what he wanted. I think the edit worked overtime to make sam look like more of a viable finalist than he was to make the finale more exciting
Tribal Council really showed why Sam should have won. He dismantled Rachel’s remarks like he already watched the last episode and knew what she was going to say. Rachel is a challenge beast, and getting advantages is not considered cheating. But strategically, she was behind Sam, even on the other end of some of Sam’s moves. He is smarter, and showed it a lot. Again, finding advantages is not something to be looked at as an easy way to the end. But Sam had none and was most voted for, out of the final 3. Sam should have won, but Rachel is fine. At least it’s not a Kenzie winning over Charlie again.
Sam had some pretty good answers in final tribal and he should of focused on how he scraped his way to the final and how he had the most votes and voted correctly every time
People are forgetting that Sam got carried strategically by Andy and Genevieve, he was almost voted out at the Kyle, sierra and Genevieve votes when he did nothing and was a sitting duck. I love Sam, but he was terrible strategically. He raised other peoples threat levels, but never did anything to lower his own.
@Kay - Once again, thanks for a season of great recaps! You're one of my favorites on bb as well...
I don't always comment but I still want to say thank you! You are always appreciated!
Happy holidays! 🎉🎅🎄
I’m happy Rachel won, the only other worthy winners would have been either Genevieve or Andy. Out of those 4, anyone other than Rachel winning would have been a major disappointment. I felt bad for Teeny, they may be the first person losing in fire who lost due to natural elements.
How come when a male player wins 4 immunity challenges, finds idols/advantages and plays them strategically, and has other players covering his back - he is a great player who deserves to win - but a woman is just "lucky?" Haven't we had enough of this crap?
An idol in fries is lucky. That does not make Rachel a bad player
Exactly! I found Sam to be a man that "thinks" he is better. I didn't think he was that great a player.
@@owenbotelho5611 she found a clue. But how many people last season found an idol? How successful were they?
Survivor 43 idol holders: Jeanine, Cody and Jesse
Survivor 44 idol holders: Mathew, Brandon, Danny, Carolyn
Survivor 45 idol holders: Austin, Julie, Sabiyah
Survivor 46 idol holders: Jem, Hunter, Tiffany, Q
I cant remember everyone off top but finding an idol has proven to be very unlucky.
Preach it!
if you were actually paying attention to what andy was saying, he was talking about how people dont look at players like that fondly because they lack the biggest element of survivor, the social game. he mentioned mike and ben. both of them dominated their seasons with idols and immunity wins and people dont think theyre good winners because of it. youre so old and bitter that you want to turn this into a gender debate when it never was about gender
I think Rachel definitely deserved the win here and she is 100% an amazing player, but with that being said if you actually look at her game it has a lot of pretty big holes in it, that keep it from being any higher than a low tier winning game. I think it really is a case of Rachel being a FAR better player than her winning game shows, and while yes she is 1000000% queen it doesn’t mean that her game is safe from criticism. Here’s how I would assess her game -
Votes correctly in her first round but then she Doesn’t know she’s on the bottom for the entire pre merge and gets blindsided at the Anika boot, comes into the merge and is viewed as the leader of Gata despite being in the bottom and gets targeted because of it, gets saved 100% completely by luck at F12 in a spot where she can’t convince Gabe to do a move in his best interest, left out of F11, fails to save Sol at F10, has a very solid F9 and F8 where she actively builds a strong power structure around herself and is incredibly well positioned for these rounds while also taking out obvious targets, but then gets voted out if she loses F7 immunity, F6 gets voted out if she doesn’t play her idol, possibly goes out if she loses immunity at F5, solid F4. Wants to go to 5 with her women’s alliance where Caroline and Andy have said she goes out at 5 if she does.
Long story short: is on the bottom for the entire game except 2 rounds, is saved completely by luck and gets benefited by luck much more than any new era winner, gets voted out every round from F7 on if she loses immunity or doesn’t have an idol. Middle merge is good but her early merge is absolutely terrible.
Once again I 10000000% believe that’s she Is a much better player than her winning game shows, but I don’t understand why people are just ignoring all the flaws in her game and propping it up to be amazing when comparatively to other winners its not
I went into the episode thinking Rachel deserved to win. I went into tribal thinking Rachel deserved to win. But when I heard Sam make his case, I did a 180 and thought "if I was there, I'd vote for him". I think I just like the underdogs, which was Sam in my eyes. After the votes were read though, I accepted that Rachel was the deserving winner.
Team Rachel all day 🎉
BTW, now that you mention it the weather was suspect, definitely seemed unfair and a bummer... I'm not a conspiracy theorist, but .... Lol😂
She won hands down💯%, best player I've seen for awhile, great job! Rachel
I think Rachel was even better than Dee. It also helps that Rachel is also a kind person.
Oh yes much better than Dee in the immunity challenges
Rachel was unlucky at the merge when she when in a tribe that already together as a tribe. So Rachel was alone in the tribe vs 5 people that already together in the trible. Rachel was able to survive that unluck. That the name of the game survivor. When Rachel was in danger. Rachel always find a way to get out of the danger. That why Rachel deserve the win.
I love that the jury called out the "Rachel was just lucky" discussion during the deliberation, and that chaotic Andy got Rachel to diss Ben and Mike lmao.
Thanks Kay! Cya next time!
The luck factor is not that she got her advantages, but how. She was literally given one on a platter at auction. The other was drawing a rock, as the game itself was ridiculously and suspiciously easy. The save by Sol is what triggered it, which Production planted to save her. Willing to bet had Sam or Kyle been in Rachels position at the tribal counsel, no advantage to Sol would have been given and they would have been booted. The way Rachel should have.
Survivor is a game show, and the producers cannot legally favor one player over another like that.
There have been plenty of male players who got advantages and either used them foolishly, or overestimated their own place in the game and literally went home with an idol in their pocket - sometimes TWO idols.
Rachel figured out the right time and way to use her advantages, which is a valid way to win the game.
Sour grapes much?
Yes, the best player won. Period.
Rachel deserved the win
Yea she does!!
Sam had a good performance but he kept disparaging Rachel to make his game better and it came off very disrespectful like dude what ??
Yeah I noticed that too. It made me really glad that he didn’t win
people do that on every season… its literally part of the game and im sure rachel was not upset by it in the slightest, she even prbly did some of the same tactics 🤷
I find it hilarious that when Sam attacks her game, it's "disrespectful" but when Rachel attacks his, it's a great final tribal performance. They were both taking shots at each other and playing the game. Sam had an uphill battle and needed to poke as many holes in her game as he could.
@@ajl9772 it's disrespectful if ANYONE does it, Sam played a good game yes, but Sam was making put shots at Rachel and disparaging her game. If I was on the jury and saw that I would not vote for them
@radicalswampert7980 So you would have voted for Sue then? I'm going to assume you're not a lawyer 😆. These people are pleading their case for a million dollars. You gotta convince the jury why your game is better. Good luck doing that without saying negative things about the other people's games.
Good for Rachel. On a side note: what really is the point of them being put through the mud again in that last challenge? I would not enjoy that. 🐷
She was way too lucky. She did not hustle for all her advantages. She just lucked out. On the operation Italy episode, she should have played her block a vote advantage but did not even think of it. She was saved by Sol when she was going to be voted out. Her idol was acquired through luck. No, despite her wins, she should not have won. Best players this season were Geniveive and Sam. Then Caroline.
Rachel deserved to win!!
Anticlimactic winner of a mostly boring season.
It was the George Costanza sitcom seasons of Survivor.
Rachel had lots of luck in the season, if you can't acknowledge that you are being ridiculous. In Survivor, the best players don't always win.
Would you ever apply for the show?
The Producers handed her the game after the merge. They pulled her out of a guaranteed vote off and then gave her an immunity in fries. Sam was correct.
Anyone could have ended up with the fries. It's not like Jeff slipped it in as soon as he knew Rachel bought them.
Jury is never wrong and Rachel deserved the win. That said, Sam deserved more recognition in my eyes. Rachel got A LOT of luck. Sol finding an advantage and choosing to save her, buying the auction item that happened to come with the idol clue, drawing the rock to get the block a vote. All of these were things outside of her control that without, she loses the game. Sam got himself to the end purely through game play. Good on Kyle for voting for him and giving him 2nd. I find it funny that by voting for Sam, Kyle cost Sue 25k. Guess he got the last laugh 😂.
Rachel made her own luck, she was always looking for opportunities. We can see this with her decision to not duo up with Andy since she read that being associated with him was not worth it, and when she tired to steal the rice from the challenge. Sol gave her the advantage because Rachel bonded with him, if Andy had found that advantage he probably wouldn't have given it to her. Also, if you're gonna talk about luck, Rachel also had absolute crud luck in the game, such as starting on the same tribe as Andy, or ending up in that awful Tuku tribal.
@thebumpercar1344 Plenty of people are looking for opportunities. The thing is, all 3 of the advantages she obtained weren't due to her looking for them, but getting them through chance. I doubt her bond with Sol had much to do with him giving her the safety without power. He did it to eliminate Tuku. Pretty much anyone who found it was gonna play it on her, no logical reason Andy wouldn't. There was no guaruntee anyone was ever gonna find it tho. Everyone was scared Tuku was gonna pick them off.
Sam also started off on the same tribe with Andy and was able to use him as an ally that was supposedly a bad idea.
@@ajl9772 : Again, Rachel ended up being the sole non-Tuku on that tribal was bad luck, so her getting the Safety Without Power was just Sol and the universe balancing things out. If Andy or Gen had found that advantage, we don't know if they would have given it to Rachel. Also, Sam, Andy, and Sierra were lucky to be on the same team as Gen and Teeny, who were the actual ones who won that challenge.
Rachel got her immunity idol because she recognized the opportunity, and managed to get the clue without anyone else finding out, even with Sol literally eyeing her food. She also managed to get the idol while Andy and most of the tribe was literally hanging out near the shelter. That was way harder than Sue's red paint idol, IMHO.
Finally, Rachel recognized that giving Gen or Sam the block a vote was too dangerous, and decided to take the chance to go on the journey even if it would raise her threat level. She also had to go solve a very hard, very stressful puzzle to get the advantage. She was lucky to get drawn for it, but NOBODY else among the remaining players aside from Gen or Sam wanted to fight for it.
Sue is only 45. She has plenty of time to make 25k.
@thebumpercar1344 You're right, we don't know what Gen or Andy do. I guess she was really lucky one of them didn't find it 😆
You're really crediting Rachel with Sol not seeing the clue in her food? What kind of mind control did she do to do that?
I'd rather have to get the idol Rachel did than the one Sue did. Sue did well to hide the evidence, but it's only a matter of time until someone finds out something was there. There is so much downtime at camp to get the idol Rachel did. She obviously felt comfortable doing it then or she could have waited for better opportunities. Everyone was sitting around talking and she knew no one could hear or see what she was doing.
She recognized she should try to stop players she's targeting from getting an advantage? Good on Rachel for being the only one not dumb enough to let Sam or Gen from getting an advantage, but is that really so worthy of recognition? Seems like common sense to me. The puzzle was incredibly easy and simple. Rachel admits this. A kindergartener can do it with enough time. The countdown is stressful, so I'll credit her for getting it done in time, but I do think Sam and Gen could have gotten it done.
I would have voted for Sam.
Sam deserved more than one vote imo
I think Genevieve was the best player.
Yawn. Rachel didn't excite me. She was the only one that I didn't want to win, but, I knew she was going to win about 60% through. The most likable person wins, not the best players. Playing the game is a bit pointless in new era. Popularity contest now. To get an interesting season, they need to cast different. No more nice, quiet, passive people.
Sam should have won