Well…whadaya think of the outcome?
I didn’t watch any of Survivor (honest!), but it strikes me that someone who was portrayed as so manipulative, etc., shouldn’t have won. But perhaps some Dopers who watched the show would have better opinions than I do.
Hi again. I’ve been cut off from the Internet due to a cable failure for the past three days or so, but it got fixed today and now I’m back in the saddle.
I was the one who said Richard was toast no matter who he got paired up with. You know, because he ticked too many people off and all. (I also claimed that Rudy vs. Kelly would be a “tossup” or somesuch.)
That, my friends, is why the prediction business is for suckers. 
'Kay, I’m done. Good night.
(Damn, why couldn’t it have been Colleen. It was just a matter of minutes…)
Well, as far as betting and predicting go, a fool and his money were lucky enough to get together in the first place.
Though, I am reminded of a couple of quotes from Damon Runyon:
"The race doesn’t always go to the swiftest, nor the battle to the strongest, but that’s the way to bet."
Which should be followed up by the another equally apt quote:
"Horse sense is what keeps horses from betting on what people do."
[sarcasm] Thanks for the spoiler, Scribe. Had to work my night job last night so I had Mrs. Rastahomie tape it. Was going to watch it soon, too. [sarcasm]
I hate to say I told you so, but I told you so.
Kind of depressing to see that jackass win…
On the plus side, I won a pizza bet on the outcome.
I have completely lost my faith in man.
I hated Rich from the beginning, and I can’t believe people give him credit for being “honest in his sliminess”. He played everybody there like a hurdy-gurdy. Kelly, was just hanging on by threads and she deserved to win, IMHO. I think she screwed up by not kicking Rich off when she could have. If it were a toss up between Kelly and Rudy I don’t think she would have been as dejected to not have won. You could tell from the reunion show that she was still pissed.
And what’s with that truck-drivin’ psycho-bitch??
“I’d leave you for the vultures to do with you what they will”???
Jesus H. Sour grapes much? After hearing that little speech, I’ve decided that that woman is a blot on society. She plays a game, and when she doesn’t win, she tells the potential winner in no particular terms, that she wouldn’t mind seeing her dead. Go back to yer friggin’ tapioca farm in Pigshit, Iowa and stay off my TV!!
That felt good to get off my chest.
Sorry about that...
Will use "spoiler" next time...and a less specific subject line.
D'oh (slaps head..."a little harder with that hit, please," rastahomie says :) )Rob - For the record, I didn’t bet anything…which was a damn good thing, since nothing on that show happened according to Hoyle, up to and most definitely including the outcome (although I’m sure at least some of it was the producers’ doing, those rascals). I’m nonetheless flummoxed to see one of the two people I pegged as dead meat (Sean was the other) win it all.
And for that matter, I’m just as astonished at who lost; I had no idea her standing in the eyes of the jury was that low (in retrospect, Rudy probably would have creamed her). Wasn’t Sean afraid of alienating her again? Wouldn’t Greg find her far more palatable than the alternative? And I won’t even try to explain Susan…
Ah, well…
Aside: Pete Sampras, one of the most decent, courteous, humble athletes in any sport, has completely blown to bits the idea that nice guys always finish last. Ironically, if tennis matches were decided by popular vote, he’d probably never win a single tournament. Think about it. 
Richard played the game and he played it well. In fact, he was the only one who came in with a game plan and stuck to it. He absolutely deserved to win, and anybody who plays in the future now knows what they have to do.
If you want to know, check out the article I wrote for the local paper: http://www.sj-r.com/features/ae/00/08/24/ac.htm
I have a number of other articles on the subject as well, but they are at Themestream, a site that pays me per hit, so I won’t list those links here. If you want to find out about them, you may either go to the site and look for them or e-mail me and I’ll tell you.
Rudy made a promise…and he’s just old-fashioned enough not to break it.
Sean probably found out how many times Kelly had voted to have him kicked off (I think it was 3 times in a row before alphabet boy got the boot).
Soozin was obviously pissed at her.
Crazy, sister-lovin’, marker sniffin’,coconut phone inventin’ Greg voted based solely on who chose closer to the number 9 when he asked.
So it’s not really that astonishing that Rich won.
I can’t believe that people really think Greg voted that way.
Do they also think he was really talking on a coconut phone earlier?
C’mon, Greg had his reasons but didn’t want to explain them. Most likely he respected Rich and didn’t respect Kelly. The whole “number” thing is just an easy out and a good joke.
==
Incidentally, not that I’m trying to give the SDMB competition, but there is a small message board dedicated to “Survivor” and other “reality TV” shows at http://pub7.ezboard.com/brealworldroadrules . Like I said, it’s small, but they have some photos and amusing polls and the like there.
Granted, he had a game plan and stuck to it, I just didn’t like his game plan all that much. It seems to me he was rewarded for being sleazy, albeit openly sleazy. I’m not saying he cheated or played dirty, but it wasn’t a very “nice” way to play. I know, I know, it’s the name of the game. Play to win. Nice guys finish last. Yada yada yada. I still don’t like him.
If you and I were playing tennis, and you won by constantly drilling the ball at my head, I wouldn’t really feel like jumping over the net to shake your hand.
I kind of wondered about Greg’s voting too. I think if he did in fact pick randomly, then it was because he no longer cared who won. I found the character they made for him the most likable on the show.
I noticed that they didn’t show what his vote was (since the vote was close it heightened the drama), so perhaps he did simply pick at random. Although it appears he voted last, so maybe they wouldn’t show it either way. Did they show it in a later clip or not? I turned it off as soon as Jeff Probst pulled the first vote out and it said ‘Rich’ on it.
What’s surprising is the number of people who think that behavior in a contest in which people vote each other out of the group every few days is validation for the unethical activities that have promoted people in larger, less game-show-like societies.
panama jack
http://www.coolsig.com - go ahead, pick one you like and make believe I wrote it.
Jack Batty said:
If I’m a pitcher and you’re a batter, and I throw a ball that’s headed straight down home plate, and then at the last minute it curves away from where your bat is, is that sleazy and sneaky?
If I’m a quarterback and you’re on defense, and I go back to hand the ball off to my running back and you pull off of your coverage, only to find that I faked it and end up passing to the guy you were supposed to guard, is that sleazy and sneaky?
Rich played the game. Yes, he was deceptive, but so are players in other games. They get accolades. Rich gets bitched about.
That would be your problem, not mine. It would be a perfectly legal way to win, though rather stupid, since it’s easy to accidentally hit it out if I keep doing that. You need to have a strategy to fight against it. Nobody had one for Rich, and he won.
Panamajack said:
Nah, they edited it so he would be last, and then purposely didn’t show his vote, just as they had done for many other votes prior. If you know the results without having to wait for the host to announce it, you lose the tension.
As I recall, yes, they showed it later, but he didn’t give any explanation.
I haven’t seen too many who think this is true, though some have noted similarities to real life (noting similarities is not the same as saying they’re good).
In my opinion, Rich was the MOST fair. Why? Because he played the game the way it was supposed to be played. The producers of the show emphasized the fact that the show was supposed to be a battle of wits as well as endurance. The players woke up every day to see flags that said, “Outwit, Outplay, Outlast” or something like that. The players knew this going in. Rich actually worked HARD at coming up with a good strategy. He said that he was evaluating various tactics weeks before they even got to the island.
Of the rest, a few of them saw it as a little mini-holiday. How would you feel if you were the producer of the show, paid to bring a contestant on a show that is costing millions to produce, and had him lie around in a hammock all day like Dirk did? He didn’t even TRY to play the game. Greg thought the most fun was trying to avoid the camera crews, even though it was a violation of the spirit of the show.
A couple others played the game properly, but with losing strategies. Gretchen tried to turn it into a pure survival skills contest, which was doomed to failure because it was only 39 days. If they had been marooned for a year she would have had an excellent chance. But she misjudged the value of her skills, didn’t cultivate the political side, and lost.
The whole Pagong tribe basically just hung around and partied. Did you see the respective conditions of each camp? The Tagi tribe was organized and clean. The Pagong camp was a festering pit. If this had been a REAL survival contest, the Pagong tribe was doomed anyway, so they got what they deserved.
Rich provided most of the entertainment on the show, which is what paid for his million in the first place. He provided the most value to his ‘employers’ (the network and its viewers). He played hard, won graciously, and is now taking full advantage of the fame it brought him, both for himself and to promote some charity causes he cares about.
Way to go, Rich.
As I’ve indicated earlier, I gotta agree with Sam. Pagong deserved to lose. Rich deserved to win. Mind you, I didn’t think he would (I predicted Susan), but he did. And I’m happy about it.
No, really.
First off, I am absolutely certain that Greg’s number nonsense had absolutely nothing to do with his vote. Why? Because if it did, he wouldn’t have taken as long as he did to make that choice. He took a long time to put Richard’s name down, almost as if he didn’t particularly like either choice (neither did Sean, remember), but Richard narrowly won out. I suppose it was easier to tell Kelly that she was just unlucky rather than the real reason she lost his vote. Let’s not forget that this was the same person who burst into “tears” right on the spot after he was eliminated. We’re not meant to take him too seriously.
Sam - Some good points; just a couple of nits. CBS earned $600,000 per commercial spot as well as their highest ratings ever, so whatever they paid to support slackers like Dirk, I don’t think they’re going to complain about it. Also, this was reality TV, meaning that the crew had to deal with real human issues, including camera shyness. Considering how much time Greg got, I think they handled it quite well.
Closing thoughts: Did anyone notice that Richard’s reaction to winning it all was completely unlike the persona he (and, I realized too late, CBS) crafted for the whole event? I’ve rarely seen such raw, human emotion. Really puts the past thirteen weeks in perspective, huh?
DKW: My point was that if all 16 players had been like Dirk, they wouldn’t have HAD good ratings. Rich was partly responsible for those ratings, because he played the game as the producers told them to play it.
Kelly did vote against Sean three times: in Tribal Council 9 (TC9), TC11, and TC12. The first two times, I think it was basically that she didn’t want to voted against her Pagong girlfriends, Jenna and Colleen, who were voted off anyway.
Kelly was really testing her Alliance ties. In TC1 and TC3, she voted against Rudy, while the rest of the Alliance voted against Sonja and Stacey. Then in TC5, 7, 8, 10, and 12, she followed the party line and voted with them.
Voting against Susan was probably her best strategy. Before TC13-1, Susan had only received 1 vote against her. So if she was in TC13-3, she’d probably win.
At TC13-2, she should’ve voted Richard off. He only had 4 votes against him before, and 3 of those were in TC9, when Jenna got the boot. Those 3 were the same people that voted for her in TC13-3.
Rudy had had 7 votes against him. Granted, all of them were in TC1 - 7, and all those people had been booted off before the jury “selection”, except for Sean. He would’ve been the swing vote. I think Richard and Susan would’ve voted for Rudy, and maybe Greg. (Greg was a hard one to read.) But the remaining Pagong would’ve voted for her, as well as Sean.