Hello Jury!
I want to first thank each and every one of your for a fantastic season. Each one of you played with determination, heart, and ruthlessness to make this season unforgettable. This was not easy on any of us and I feel confident this season will go down in history.

Secondly, thank you for allowing me this platform to make my jury speech. I believe that I should be awarded the title of Soul Survivor due to my adaptability and my keen focus moving from one vote-off to the next. Nothing was ever straightforward for me in this game and every tribal council was information I used to change what character I was playing and how I was playing. It’s that kind of gameplay that I think makes me a truly unique final three candidate.

When I played Survivor group games in the past, I had one strategy. It was to find one or two people and have them be my rock the entire game. Do anything and everything with them to keep me and them safe in this game. Win with them or die with them, they were my people. Honestly, it worked pretty well.

After I came back to Tengaged after a three-year break (thanks quarantine), I decided to approach this game with the same strategy and chose Ashanti and Tyler to by my people. However, you all are some fierce ass competitors and never made it easy on us. I had to think quick on my feet and play the role of naive player to get myself forward with the aid of Tyler and Ashanti at times. I think a lot of people underestimated me and I used that to my advantage. I played up this role of unfamiliarity but honestly, I pretty much knew what would be happening a large majority of the time. People put me in a box and rather than get upset and tried to change my narrative, I took a backseat and let people think they knew me. When, in actuality, they were sleeping on a dangerous player. 

I would like to go through each phase of the jury because my strategy did change vote by vote, it was that unique of a game for me and it changed after every vote. 

JAY (11th): I really did want Ashanti out this round. I felt betrayed by her throwing the competition to Joe so blatantly and I knew I could never fully trust her again. Alex was the only person to say Ashanti might have an idol and we all fell for it. Had we have known, maybe we could have controlled the vote a little better.

JOE (10th): After Jay left, I knew Ashanti would want answers because I had just lied to her. I think I was very smart in this moment to tell Ashanti the truth about what happened. She made a huge move and I needed to answer for it. I figured, if I couldn’t beat ‘em, I need to join ‘em. I quickly reformed a group with Ashanti, Tyler, Sagar, and myself. I don’t know who pulled Jordan in, but he was there too. Now this group, I wanted to ride with until the very end, but the only problem was, we needed majority over the other side. Joe was the suggestion from Ashanti and I had never talked with Joe but, Tyler had alluded that he was kind of a crazy player and not to be trusted from other group games. He was right. I would have a conversation with Joe and pull him off the ledge and then an hour later Joe would come back and be like I HEARD THIS, WE GOT TO CHANGE EVERYTHING! It was EXHAUSTING. Joe was playing a million miles a minute and I felt like he was playing all sides. I knew it would be best to boot him before he became a more dangerous player. I knew I wanted Joe gone that I was willing to go to rocks before I let him stay in the game. Haha Joe, to you I did want to address my comments towards the end of your stay about trusting Alex. I did want to create some doubt in your mind in case you stayed but it wasn’t the best move on my part, I will own that. You were just super difficult to work with and I never knew exactly what was happening with you. You lied and said you had an idol at one point. Haha It was too much man, I hope you understand my move here.

JOSH (9th): When Tyler won the quarantine option, I BEGGED HIM to take me! I needed some safety after and exhausting two tribals. This accomplished two things, not only did it keep me safe and my name out of the conversation, I think it played into my weak player persona which I was used perfectly in the next vote. Josh, personally I think you were robbed. If I was still there, I would have fought for you helping us out when you flipped on Joe. You did a great game move and I am sorry your old team made you pay the price. You deserved better; I think.

ALEX (8th): This was by far my best work. With Sagar, Ashanti, Tyler, and I we all knew Alex was our target. It was never a doubt in our mind. However, we didn’t have majority and we didn’t know where idols were. We figured it would be smarter to play up a fake vote to potentially flush and idol. Who was the most impressionable guy? Nathan. Joe had also tipped me off that Nathan may have had an idol. I didn’t think it was true honestly, but I was willing to ride on the assumption. My next step was to play up the Nathan vote. I took some of Joe’s play style and talked to everyone. I was like “Help me. No one is talking.” And “All I heard was Nathan, is that the plan?” Meanwhile, the four of us were sharing all information other people were saying with one another to keep our stories straight. With you Alex, I really played the weak persona. I knew you were voting me, but I acted like I had no idea what was happening. I pretended I was pushing Nathan to keep you in the dark. I don’t want to repeat history, but it was flawless. Nathan played the idol incorrectly (I almost spit out my drink) and you went home with your advantage and later with your idol too! It was the biggest victory for our side, and I don’t think you had any clue until your name was being read aloud.

ASHANTI (7th): I knew you were the number one person to win this game. You played your ass off and you were a fierce person every step of the way. I knew that and I didn’t care. You kept out team safe the last three votes and I wanted to prove my loyalty by taking you all the way. I truly did. I wanted the final four to be Tyler/Me/Sagar/You and we would battle it out for final three. Maybe I should have been smarter, but I was so confident in our team that I did not waiver. Tyler got you and there was nothing I could have done differently. I did stay loyal to you, know that.

TYLER (6th): Tyler, you made a big move and it came back to bite you in the end. I loved playing this game you and I did vote Nathan the time you were voted out. I kept my word to you and Ashanti! I told you, I’m a very loyal guy! I did really want to end this game with you, and I am sorry you got played by the boys on the other side. You are a hell of a player man. 

JORDAN (5th): After Tyler, like I was like…ummm…fuck…This was SOOOO COMPLICATED. I knew I had to bust my ass for immunity, and I THINK I SHOULD HAVE WON! I was robbed of that necklace. Jordan, I truly loved getting to know you and I think we bonded as friends. In the game however, we always had a strange relationship, you voted against me twice in this game, but you had this passion which I truly was so touched by. I think loyalty really paid off here. I made Sagar feel safe around me and he was willing to do whatever it took to move us forward. Sagar told me you were the biggest jury threat and looking big picture part of me agreed with him. No one dislikes you because you are such a great guy. I honestly did LOVE getting to know you and I hope we can continue friendship outside of this game. I must thank Nathan here, which I never thought I would do, but he flipped to save me here.

PATRICK (4th): I did bust my ass in the challenges but alas, Sagar proved he is a beast after all. I kept my loyalty by sticking with Sagar and Nathan/Patrick turned on each other leaving me in the perfect state to ride to the final three. Patrick, we never worked together and at the last second you wanted to flip on Nathan. I honestly did want to get Nathan out of here so bad but at the end, I thought big picture. You never saved me. You voted against me twice. You had no enemies on the jury. This was the first chance I had to write your name down, so I took it. I am sorry man. I figured this would be a little bit of a pay it forward to Nathan since he saved me with the Jordan vote. 

At the end of the day, I had to wear many different hats. I had to lie to everyone, and I had to change my character using the last vote as my guide. It was a playstyle I never anticipated, and I had to play hard, smart, and fast. I had a great social game and I made my loyalty count where it needed to. I made it to the final three because I believed in myself when no one else did. I played the weak persona and I don’t think anyone ever saw me as a huge threat. I busted ass in every challenge and while I never won, I made it here to the final three. I was essentially vulnerable every tribal and I knew my name was always in the conversation. Of the final three, I had the most votes against me, and I still maneuvered myself to make it count and made sure I was never the person going home. I am so proud of myself and I see myself as a champion of this season. Sagar and Nathan both played excellent games so I know this will NOT be an easy decision for any of you. Reflect on your experience, reflect on our statements, and vote for who you know played the best game. I ask you for your vote and thank you so much for letting me share my story and I am here to answer your questions!

Hi guys, so I’m going to try to keep this as short as possible but I have the tendency to ramble so forgive me in advance.

I am SO proud of the game I’ve played this season. I joined this on a whim in anticipation of my previous season ending right around the time this one would start. In that season, I made finals but only after winning 7 immunities which was a huge negative in the eyes of many jurors, a lot of whom said I relied on immunities as a crutch to make it to the end. So I came into this season wanting to change up my strategy and instead let other people appear as much bigger social and physical threats than me early on in the game so that I could keep the target on my back as small as feasibly possible.

After voting for Ashanti at merge and yet still losing probably my closest ally in the game (Jay), I realized almost immediately that Ashanti would be someone who would be a major shield for me in this game (sorry girl you know I love you). I knew Ashanti was at least as good (if not better) than me at challenges and I knew that the time would eventually come when the cast would turn on one of us, especially when we were both vulnerable. So after the clusterfuck merge vote, I decided that the best course for me would be to team up with Ashanti who ended up being my ride-or-die in this game even after I voted for him at the merge. The next few votes were spent building relationships and also trying to get out the people I did not trust. Joe voted for me at the merge and got voted out himself the very next round. Josh voted for me at F9 but ended up going home himself that same round (although me/Ashanti voted Alexander here in case of stray votes). At F8, I made probably my biggest move in the game by teaming up with Ashanti/Ozzy/Tyler and using my vote steal to pull off a complete and utter blindside against Alexander, who I believe was playing the hardest and most unpredictable game up until this point. In the process of doing this, we literally flushed 2 idols (Nathan’s idol that he misplayed, and I believe Alexander went home with one in his pocket) as well as Alexander’s unplayed extra vote.

Coming off of the high of the Alexander blindside, I knew that the season was building up to that moment I described earlier where the cast would essentially turn on me/Ashanti and I did everything in my damn power to make sure it wasn’t me voted out when we were both vulnerable at F7. I knew that the way I had played up until this point made me not the biggest target, but the 2nd biggest target, which ended up being probably the most important long-term strategy I could have possible used in this game. Ashanti was voted out and I genuinely believe that Tyler, Nathan, Patrick, and Jordan made a huge miscalculation here. Not because they voted Ashanti out, who was an obvious threat, but moreso because they didn’t vote me out. Coming out of F7 unscathed was when I knew I could kick my game into high gear.

After only winning one immunity (the one I shared with Patrick) the whole game, I ended up winning the final 3 immunity challenges in a row and used every single round from F6 to F4 to get out the 3 people who I identified as the biggest jury threats to me by far:
6th: Tyler immediately became a huge threat the moment he made the move on Ashanti so I decided the time was right to flip the script on him immediately after.
5th: Jordan was someone who I realized played a phenomenal social game and very likely had deep bonds with people from his original tribe that would end up being on the jury (Alexander, Patrick) as well as allies he made later in the game like Tyler.
4th: And finally, Patrick was someone who I think almost NO ONE recognized as a huge social threat. Patrick is the only one out of all of us in the F4 who could say that he did not receive a single vote cast against him the whole game and he was literally never once the target. I recognized this in the few short minutes we had to cast our votes at F4. Once Patrick told me he was voting Nathan and Nathan told me he was voting Ozzy, I realized what I had to do and pulled off the dream 2-1-1 with Ozzy and I voting for Patrick.

Ultimately, I was the only one to vote for the person who went home in all 3 of the finale night votes. I really do believe that my game of using Ashanti as a shield up until he was voted out and then dialing up my game to the next level to vote out the 3 people that I perceived as my biggest threats was the PERFECT way to play this season and I don’t regret any of the moves I’ve made along the way.

THANK YOU to all of you for a fun season. And I also want to say thank you and also sorry to JB for sometimes making his life hell during this season. I flipped out at him a few times but ultimately all I can say is that this season was a blast and Cutthroat has always been a special series to me! Good luck Ozzy and Nathan!

Hello jury! I would like to first off thank you guys, because this game was honestly a wild ride and it never slowed down for a second. We all came here to play and we all played HARD. And of course to JB, for hosting and putting up with everything we did.

-PREMERGE-

Premerge, I was put on the Tawi Tawi tribe. Pretty much instantly I formed a bond with Joe, who I had planned to stay loyal to for the time being. I also had formed a vry strong bond with Alexander from the Sarangani tribe, because we played a past game together. He would be the strongest bond I had out here and would be my ride or die for the entire game. When we lost, everybody voted out Ryan as he asked for it and was inactive. Ozzy mailed me, asking for us to join his tribe, and we all did so. After flopping in the immunity challenge, everybody in the tribe agreed to vote off Zyler. My tribe wanted to go to Cotabato, but exclude Joe, so we did just that.

-MERGE-

Going into merge, I had some pretty strong bonds, but I knew I needed more. I focused on working with Patrick and developing a relationship with Sagar. I was blindsided at the merge vote thanks to the help of an idol, and from that point onward I was on the bottom with Alexander and Patrick, because after Joe royally sunk his game trying to deflect votes off me, we had to do whatever we could to just survive the votes. I went back to old relationships with Tyler, and made new ones with Jordan. I knew that after my idol was gone, that was all I had to survive because I am not very good at the comps AT ALL. After Ashanti was voted out, I realized that for once in the game, I had power. I knew that after the huge move Tyler made, I needed him out. I approached Sagar, because I knew for this to work I needed him, and he agreed. However, Patrick and Jordan both wanted to do Ozzy. And, it took a lot to convince Patrick to realize we needed to vote Tyler, but we still weren't sure about Jordan. We considered doing a 3-2-1 many times, but each time I tried to execute it Patrick would shut me down saying how he didn't want to lie to Jordan and he was sure he was voting with us. At this point I realized how dangerous Jordan was. He had never received a vote to that point, was close with pretty much everybody, and I knew he knew that as well. So, at the final 5, me Sagar and Ozzy voted him out. The f4 vote confused me, because I thought me and Ozzy were going to fire, with me and Sagar voting Ozzy. But Sagar and Ozzy instead voted Patrick, which, while I was relieved at, was the only vote I was truly surprised by the reveal.

I am now going to go into each vote in the post-merge, and explain my role in it a little deeper.

-JAY:11th-

Ozzy and Tyler wanting to vote off Ashanti because she threw the competition to Joe. I was obviously on board with this. Really, I wasnt completely shocked with the idol play, but I knew I would be safe here because at that point I hadn't done anything in the game to warrant voting me off.

-JOE:10th-

After coming off the insane merge vote, I expected it to be a clean sweep on Ashanti. Of course, that's when I heard from Joe that MY name was being thrown out by Ozzy and Tyler, the two people who I up to that point, been working very closely with. And, this is where I think I made the worst move I made this game. I told Joe about my idol. Obviously, Joe went and told Ashanti and Patrick, and I almost lost my closest ally in doing so, Alex as he was pissed. However, it was a blessing in disguise. With Joe blowing up and scrambling like mad, it actually put the target off of me and onto himself, which obviously was brilliant. My side voted Ashanti with the hope of gaining Joe, but when he left in the revote I wasn't all that mad.

-JOSH:9th-

At the auction I bought the applebees appestizer, which included an advantage menu. I opted out of the challenge in order to get a specific idol clue, which sadly was to the idol Sagar has already found. Either way, after Josh flipped in the revote, it was very clear he needed to go because he was untrustworthy and wasn't really apart of my game. I also spent this vote starting a bond with Sagar, which would prove to be a very good decision.

-ALEX:8th-

This was for sure the toughest vote for me. I had heard my name being brought up, again, but this time I wasn't so confident in the numbers. I knew that Sagar and Jordan were very unstable this vote, and could easily be lying to me. Once Sagar played his vote steal on Alex, I thought it was a done deal and played my idol. Obviously, the entire plan was to vote off Alexander, who at the point had been my #1 ally and who I shared everything with. From this point onward, I had to change my entire game.

-ASHANTI:7th-

I knew since my #1 ally was gone, I need another. I found this in Patrick. Tyler came up to us and Jordan, wanting to blindside Ashanti. I didn't like this, I wanted Sagar out. I discussed it all I could of how much better it would be for us to vote out Sagar, but ultimately we were relying on Tyler for this vote, and if he didn't go along with us we were screwed. So, I settled for Ashanti. And Ashanti left with me still thinking about how badly we had just fucked up.

-TYLER:6th-

This was one of the only times in the game I realized I had actual power. With Sagar being blindsided, I instantly went to him about voting off Tyler, who had just put himself in the frontrunner position to win. He agreed very quickly, and after that I had to convince Patrick and Jordan. Patrick took some convincing, but he agreed. Jordan, though, wouldn't budge. When he didn't, we began to think about plans to make a 3-2-1, leaving Jordan out. But Pat didn't wanna. He didn't want to lie to Jordan. This is when I realized how tight Pat and Jordan were, and Jordan was to everybody. He hadn't gotten a vote, was in the majority for pretty much every vote, and had the social bonds on the jury. Sagar had already mentioned voting Jordan, so I knew hed be down with it, and Ozzy was on the outs. Us 3 came together and voted off Jordan.

-PATRICK:4th-

Pat, I dunno what happened this vote. Obviously I wanted to vote out Sagar, but he won immunity, so I settled for Ozzy. However, I knew you were voting me, and I knew Sagar was voting Ozzy. I thought I would be going to fire against Ozzy, so when they both voted you I was shocked. I can honestly say that this is the only vote that I didn't see coming, because I saw even the Alexander vote coming beforehand.

-SUMMARY-

All in all, I played very heavily from the bottom, but I always found a way. I always survived the vote, if that meant voting off Ashanti instead of Sagar, I did it. However, I was also able to realize when I was in a power position, and when I was, I made the best moves I could to position myself better in this game. I can honestly say I played this game to the best of my ability. And I wish the best of luck to Sagar and Ozzy!

sorry about the slow posting. I  had to take a nap cuz I was tired

Ozzy, you told me the final 10 that you were a "striaght shooter" and that I could count on you. Yet, right after 6pm when the votes were cast, I told you that alex told me I needed to change my vote or I would be gone. Then , you freaked the fuck out at me for not trusting you. Yet 2 minutes later, the votes got read and alex was right. You voted me out. You were a blatant asshole for me despite the fact that you played me for a fool and you got caught in the act. For that interaction with you, you 100% will not receive my vote tonight.

Sagar, why did you feel it wasn't important for you to ever take any time to reach out to me when we merged? Why was my jury vote so unimportant to you?

Nathan, I truthfully have been paying 0 attention to this game after I went, so tell me, how did you navigate your way to the final 3 with the odds (seemly) being stacked against you? Did you want to go against Sagar and Ozzy, or did it just happen by chance that they are here?

Hey again guys and before i start asking ye my questions i would like to say a huge congratulations for all of you making it this far in the game! You did what all 13 of us could not (even though i came so damn close lol) and it was a pleasure to play with all 3 of you! Now my question!!

Nathan - So as everybody knows me and you worked together for a good bit of this game and i definitely did underestimate you if I’m honest and I’m  quite surprised you even made it this far! Although i was aligned with you i often thought your gameplay was very impulsive, crazy and erratic and you couldn’t keep your mouth shut to many people! So with that being said what was your biggest move in this game that YOU orchestrated and the reason yours is better than the others moves? And my other question is what have you done regarding jury management as from what i can see many people sitting on the jury aren’t your biggest fans, or did you just forget about that part of the game ?

Ozzy - It was clear to everyone that you and tyler were very close allies and coming into merge it was definitely a valuable bond to have but as the game progressed it looked to me that you were being controlled by tyler and pretty much floating along which sagar clearly used to his advantage in bringing you to final 3! Why didn’t you make a power move to get any of the arguably biggest threats out of this game, tyler, sagar or ashanti and how did you not just float all the way to final 3 sitting comfortably behind these three big shields?

Sagar - It is undeniable that you played a very big game while remaining under the radar for many votes! But my understanding is that you had it rather easy in this game! You attended zero tribal councils before merge, come merge many of your moves were perceived as ashantis moves and you just voted along with them and finally once ashanti was voted out you began winning immunities. In my opinion it doesn’t look like you had to work that hard to get to final three. So can you explain to me firstly how you outplayed everyone and finally i do believe that the sole survivor should have to have worked their butts of to deserve that title so with that being said why do you deserve to win this game over your the other two sitting beside you?

Thanks for reading all that and i wish you all the best of luck !

-JOE-
Ozzy, you told me the final 10 that you were a "striaght shooter" and that I could count on you. Yet, right after 6pm when the votes were cast, I told you that alex told me I needed to change my vote or I would be gone. Then , you freaked the fuck out at me for not trusting you. Yet 2 minutes later, the votes got read and alex was right. You voted me out. You were a blatant asshole for me despite the fact that you played me for a fool and you got caught in the act. For that interaction with you, you 100% will not receive my vote tonight.

-OZZY-
I 100% respect your decision! As I said in my jury speech earlier, this was the only move that I wasn't proud of. I am not exactly sure what my goal was here either. I am sorry if I came off as rude, I was scared and it showed my lack of courtesy to you. I should have targeted my rage towards Alex here for spilling the beans! haha You did not deserve that. I do still think you were the right person to vote off that week because you were playing so many sides. I knew you would be a risk to my game moving forward and I did what I felt I needed to do. I could have obviously done it in a much cleaner fashion. I am sorry and I do mean that. Game or not, as people, we need to remember not to treat each other like pawns.

-PATRICK-
Ozzy - It was clear to everyone that you and tyler were very close allies and coming into merge it was definitely a valuable bond to have but as the game progressed it looked to me that you were being controlled by tyler and pretty much floating along which sagar clearly used to his advantage in bringing you to final 3! Why didn’t you make a power move to get any of the arguably biggest threats out of this game, tyler, sagar or ashanti and how did you not just float all the way to final 3 sitting comfortably behind these three big shields?

-OZZY-
This is a great question and I think you have the wrong idea about me because you never talked with me. Every time I reached out to you, I often got no response so I had to work with the people the were responding, Tyler, Sagar, and Ashanti. I do not think putting big targets in front of me was a bad move in the least. As I mentioned in my jury speech, I was given this persona of this "know nothing" player and no one took me seriously, including you. However behind the scenes, I working my butt off socially and working as many angles as I could. My biggest move was the Alex blindside. I can't take full credit for this obviously but I was KEY in ensuring Alex felt safe and for spreading paranoia to Nathan to get him to play this idol. I played my role perfectly and I influenced that vote greatly with the key players. This game is about making moves at the right time. Tyler made a "big" move to boot Ashanti and looked what happened, YOU voted him out the very next week. I don't think a survivor needs to dominate the game with BIG MOVE after BIG MOVE because they often get played immediately after. I played a consistent game, I got behind bigger targets, and I got a shit ton of votes in the process. At the end of the day, my loyalty always came through though. AND it was proved when Jordan was voted out. Sagar kept me because I proved I was loyal to him and I would have never earned that if it weren't for my strong social game.

Great answer ozzy good luck tomorrow!

hey y’all. for starters, i wanna say congratulations. personally, i really think i deserve to be up there in y’alls position but c’est la vie! despite being here, i’m left at a crossroads. my vote between sagar and ozzy is really left up in the air because i have mad respect for both of y'all and your games. you guys showed me a lot more decency, respect and general conversation than most of the cast did, so i thank you.

ozzy - you were without a doubt an ally i very much appreciated having in this game. i understand you had your guns out for me initially, but we moved passed that and put the pedal to the metal moving forward. i want to ask you what you think you excelled at in this game compared to those sitting next to you?

sagar - idoling out jay was probably the best decision i made all game because i got an amazing rock out of you. you been knew i loved you and always enjoy playing with you, and this game was no different. i truly felt like we were thelma and louise. my question for you is the same as ozzy, what did you excel at in this game that you believe your opponents lacked?

@Joe - Sagar, why did you feel it wasn't important for you to ever take any time to reach out to me when we merged? Why was my jury vote so unimportant to you?

Hey Joe, so of course your jury vote isn't unimportant to me at all. I truly feel that, in general, the earlier merge boots are some of the more crucial jury votes to campaign for because you may not have seen a lot of the game that I played after your elimination from the game.

I went back and read through our skype chat, and honestly, you're right. I was actually very short with you and probably could have done a lot more to try to get your jury vote. I do believe that talking to all the people you've never talked to before once you merge is an important thing to do in Survivor. That being said, there is an argument to be made that, as a group game player with somewhat of a reputation that follows me in this game, it's not a bad idea to take a more low-profile approach rather than try to talk everyone up. Honestly, I think I realized early on that we would probably not be long-term allies in this game and therefore I didn't think you would appreciate me trying to kiss your ass or blow smoke up your ass about voting with you when I really wasn't. If I can defend myself here for a minute, if you go back and read our chat, I was honest with you that round about voting Jay and then switching my vote to AJ at the last minute. However, you voted me that round despite me telling you what I was doing. The round after was when you kind of more formally offered me a deal to work together but at that point, I had considered the bridge burned. I know you're a long-time group gamer as well and can appreciate that I didn't think it would be prudent for me to trust you right after you cast a stray vote at me out of the 10 or so options that you had. That was kind of the moment in the game when I realized that I had to get you out. I definitely didn't manage your jury vote perfectly, I fully admit to that, but I also am not in the business of trying to butter people up before sending them to the jury.

-ASHANTI-
ozzy - you were without a doubt an ally i very much appreciated having in this game. i understand you had your guns out for me initially, but we moved passed that and put the pedal to the metal moving forward. i want to ask you what you think you excelled at in this game compared to those sitting next to you?

-OZZY-
I love this question! I obviously was not a challenge BEAST like you or Sagar but I assure you I did give my 100% in every challenge, trust and believe! However, I think I excelled in playing the persona of a weak player and not freaking out which was critical. I don't think anyone ever saw me as a threat and often times people would shut doors in my face when I tried to talk to them. Rather than freak out and try to make a risky move (like Tyler) or play an idol incorrectly (like Sagar and Nathan) I kept my cool. Even when I knew my name was getting written down I never let them see me sweat. I think this persona of weak player really worked for me and I leaned into the idea that no one cared about me (besides y'all) so I just stayed calm, let them throw my name out. I feel Sagar and Nathan both did not play as cool as me when they thought votes were coming their way. When their names were thrown out, they reacted by playing idols incorrectly. In addition, both boys let their games define who they were and it changed how they played. Sagar made himself a threat by winning challenges and he put himself in a box where he had to win immunity. Nathan often said one thing to me and said the exact opposite thing to Tyler and he put himself in a box where he needed to be two faced to gain trust. For me, I let others the other players put me in a box that I could maneuver whatever way I needed.

@Patrick

Really glad you're giving me the opportunity to expand on this part of my game. Honestly, I don't think I had an easy ride to the end at all. It's true that I didn't go to any premerge tribal councils but what's interesting about this is that I actually consider it to have been a disadvantage for me coming into the merge. Going to tribal in the premerge would have given me a chance to build trust with the alliances that I was creating (Jay, for example, as well as some of the people that came to Cotabato after the first TC such as Jordan who I actually made an alliance with quite early on). I didn't have that opportunity.

In fact, I came into the merge with my only real ally up to that point (Jay) getting idoled out. The only other original Cotabatos were Nick who quit in the premerge, and Josh, who was someone that I actually did try to make an effort with during the premerge but unfortunately could never get off the ground running with. So I truly did feel like from F11 onwards, I was basically starting completely from scratch while other people had some really strong bonds they could rely on during the toughest parts of the game. I think that's what makes some of the strong alliances I built so impressive. My alliance with Ashanti became one of my most important obviously even though I voted for him the round previously. I built connections with others in more subtle ways; for example, Patrick I feel like I built trust with you when we shared that immunity. Really my goal was not just to try to stay under-the-radar in the early merge but also try to weasel my way into alliances with people purely through small actions like that. Another example that comes to mind is me voting for Nathan at F7 and then literally working with him immediately after at the F6 and F5 votes to get out our mutual targets.

I also want to say that even though my moves may be perceived as Ashanti's moves (and this was purely intentional on my part, although I'm not trying to downplay the incredible game Ashanti played up until his elimination), I don't think that's actually the case and I would like to fight that perception.

The two biggest rounds that solidifed my bond with Ashanti were F9 and F8. At F9, I actually was the one that made the final call on the decision for us two to vote for Alex instead of going along with the Josh plan, and I think Ashanti will back me up here. And finally, at F8, I really feel like I was the one who put the plan in motion. I put it in people's heads that Jordan was tight with the trio of Nathan/Patrick/Alexander and I really pushed the idea of there being two sides with a line drawn in the middle. I was the one who originally made the pitch to the group of Ashanti/Tyler/Ozzy that with my vote steal we could turn a potential 4-5 disadvantage (because of Alexander's extra vote) into a 5-4 advantage for us, which ended up essentially being the case (although Alex didn't use his extra vote, the vote steal was still the deciding factor in that vote). I don't want to diminish the role that Ashanti, Tyler, and Ozzy all played in this move because we all did our part but I really feel like it was my vote steal that set this plan in motion.

On the topic of the vote steal, let's talk about the auction. I could have held out for the necklace which I knew would be the last item, just to guarantee myself safety, but I took a BIG risk and went all in on the vote steal because I knew that was exactly the kind of item that I could make a big move with, and I did just that.

Okay this has already been WAY too long but I want to be thorough here and address the last part of your question. You want to vote for someone who worked hard. I didn't want to emphasize these things too much because they make me look like kind of a loser but let's talk about two things that no one was able to see in my game:
1) The idol. Yeah, I completely wasted it (to be honest, I never needed it anyway). But I spent hours looking for it with the 2 clues I had. It took me at least 3 hours of nonstop searching and the feeling when I found it was euphoric.
2) The final immunity challenge. I actually did my research and looked up the endgame challenges that JB has used in the past, and I saw that the timeline challenge was a popular one. Literally, last night, I created an entire Word document that contains all the major events in this game by date. All the idol plays, the vote counts, the advantages, even the titles of the immunity challenges. If anyone wants to see this as proof that I'm not just bullshitting, please let me know and I'll share the doc with you on Skype. I literally even added some major world events by date at the end of the document (although I only ended up predicting 1 of the events that showed up on the challenge). So without knowing the context, you could say I got lucky in this challenge, but I actually used my work ethic and my critical thinking to be as prepared as I could be going into tonight.

So, yes, I promise you I worked my ass off to get here. A lot of it may have been behind the scenes but I hope you can appreciate what I've done now that it's public. I had my finger on the pulse of this game for the vast majority of it and almost every round went the way I wanted it to. Really the only time I left my fate in the hands of other people was the F7 vote and, like I talked about in my opening statement, I planned for that possibility for a long time and I ended up making it through that unscathed.

Sorry for the rant, that was way too long omg

And, I just want to add onto that already long answer. But I really feel like my crowning achievement in this game was my quick thinking that led to your vote-out at the last minute. I feel like pulling off a 2-1-1 is extremely difficult in Survivor lately but when I saw the opportunity presenting itself, I seized the moment and did what I quickly realized was the best possible move that I think caught both you and Nathan completely off guard. During those few minutes, I quickly scrolled through that Final Immunity Challenge document I just told you about that confirmed to me that you had 0 votes cast against you throughout the whole game. I knew that was an unbeatable argument in the FTC so I took the shot and I feel like that is the one moment that I will remember for a long time from this game. So I feel like the point I'm trying to make is that I never once let an opportunity slide by in this game. A lot of the early merge votes were about voting out people that had either voted me or were very likely to target me. A lot of the later merge votes were about voting out the people that I did not want sitting next to me and I did just that.

Nathan, I truthfully have been paying 0 attention to this game after I went, so tell me, how did you navigate your way to the final 3 with the odds (seemly) being stacked against you? Did you want to go against Sagar and Ozzy, or did it just happen by chance that they are here?

Really in this game I knew I was on the bottom. I knew I had to sett;e for whatever vote was in front of me or risk elimination. However, I realized when that wasn't true. I saw when I was safe, and capitalized on those tribals to take out big threats like Tyler and Jordan. I didn't ever make a big move that backfired on me. Every "big move" I made worked out. My story was underdog turned overdog, and that's how I got here. If I had a choice, I would rather have Patrick here than Sagar. I knew I needed Sagar for f6 and f5, so I went into f4 knowing this was my only chance to take him out. Obviously, we all lost immunity and hes sitting here today.

Nathan - So as everybody knows me and you worked together for a good bit of this game and i definitely did underestimate you if I’m honest and I’m  quite surprised you even made it this far! Although i was aligned with you i often thought your gameplay was very impulsive, crazy and erratic and you couldn’t keep your mouth shut to many people! So with that being said what was your biggest move in this game that YOU orchestrated and the reason yours is better than the others moves? And my other question is what have you done regarding jury management as from what i can see many people sitting on the jury aren’t your biggest fans, or did you just forget about that part of the game ?

I think my biggest move was a combined move of Tyler and Jordan, as they both go together. I knew Tyler was the frontrunner to win, so I knew he needed to go, and I wasn't going to settle for anything less. Even if Jordan wasn't voting him, I was going to pull off a 3-2-1 (or try atleast) to vote off Tyler. I pushed for Tyler so hard this tribal, and he left. Compared to others, this didn't put a bigger target on me. When Ozzy and Sagar did their moves at the f8, they put themselves in the spot light and really put themselves as bigger targets. When Sagar used that steal a vote, I wanted him gone at the f7, but Tyler wanted Ash, and he was our only option so we HAD to go with him. As for the jury management, I really don't know. I think it was a combination of how frequently I lied to people like Ashanti and even Ozzy. My main reason for doing this was because of paranoia of idols, and we always had to tell them a fake vote incase of them. I also think it has to do with how unlikeable I am. I don't like music, or games, or sports, and don't have many hobbies. I never have been able to form real 1 on 1 relationships with people because I legit cannot. Its something I have always struggled with in these games, and even in real life. So, I think the combination of the constant lying, not building relationships, and blindsiding contribitued to it. And I feel super bad for it, because I like everybody here, but I really cant say that they feel the same way about me. I tried to be as honest with people as I could this game, but I really couldn't.

@Ashanti I love you Thelma <3 Loved playing this game with you. You are always a treat to play with in games and I feel like you're so zen that you immediately calm my manic energy whenever I'm going crazy over a vote.

What did I do better in this game than the others? This may sound like a crock of shit but I think what I did better was the fact that I wrote my own story in this game while the other two (in my opinion) were much more passive players in different stages of the game. I agree with Nathan when he says he played well from the bottom for a lot of the early merge, and I also think Ozzy also successfully played from the bottom after Tyler flipped on us. Meanwhile, I think my game was very different from these two in that I spent a lot more time over the course of this game controlling my own fate. From F10 all the way to F4, I can pretty much say that I felt very comfortable with my footing in the game in every single round except for F7 of course. Although I didn't necessarily vote for the person who went home in each of those rounds (the Josh boot for example), I did have a decent sense of what was going on and I never felt truly caught off guard. Even at F7, I think both of us had sort of an uneasy feeling that something was off that night and things seemed a little bit TOO easy, so when you were voted out, all it really did was light a fire under my ass becuase I knew it was coming. It was just a matter of which of the two of us they picked to go home.

And for the 3 finale night boots, I really feel like I played a season's worth of Survivor in just one night. I felt more in control than I ever have in any recent group game I've played. I was in majority for 3/3 of these crucial endgame boots while Nathan and Ozzy were both sort of caught off guard at some point by my decisionmaking (Ozzy at F6, and Nathan at F4).