S33: Justin "Jay" Starrett

[LanceM]

I can't believe he still has his idol. I wonder if he will be targeted next week. He seems to have definitely slipped off the radar from the other players. If he is the final 3 I can see him winning for sure.

[waving feather]

These two confessionals Jay and Adam gave respectively regarding the reward and giving away the advantage are interesting for me. Obviously they have different perspectives on it. Jay views it as a social (and to my surprise, a rather sincere and uncomplicated) move but Adam viewed it as a strategic move. 

Jay:

 

Adam:

I think I'm with Jay on this because sometimes Adam overthinks things a bit and misses the human social aspect of it.

[laurakaye]

Jay continues to make small but important moves to deflect attention from himself and his idol.  It's so interesting to me that everyone knows he has the remaining idol, but he's kind of sitting on the sidelines, watching, while the Jets and Sharks rumble and try to off each other.  And I thought he handled choosing people to come along on the loved one's reward perfectly.  He honored his promises first, and then took Adam: a guy he admits to having had issues with, but chose as a way to honor him for not using the advantage.  Well played.

[peachmangosteen]

To me Jay's game play is super meh. I don't really see him as that great like many seem to. But I do think he will be the winner this season. And if he is, his win will remind me a lot of Fabio's, but I didn't have a problem with Fabio's win so I shouldn't with Jay's. I liked Fabio a lot more though, so there's that!

2 hours ago, laurakaye said:

It's so interesting to me that everyone knows he has the remaining idol ...

They do? I did not know everyone knew he had the idol. 

Edited December 1, 2016 by peachmangosteen

[ljenkins782]

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These two confessionals Jay and Adam gave respectively regarding the reward and giving away the advantage are interesting for me. Obviously they have different perspectives on it. Jay views it as a social (and to my surprise, a rather sincere and uncomplicated) move but Adam viewed it as a strategic move. 

I'm not surprised that Adam would be suspicious. Also not that surprised that Jay was sincere about his move, he was pretty worked up at the loved one's visit. He does seem to have some genuineness to him, which might be why people seem so drawn to him. 

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Jay continues to make small but important moves to deflect attention from himself and his idol.  It's so interesting to me that everyone knows he has the remaining idol, but he's kind of sitting on the sidelines, watching, while the Jets and Sharks rumble and try to off each other.  And I thought he handled choosing people to come along on the loved one's reward perfectly.  He honored his promises first, and then took Adam: a guy he admits to having had issues with, but chose as a way to honor him for not using the advantage.  Well played.

He has gotten somewhat lucky that Zeke and David decided to go after each other so hard, but he's also playing well. He never came out swinging after his allies got the boot, he just put his head down and kept moving. 

I'm not sure if I think he'll win though, David's extreme amount of early airtime and the overcoming obstacles arc he's had all season makes me think it's him. But Jay seems to have such a clear path to victory with his unused idol, his relationships to other players and his friends on the jury.  

[Rachel RSL]

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They do? I did not know everyone knew he had the idol. 

You don't remember last week's game of Telephone? "Jay has an idol." "Did you hear? Jay has an idol." "We can confirm that Jay has an idol." "So Jay does have an idol purple monkey dishwasher."

Edited December 3, 2016 by Rachel RSL

[LadyChatts]

What's interesting is everyone has used their idols for someone else.  Jay will probably be the only one this season who ends up using it on himself.  He should have the biggest target on his back, at the very least to force him to use his idol, but there he sits.

[laurakaye]

I'd love to see Jay go on an insane immunity challenge winning streak right about now, too.

[ljenkins782]

3 hours ago, Rachel RSL said:

You don't remember last week's game of Telephone? "Jay has an idol." "Did you hear? Jay has an idol." "We can confirm that Jay has an idol." "So Jay does have an idol."

That was such a great sequence. Jay: "Nobody except Will knows I have an idol and he's not going to tell." Cut to Will telling Zeke, who then tells EVERYONE...

I'd like to see Jay go on a run too, but this season has been interesting in terms of individual winners, there's been such a mix of winners. Like, who predicted David and Adam winning one? 

I have to wonder if there's been some turnover amongst the staff of the show because the casting, the editing, and the variety of challenges has been a lot better. 

[peachmangosteen]

4 hours ago, Rachel RSL said:

You don't remember last week's game of Telephone? "Jay has an idol." "Did you hear? Jay has an idol." "We can confirm that Jay has an idol." "So Jay does have an idol."

I do remember that, but for some reason I forgot it was about Jay. Honestly I often forget Jay is even still there!

2 hours ago, laurakaye said:

I'd love to see Jay go on an insane immunity challenge winning streak right about now, too.

I could easily see this happening. I'm telling you, Jay is gonna Fabio his way to the win.

[Rachel RSL]

I think if Jay gets anywhere near that final 3 (final 2?), he's got it in the bag. 

[peachmangosteen]

Yep, and I think that he's likely to IC win his way there. Plus he has the HII. I don't really think the others will have a chance to get rid of him before the finals. But honestly I could actually see them being dumb/naive enough to let him get farther than he should and not realizing the mistake they made until it's too late.

[waving feather]

About Jay getting lucky, yes to a certain extent when David and Zeke started to target each other. But I disagree that Jay's game play is meh. He may not be a strategic mastermind (like Zeke, David, Adam or Hannah) but he is a social gamer and his social game has been on point so far. And that seems to be something that comes naturally to him, instead of just forcing for the game. I always admire players on this show who are good with people because that's a trait I would want for myself as well.

I think Jay knows how to relate to different people. Jay is a surfer dude-bro with Taylor and Figgy, a partnership with Michelle, like a friend to Michaela, like a big brother to Will, like a son to Sunday, and a fishing buddy with Ken. Zeke and him seem to get along too. This show is a popularity contest after all and getting along with people is majority of the battle, IMO anyway. I still recall the BTS talking heads by Hannah and Zeke about how everyone likes Jay and trusts Jay even though they know he is probably lying to all but one.

[peachmangosteen]

23 minutes ago, waving feather said:

He may not be a strategic mastermind (like Zeke, David, Adam or Hannah) but he is a social gamer and his social game has been on point so far.

This is true and I do appreciate the social game, probably more than I do even the strategic game. But I'm not sure if I believe Jay is really playing the social game purposely or he just happens to be a social person. Either way for me Jay's win will be meh, but he certainly won't be a winner I hate.

Edited December 1, 2016 by peachmangosteen

[waving feather]

Even if he's just a social person by nature, that's a great quality to have in this game.

Zeke about Jay in his exit interview. If Jay makes the finale, he would probably get Zeke's vote.

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Wigler: I want you to give me your quick takes on a few people we haven’t discussed much, starting with Jay.

Zeke: I love Jay. I think Jay is a tremendous human being. He’s one of my favorite guys to be out there with. We had a nice little bromance. It would have been nice to see that. I think Jay is very savvy. I think it’s incredibly impressive that he makes a big move going into the merge, has a huge target for being part of the upper echelon of Millennials, and has been able to hide and dodge the vote as far as he has. I think Jay is a pretty dangerous guy. He’s well-liked by a lot of people.

[Rachel RSL]

And that's what makes Jay so likely to win. I bet every guy there thinks they have a nice little bromance with Jay.  I remember Boston Rob saying how important it is to make each player think you have a special relationship with just them and, whether he meant to or not, Jay seems to have mastered that.

[simplyme]

I don't know that I would call it luck that people keep taking out others instead of Jay. They all know Jay is a threat, but too many people like him too well to want to vote for him. Instead of voting out Jay, the mastermind, they disassembled his alliance and left him in the game. ("Jay! You were a bad boy! To punish you, we're voting out your allies. Now behave.") Now they keep prioritizing other people as targets. It's kind of magical to watch everyone's love affair with Jay.

I would also say that Jay may have learned that playing too hard is dangerous, so right now he's content to let others drive the game and take the heat so long as he stays safe and it works to his advantage.

IMO in terms of Survivor archetypes, Jay is either fox or lion. I'm kind of waiting to see which.

[peachmangosteen]

See, to me it doesn't come off that way at all. Sure, I'm hearing now that everyone had a love affair with Jay, but I'm not really seeing it on screen. I feel like this is last season all over again but this time I'm one of the "But Michele did nothing!" people. 

[ljenkins782]

16 hours ago, Rachel RSL said:

And that's what makes Jay so likely to win. I bet every guy there thinks they have a nice little bromance with Jay.  I remember Boston Rob saying how important it is to make each player think you have a special relationship with just them and, whether he meant to or not, Jay seems to have mastered that.

That was Parvati's gift too. She wrapped Natalie and Alexis around her little finger guaranteeing that they would always be more loyal to her than Amanda even though they were all supposed to be technically in an alliance together. She had Russell and Danielle in the palm of her hand too. Some people just have that knack.

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I don't know that I would call it luck that people keep taking out others instead of Jay. They all know Jay is a threat, but too many people like him too well to want to vote for him. Instead of voting out Jay, the mastermind, they disassembled his alliance and left him in the game. ("Jay! You were a bad boy! To punish you, we're voting out your allies. Now behave.") Now they keep prioritizing other people as targets. It's kind of magical to watch everyone's love affair with Jay.

I would also say that Jay may have learned that playing too hard is dangerous, so right now he's content to let others drive the game and take the heat so long as he stays safe and it works to his advantage.

It could be argued that Jay was lucky that Taylor was such a lunkhead that he'd steal food from starving people and then openly laugh about it to said people, but worming his way out of the fallout is part of his skill. By all metrics, they absolutely should have taken Jay out (idol in pocket) that night, Taylor was a dolt who could have easily been dispatched later, especially with the brains of his alliance (Michelle and Jay) already gone. 

[Stinamaia]

I don't like Jay.  I don't see that changing.  Good news is that means he will probably win.

[NutMeg]

I've thought for a while that Jay reminds me of Parvati and I'm glad to see some of you joining me in that opinion :) There is a special social skill in making people think they have this very special connection with you - Parvati has it, Boston Rob has it, Kim has it, and now, with even Ken, who's never been in an alliance with Jay, thinking they have a connection, I'm even more sure than ever that Jay has it. [But really, Zeke's taking head some episodes ago already telegraphed it, didn't it? Plus how often is it that EVERYONE knows you have an idol, and you're not in their alliance, and they STILL never try to flush that idol?]

It's interesting how Jay could have been a Terry or an Ozzy 3.0, and relied on immunities, etc., but instead went all being his charming self to everyone, developing connections (that we didn't see on screen), notably with Sunday, Ken, etc., and just binding his time and let the game develop around him. Like in any martial art, while your normal instinct would be to go on the offensive, it's much more efficient to go with the flow. Very few people are able to do that, and because it fits his personality, Jay can. I think this ability is extremely powerful. As I said before, I see a winner here, either this Survivor season or a future one. He's got what it takes.

[Stinamaia]

3 hours ago, NutMeg said:

I've thought for a while that Jay reminds me of Parvati and I'm glad to see some of you joining me in that opinion :) There is a special social skill in making people think they have this very special connection with you - Parvati has it, Boston Rob has it, Kim has it, and now, with even Ken, who's never been in an alliance with Jay, thinking they have a connection, I'm even more sure than ever that Jay has it. [But really, Zeke's taking head some episodes ago already telegraphed it, didn't it? Plus how often is it that EVERYONE knows you have an idol, and you're not in their alliance, and they STILL never try to flush that idol?]

It's interesting how Jay could have been a Terry or an Ozzy 3.0, and relied on immunities, etc., but instead went all being his charming self to everyone, developing connections (that we didn't see on screen), notably with Sunday, Ken, etc., and just binding his time and let the game develop around him. Like in any martial art, while your normal instinct would be to go on the offensive, it's much more efficient to go with the flow. Very few people are able to do that, and because it fits his personality, Jay can. I think this ability is extremely powerful. As I said before, I see a winner here, either this Survivor season or a future one. He's got what it takes.

You may think my point supports your "charming self" theory because Jay escaped with no consequences.  I don't find Jay charming at all and I have only to harken back to the attack on Adam during tribal council.  That had a very mean girls flavor to it even if loosely connected to game play.  I think Jay's strength is not charm but a rather arrogance of "I'm a cool Dude" that comes from being handsome and athletic.  Poor Adam is fatally attracted to the cool Taylor and Jay.  I think others have this attraction too.  Just think back to the cool kids in High School who weren't very nice, but others wanted to be with them anyway.  Perhaps Jay does have charm, but I don't recall seeing it on screen.

[Rachel RSL]

He can come off as smug for sure but the fact that he chose Adam, his Survivor mortal enemy, for the loved ones reward showed a very kind, genuine side. I think moments like that often reveal a person's true character.  

Edited December 3, 2016 by Rachel RSL
Punctuation is important

[Stinamaia]

1 hour ago, Rachel RSL said:

He can come off as smug for sure but the fact that he chose Adam, his Survivor mortal enemy, for the loved ones reward showed a very kind, genuine side. I think moments like that often reveal a person's true character.  

I don't know that Adam is Jay's mortal enemy. It may have been a pure game move, but until we know otherwise I'll concede it was at least gracious. ;)

[Rachel RSL]

That's why I said "Survivor mortal enemy". Even Jay said that he and Adam had been brawling the whole time.

[Lingo]

7 hours ago, NutMeg said:

I've thought for a while that Jay reminds me of Parvati and I'm glad to see some of you joining me in that opinion :) There is a special social skill in making people think they have this very special connection with you - Parvati has it, Boston Rob has it, Kim has it, and now, with even Ken, who's never been in an alliance with Jay, thinking they have a connection, I'm even more sure than ever that Jay has it. [But really, Zeke's taking head some episodes ago already telegraphed it, didn't it? Plus how often is it that EVERYONE knows you have an idol, and you're not in their alliance, and they STILL never try to flush that idol?]

Well they did try to flush it out a couple of times early in the merge (on the Taylor and Chris votes), but it didn't work. And at this point no one's got an alliance big enough to try another split vote, and probably no one is willing to try blindsiding him. So my guess is that he's going to leverage that idol fear all the way to F4, and then he's going to be voted out then because he's too big of a jury threat.

[waving feather]

9 hours ago, Stinamaia said:

You may think my point supports your "charming self" theory because Jay escaped with no consequences.  I don't find Jay charming at all and I have only to harken back to the attack on Adam during tribal council.  That had a very mean girls flavor to it even if loosely connected to game play.  I think Jay's strength is not charm but a rather arrogance of "I'm a cool Dude" that comes from being handsome and athletic.  Poor Adam is fatally attracted to the cool Taylor and Jay.  I think others have this attraction too.  Just think back to the cool kids in High School who weren't very nice, but others wanted to be with them anyway.  Perhaps Jay does have charm, but I don't recall seeing it on screen.

But most of these people except Will are grown adults and I would hope they can see through it if Jay is going mean girls on people on a regular basis. I see Zeke more of a mean girl than Jay (and I like Zeke).

Besides, Ken is also good looking and athletic, but I don't see fellow players being charmed by him (except for maybe Hannah who has a crush on him). Figgy is pretty and athletic but most of them weren't fond of her as well.

[NutMeg]

13 hours ago, Stinamaia said:

You may think my point supports your "charming self" theory because Jay escaped with no consequences.  I don't find Jay charming at all and I have only to harken back to the attack on Adam during tribal council.  That had a very mean girls flavor to it even if loosely connected to game play.  I think Jay's strength is not charm but a rather arrogance of "I'm a cool Dude" that comes from being handsome and athletic.  Poor Adam is fatally attracted to the cool Taylor and Jay.  I think others have this attraction too.  Just think back to the cool kids in High School who weren't very nice, but others wanted to be with them anyway.  Perhaps Jay does have charm, but I don't recall seeing it on screen.

Haha, I didn't mean to say *I* find it charming, what I meant is that *people in the game* find him charming. Our personal opinion of a player has no impact on the game, but the way other players see that person does. Sorry if that wasn't clear. 

[peachmangosteen]

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I've thought for a while that Jay reminds me of Parvati and I'm glad to see some of you joining me in that opinion :) There is a special social skill in making people think they have this very special connection with you - Parvati has it, Boston Rob has it, Kim has it, and now, with even Ken, who's never been in an alliance with Jay, thinking they have a connection, I'm even more sure than ever that Jay has it. 

I think Jay has that quality, too, but what makes him different from those players imo (and based on what we're being shown) is that I don't believe he's purposefully playing that up as a strategy the way those people were. I just think he's lucky that people like him for no tangible reason and that he's good at comps. For me he's another Fabio, which isn't really a knock as I liked Fabio.

On 12/3/2016 at 10:12 AM, NutMeg said:

It's interesting how Jay could have been a Terry or an Ozzy 3.0, and relied on immunities, etc., but instead went all being his charming self to everyone, developing connections (that we didn't see on screen), notably with Sunday, Ken, etc., and just binding his time and let the game develop around him. 

To me this basically describes Michele and I still hear about what a sucky winner she is.

Which actually I think Jay might be more like Michele than Fabio. And I loved Michele, so you'd think I'd love Jay. I think my two main problems with Jay are that he gets real smug when things start going his way and also that the audience loves him when they hated Michele, which annoys me lol.

[Jillibean]

I've gone back and forth on Jay--ultimately I like him, but he's definitely had some very unflattering moments. I think what has impressed me the most about Jay's game so far was his ability to read the room enough to correctly hold his idol twice rather than playing it without knowing for sure that the tribe was going after someone else. When you consider the paranoia that everyone says is inherent to playing this game, and the fact that the plan was to make Jay think the vote was on him, I think that's a pretty solid game move in and of itself. Idols have become a big part of this game, and playing them correctly can be the difference between winning and not. I also have to chalk it up to more than luck or unintentional charisma that he ducked the axe coming for his head multiple times. I think Jay has probably been applying that social acumen of his to figuring out who is most open to keeping him/working with him and cozying up to those people, which I think likely accounts for some of why he's still there. Yes, he did get "lucky" in that first Jessica and Chris and then David and Zeke turned on one another, but I have to think that never would have happened if Jay hadn't managed to worm his way in enough that people were content to let him hang out. I think Sunday's attitude probably summed it up best--that she understood why people wanted him gone, but she personally still trusted him more than other people left in the game. 

That being said, I think what speaks the most to his weakness as a player is his inconsistent sway over his closest ally, Will. Will has already turned on him twice and even wrote his name down once. This is the person whom Jay selected as his confidant and "second", and the fact that he doesn't have a lot of control over him counters the idea that he might have this Parvati/Rob/Kim like hold over people. It's great and clearly a strong game skill that he can be generally liked by all, but the fact that he can't keep the person he is closest to where he needs him to be with the votes is problematic, IMO. 

[Stinamaia]

I think one person charmed by Jay is Sunday. I suspect Sunday clues Jay in about votes. The fact we haven't seen this leads me to believe he's getting a winner's edit. If my suspicions are true, Sunday is a numbskull because she can't win against Jay. Well, maybe not. Maybe Sunday only wants to be pulled to the end. 

[peachmangosteen]

5 hours ago, Jillibean said:

I think Jay has probably been applying that social acumen of his to figuring out who is most open to keeping him/working with him and cozying up to those people, which I think likely accounts for some of why he's still there. 

But we haven't been shown anything like this. And we haven't been shown Jay talking about it in confessionals. We can infer it if we want to, but Jay isn't really being shown doing any more than Michele was shown doing and yet it seems like a majority of the online audience will accept a Jay win while they didn't except Michele's win. I don't really get it.

1 hour ago, Stinamaia said:

I think one person charmed by Jay is Sunday. I suspect Sunday clues Jay in about votes. The fact we haven't seen this leads me to believe he's getting a winner's edit.

+1. I think Jay is being told more than we're being shown and that it's not so much that he just has an insanely good read on the situation/has a lot of gumption to not play his idol. But since we're not being shown that it leads people to believe he's playing better than he is, so yea, winner's edit imo.

Edited December 4, 2016 by peachmangosteen

[violet and green]

17 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

But we haven't been shown anything like this. And we haven't been shown Jay talking about it in confessionals. We can infer it if we want to, but Jay isn't really being shown doing any more than Michele was shown doing and yet it seems like a majority of the online audience will accept a Jay win while they didn't except Michele's win. I don't really get it.

I think we have been shown this, and more. Maybe as you're not interested in him you haven't especially noticed.

I locked onto Jay during one of his confessionals in episode one (admittedly after confusing him for one of the other males, c/- his headscarf) as he seemed alert, self-aware, intelligent, and with a good wit about him. His people skills have been paramount, he's good in challenges, he smoothes things over with those he's betrayed, he ousted Michaela (maybe too soon, who knows, but it was fun!) and he also seems to be recognized by Sunday (and even Ken) as a general  good egg. I am so pleased he's made it this far, during a stretch where it seemed unlikely, and hope he wins.

[LadyChatts]

2 hours ago, Stinamaia said:

I think one person charmed by Jay is Sunday. I suspect Sunday clues Jay in about votes. The fact we haven't seen this leads me to believe he's getting a winner's edit. If my suspicions are true, Sunday is a numbskull because she can't win against Jay. Well, maybe not. Maybe Sunday only wants to be pulled to the end. 

I don't think Sunday can win against anybody at this point.  Maybe she thinks differently, or perhaps she is just fine getting to the final 3.  If she is clueing Jay in, I think that's another testament to how strong his social game is.  Going back to the Mari boot, Zeke confided in him then that they were going after Figgy.  So he and Michelle got the vote to change to Mari.  Michaela said she respected the move he made against her, and he obviously did it to protect one of his allies.  And then Ken last week goes to Jay of all people to blow up Will's game.  I'm not a Michele fan, but one of the issues I had with her game play (other than it did feel like the pretty prom queen beating the two outcasts), was I never got much of a sense of her game.  She may have played very good socially to warrant a win, but compared to Aubry and Tai, I just can't remember much.  In Jay's case, I feel like they are at least portraying him as someone trust worthy, and as a confidant, if socially is what will give him the win in the end.

[waving feather]

We are not shown so we can't know that Jay is not building personal relationships for the benefit of the game.

If Sunday is feeding him info, good for him! Because that means he built enough rapport with her for her to do that.

And Taylor said he told Jay to write his name down at tribal because he didn't want Jay to suffer the consequences of voting for Adam again. Like, why would Taylor do such a selfless thing. Why not he write Jay's name down as well if he knows they at going to split the vote between them?

And the reason Michaela was so shocked and hurt was because she really thought she had a personal connection with him.

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“I thought I was building loyalty with Jay, and I looked at us as a team. We both have very similar backgrounds. We both wanted to win this for our families. For him to do that to me, it was just like, ‘Man, what happened to this personal rapport that we were building?’”

It takes effort to build rapport with people, so I definitely give credit to Jay.

[Nashville]

21 hours ago, waving feather said:

Besides, Ken is also good looking and athletic, but I don't see fellow players being charmed by him (except for maybe Hannah who has a crush on him).

IMHO players are not charmed by Ken for the same reason they are not threatened by him; strategically speaking, Ken is about as sharp as a sack full of ball bearings.  He's a dependable alliance vote who, once he is no longer useful, can be easily discarded with a minimum of fuss.

[peachmangosteen]

17 hours ago, violet and green said:

I locked onto Jay during one of his confessionals in episode one ...

Someone in the winner's edit thread just rewatched the first episode to try to get a feel for the winner's edit and Jay actually had no confessionals in the first ep, which is interesting. And kinda makes me question my "Jay is the winner" spec.

I still think Jay and Michele are basically playing the exact same game, but Jay is getting credit for it (from the show) while Michele didn't. Which just proves to me that the problem the editors have is not with showing the social game as much as it is at showing a woman's social game.

[ljenkins782]

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To me this basically describes Michele and I still hear about what a sucky winner she is.

Which actually I think Jay might be more like Michele than Fabio. And I loved Michele, so you'd think I'd love Jay. I think my two main problems with Jay are that he gets real smug when things start going his way and also that the audience loves him when they hated Michele, which annoys me lol.

 

I don't think Michele was hated at all during the season. People hated her win, but not her as a person. And that was probably because the airtime breakdown was 90% Tai/Aubry to 10% Michele. 

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I still think Jay and Michele are basically playing the exact same game, but Jay is getting credit for it (from the show) while Michele didn't. Which just proves to me that the problem the editors have is not with showing the social game as much as it is at showing a woman's social game.

I disagree. More than likely, the reason Michele got so much less focus was that she faced less adversity in her time, therefore there was less of a story to tell. Which is not me taking anything away from her win at all, it just means that it's tough to weave a compelling-to-watch tv story around "tribe keeps winning, all members intact, life is good" when you have other tribes imploding and stories to tell in that limited space of one hour airtime per week. All credit to her for pulling through after the medevacs and shuffles, but those early weeks were light on the Beauty tribe because they kept winning. 

In Jay's case, the millenial tribe was also doing well, but their first boot was a huge blindside and he's been in more tricky situations since the swaps, so they're able to focus on him within the context of the story. 

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Someone in the winner's edit thread just rewatched the first episode to try to get a feel for the winner's edit and Jay actually had no confessionals in the first ep, which is interesting. And kinda makes me question my "Jay is the winner" spec.

I think he did have one because he was one of the "gen X does things the boring way, millennials follow their dreams" commenters. Which is why I didn't like him at first. 

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That being said, I think what speaks the most to his weakness as a player is his inconsistent sway over his closest ally, Will. Will has already turned on him twice and even wrote his name down once. This is the person whom Jay selected as his confidant and "second", and the fact that he doesn't have a lot of control over him counters the idea that he might have this Parvati/Rob/Kim like hold over people. It's great and clearly a strong game skill that he can be generally liked by all, but the fact that he can't keep the person he is closest to where he needs him to be with the votes is problematic, IMO. 

This is true, though this last episode makes me think that Will isn't interested in solid relationships with anyone. He outlined his plans in a secret scene with Hannah, in which he called it the "pendulum theory." He's planning to swing from group to group on a vote-by-vote basis to get out the biggest threats. So I'm not sure anyone could really count on Will and he's not intending to be "kept" by anyone.

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You may think my point supports your "charming self" theory because Jay escaped with no consequences.  I don't find Jay charming at all and I have only to harken back to the attack on Adam during tribal council.  That had a very mean girls flavor to it even if loosely connected to game play.  I think Jay's strength is not charm but a rather arrogance of "I'm a cool Dude" that comes from being handsome and athletic.  Poor Adam is fatally attracted to the cool Taylor and Jay.  I think others have this attraction too.  Just think back to the cool kids in High School who weren't very nice, but others wanted to be with them anyway.  Perhaps Jay does have charm, but I don't recall seeing it on screen.

Jay does seem like he's been a "cool kid" for most of his life and he has the confidence (and arrogance) that comes from that, but I don't really see him as mean-spirited. His confessionals and extra scenes are almost always extremely complimentary of everyone and those are where the meanest people usually spew their ugliness (like Russell Hantz calling everyone dumbasses, etc.)

As for attacking Adam, that was in an attempt to save an ally of his, which Adam definitely is not and never has been. Adam's been on the opposite side of every vote going all the way back to Mari vs Figgy. The fact that Adam's not great at firing back made it look very heavy-handed, but had that same level of critique been leveled at say, Zeke or Michaela, it would have looked less like an attack and more like an argument. 

[Lamb18]

I was the one who rewatched the first episode last night. Just checked my notes - I'm pretty sure he didn't have a confessional, but he was shown a lot and his interactions with other people shown. Taylor had a lot of confessionals - he might have had more than anyone else. Chris had a lot, too.

[Rachel RSL]

6 hours ago, ljenkins782 said:

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Someone in the winner's edit thread just rewatched the first episode to try to get a feel for the winner's edit and Jay actually had no confessionals in the first ep, which is interesting. And kinda makes me question my "Jay is the winner" spec.

I think he did have one because he was one of the "gen X does things the boring way, millennials follow their dreams" commenters. Which is why I didn't like him at first. 

I just went back and watched it (we're such geeks, heh!) and Jay did have a confessional about mid-episode but he says absolutely nothing about Gen X doing things the boring way while millennials follow their dreams. In fact, his entire confessional is about how "Tayls" is his bro and how hot Michelle is.   

[waving feather]

I see Jay as very confident and sure of himself but I can still enjoy watching him because he doesn't have a chip on his shoulder. His confidence may appear as arrogance at times but truly arrogant people don't like to give others credit and I've seen him give many of them credit, whether they are in an alliance with him or not. Of course, I see it mostly on the secret scenes where he's talking about people and they don't show a ton of it on the actual show, so I get if people has a different perception of him as a cocky smug dude. But I've always liked that he has no problem calling people out or praising them if they deserved it.

[violet and green]

8 hours ago, peachmangosteen said:

Someone in the winner's edit thread just rewatched the first episode to try to get a feel for the winner's edit and Jay actually had no confessionals in the first ep, which is interesting. And kinda makes me question my "Jay is the winner" spec.

I think I deleted it. But my recall is strong. Maybe I have mispoken and it was episode two, and it was the episode were Mari unfortunately went. I saw one and two back to back. Maybe it was screened as a double ep...

I recall this awful douche alliance and then this bro with a headscarf on saying something in a stoner voice, and then later on saying something without the headscarf on, so I thought he was another one of the brown haired boys, a more intelligent and interesting one, and when I rewatched the ep(s) I twigged oh that's the douche from Figgy and Taylor's hideous whatever they called it 'triforce'? and then I had to cancel my previous impression as I really liked what he said. Sorry, it's a personal memory and a blurry one to describe. I locked onto him early is my point. He went from that goober in triforce to someone I am interested in and like in a flash, and I put a little asterisk next to his name. My interest and appreciation has grown from that first confessional I saw and really like (but don't sue me, it might have been his actual second confessional).

[peachmangosteen]

I've gone back and forth on him. At first I liked him and even thought he was playing a better game than he was getting credit for early on, but then I started to see his smugness and I was over him pretty quickly. But there's been times I've liked him, even lately. Overall the gameplay we're being shown from him is very lackluster and uninteresting to me on top of the fact that I hate how smug he gets at times and he's just meh to me.

[LadyChatts]

Jay wants to take Adam to the end now because he respects him and considers him a warrior (though still finds him annoying enough to want to punch).  I'm really hoping Jay is the one who walks off with the million next week.

[waving feather]

5 minutes ago, LadyChatts said:

 

Jay wants to take Adam to the end now because he respects him and considers him a warrior (though still finds him annoying enough to want to punch).  I'm really hoping Jay is the one who walks off with the million next week.

Jay could take Adam to the end because I think he wins if he sits next to Adam...he has more friends on the jury than Adam. Jay is a big hearted kid (in my opinion), so I totally see why others like him.

[LadyChatts]

11 minutes ago, waving feather said:

Jay could take Adam to the end because I think he wins if he sits next to Adam...he has more friends on the jury than Adam. Jay is a big hearted kid (in my opinion), so I totally see why others like him.

He made a comment in the video that he thinks (despite their differences) that Adam keeps him around because he sees himself in him.  They have the same goal.  Jay has a lot on his own Survivor resume why he'd make a good winner, and I'd love it if the jury would reward him on that.  I also like Jay's take on his relationship with Adam, and even Will last week during the family visit.  Despite their differences and maybe not liking them so much, he can still find the bit of respect, and keeps his promises instead of being spiteful.  Win or lose, I hope Jay will play again in the future. 

I'm also going to guess that Jay doesn't use the advantage Adam gave him, so another advantage that was a waste.  

Edited December 8, 2016 by LadyChatts

[laurakaye]

I can't watch the video at work, but that's okay...I don't want to cry at work, either.

Really hoping Jay wins this thing with Adam seated next to him.  Jay is playing a great game in that he's trying to make moves, has the odds stacked against him, but he doesn't seem to be panicking.  And I think I could listen to Jay and Adam talk strategy all day.  Yin-Yang indeed.

Jay for the win.

Editing to add that Jay's handling of Will was brilliant in this episode.  Jay was all, "hey, whatever you want, Will."  Then later, Will asked Jay if the vote was going to be David (while they were talking with Hannah and Bret) and Jay said, "yes, isn't that what you wanted?"  Jay played the cowed "yes-man" to Will's King Neptune perfectly.

Edited December 8, 2016 by laurakaye

[peachmangosteen]

I still feel like Jay hasn't done much and I don't particularly like him so I'll be meh over him winning, but I'm also more convinced than ever that he will indeed win.

But hell even I shed a tear at his reaction to Adam telling him about his mom!

[azshadowwalker]

Jay is playing a similar game to Michele. And I loved her win. I may have a huge problem with Jay being defended, while Michele was slammed, but that's on an those who regularly slam young, attractive female players, not on Jay. I have made that obvious in the past, though. I want him to win. If not him, then David.

As for her not facing adversity, I don't get that argument. Her allies were voted out several times, and she managed to survive despite not having the extra votes that Aubrey had in Joe and Tai. Jay isn't facing anyone who wields 2-3 votes as a given. Joe just sat there and let Aubrey tell him what to do from day one, and Tai fell in line later. So, I am not sure how Jay has it more difficult.

Love them both, and hope this season ends like the last one.

[peachmangosteen]

6 hours ago, azshadowwalker said:

Jay is playing a similar game to Michele. 

I'm glad someone agrees with me!

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I may have a huge problem with Jay being defended, while Michele was slammed, but that's on an those who regularly slam young, attractive female players, not on Jay. 

You're absolutely right, but I can't help it, it annoys me and makes me like Jay less.

There's just something I can't explain about Jay that keeps me from going all in with liking him.