‘Survivor Cambodia: Second Chance’ spotlight: Can Joe Anglim be less of a threat?
Today, our “Survivor Cambodia: Second Chance” spotlight series officially begins! We’ve written these articles now entering our twelfth straight season, but with this being a different sort of season (premiering September 23 on CBS) featuring returning players, we’re looking to change things up.
We recently detailed over here some of the changes we’re making to the system this year, since the reality is this time around that we already know these people. We really should know Joe Anglim super-well given that we just saw him on this past season of the show, but we don’t think there is a whole lot of time for him to undergo a complete transformation to his game. What he really needs to do this time around is get in a better group, one where his obvious target can be diminished.
History lesson – 10th place, “Survivor: Worlds Apart.” Known for being a super-nice guy, for being a little flirty, and for winning a ton of challenges. He basically became so enormous of a threat that it was very hard to work with him since if you took him to the end he’d likely win, and he was basically voted out at the first opportunity possible after the merge.
What worked last time – Winning, and being likable. When you’re seen as a contributor around camp and are establishing relationships, people want to keep you around. Unless you are just PETRIFIED of what Joe can do after the merge, there is almost zero reason to get rid of this guy within the first nine or ten days of the game. He’s still bringing all of that to the table this time around, and you probably don’t have to worry about him as much strategically as others.
What needs to change – Joe claims in the CBS video below that he really wants to do better with the strategy, and he needs to. Specifically, he needs to introduce a strength-in-numbers philosophy and recruit some other threats to work together as it could benefit all of them to go far. As strange as it sounds, he should also be a little more deliberately cutthroat and even nastier. Yes, Mike did pretty much win his way to the end last season after Joe was gone, but you can’t count on that. Joe needs to do something so that it is not just perceived that he is a slam-dunk to win if he makes it to the end just because people like him.
Potential obstacles – The biggest one is going to be recency bias above all else. Everyone remembers the guy, and he’s probably the most athletic person on the season. Some may be stronger, but he has that combination of speed and strength that is so deadly. We also think that there is something to be said for players wanting to get rid of the people who are well-liked, just to take them down a notch and get more time for them to shine. We saw this multiple times in the “Survivor: All-Stars” pre-merge, and that could come back here since Joe is the current reality TV flavor of the month.
Prediction – Our feeling right now is that Joe isn’t going to be the first person off; we’ve heard various preseason interviews speculating that he could be targeted right away, but that would only make sense if you deliberately wanted to cannibalize your own tribe. We feel like the odds are 50-50 that he makes the merge, since our feeling is that they maybe consider getting rid of him after they use him to make it through three or four tribal councils, around the time that a possible tribe swap becomes part of the discussion. They want to get far enough that you know the merge is on the horizon, and can afford losing a small handful of challenges without him. It’s going to be so hard for Joe to convince anyone he’s not a huge threat that we just cannot see him in the game’s home stretch.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VwrRFR3RaN8