Survivor: Heroes vs. Healers vs. Hustlers interview: Alan Ball
Luckily, we did have a chance to touch on the surprise blindside and more with Alan in our latest CarterMatt weekly exit interview below! Read on for some additional thoughts about the vote, how he’s feeling about it now, and whether or not he has any regrets after all of this.
CarterMatt – Was it hard for you leaving the game the way that you did?
Alan Ball – I was in a good place. It’s hard seeing it [now] — I don’t like losing and I didn’t like being sent home. I did my best, and if those are the extremes that had to happen for me to go home, how can I really, truly be mad? An advantage and the idol get played, and I end up with the short end of the stick. There’s nothing much that I could do. My hands were tied and I tried to make the best of the situation I was dealt.
Was there ever a moment where you thought your name was being written down over Ashley’s?
Absolutely. Watching the episode I even said it to Ashley — ‘if something goes wrong, if they have an idol, I’m going home.’ Ashley thought it was her, but I was like ‘if something goes wrong and Joe pulls out the idol, I’m going home. There’s no way that Joe, if he operates the way he wants to operate, will let me stay in this tribe.’ There was really no way for him to stay in that tribe [without an idol] because he was annoying pretty much everybody.
For his game I think it was the best thing to get rid of me, and he did that.
So do you think then that his ‘logical reason’ for voting you out was because you’re such a physical threat?
I think we butted heads. He said that he was intimidated by me and didn’t want to compete against me. There’s also the fact that he wanted to do things in a way where Joe’s word was the last word. For me, that doesn’t stand. My opinion is one that I’m gonna share with you regardless of if you want to hear it or not. I think that for him, that’s not the way he wanted to do things. Whether it was because Joe had the idol or because he was in a position of dominance in his previous tribe, that’s what he was doing. That’s why after the challenge I let him know that this is not how things were going to go down — ‘if you point the finger at Ashley, I’m gonna point the finger at you.’
I definitely think that for him, having another dominant personality in his tribe was intimidating for him. He couldn’t have that.
That first episode where you led the witch hunt against JP and Ashley was gold. Why did you want to target them so much in the early going?
You got nothing but time out there and as I was [at camp], I was seeing a relationship developing between Ashley and JP. Some of the things they were doing made me think they were hiding [things] from the tribe. We agreed to do this core-four thing with me, Ben, Ashley, and JP, but they were quickly becoming the power of the core four. They were getting closer than Ben and I were. They were stronger than anyone and I didn’t like that.
My feeling was to let everyone know that there was something going on so they could look at it — once I got them to a point where they were seeing it, I felt like I could control the narrative. Then I could say something about them having an idol and [people] could take that however they wanted to.
It was fun doing it! I mean, JP and Ashley got a little hot over it, but I felt like it was something I needed to do to put the target on them and make sure that I was in the majority of the tribe.
What was your ultimate plan out there this season? Did you have an endgame in mind?
Going into the game I knew that I needed to make a strong bond with the people from the first tribe. It was just a matter of finding out who I was the closest two. I really appreciated Ben and Chrissy and they were the two I was the closest to. When I found out that Katrina was going I felt like JP and Ashley were disposable to me. I didn’t want to wait to make sure that no matter what happened, there was suspicion drawn to those two. ‘Let me beat you guys to it before you put a bug in anyone’s ear about me.’ That’s what I did.
I wanted to work with Ben throughout the entire game, and I also wanted to be with Chrissy for the entirety of it.
Did you ever go by your last name out there?
Do you know what’s crazy? I don’t know if I ever shared my last name with anyone out there — wait, no, I did, but nobody caught on to it. I was reluctant to do it, but eventually I did but nobody caught on to it.
How much did you look for the immunity idol during your time out there?
I looked for it as I would do whatever I was doing. I would never leave and not make it look like it was my sole mission. If I was off collecting wood I would look, or if I was off getting water I would look. I never made it my mission. I was confident in the game that I was playing and I didn’t think that I needed an idol at that time or at any point in the game until Joe pulled out his. It was then I was like ‘d–n, I wish I had an idol’ (laughs). Up until that point I never felt like I was in jeopardy and that I really needed an idol.
How did being out there in the conditions impact you? I’ve interviewed Survivor athletes before who talked about the loss of food being a huge adjustment?
I beefed up before I got there. I eat a lot, but I was also training myself to not eat as much before I went on. Diet-wise I’ve always been able to eat what I want because I burn so many calories and my metabolism works so fast. I’m always going to work it off in a day.
It was harder to get back on track after I was back because all I wanted to do was eat junk food, but my diet wasn’t too bad. It was just hard not being able to eat when I wanted to.
Is there anything that you really could have done differently? I’ve tried to think what you could’ve done, but I don’t know what would’ve changed anything.
There are definitely things I could have done, but in the long run it would’ve hurt my game. Take after the swap when Joe and Desi approached me and asked what I wanted to do, whether I would consider teaming up with them and getting rid of Ashley. Had I considered that yeah, it would’ve gotten me through tribal last night, but when I showed up to the next challenge it would’ve [angered] the people I did want to work with. If I got rid of a Hero then there would be six Healers and they’re still six strong. I had to do everything I could to protect Ashley and get rid of one of those Healers. I’m a loyal person and no matter how I felt about Ashley, I needed to be loyal to her for the sake of our tribe.
Could have I done it? Yea, but it would’ve only kept me there at night instead of the long haul.
Then, at Tribal if I could have taken a deep breath and said to Ashley and Desi ‘look, we’re in a situation where Devon’s vote doesn’t count. He can’t help you and he can’t help us. We can eliminate him, go back to camp, and battle it out and everybody stays.’ But, I had developed a relationship with Devon back at camp and I didn’t want to stab him in the back, and I didn’t want to have to deal with Joe anymore at camp! In the end, it all worked out in the way it was going to work out.
Do you have any interest in going through this whole experience again?
Absolutely.
Are you going to miss Alan Ball on Survivor?
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