‘King of the Nerds’ season 2, episode 4 rankings: Is Chris Jackson the smartest guy in the room?

We are back with our “King of the Nerds” weekly rankings! Last week’s episode exposed a lot of the weak links in the competition as well as who the threats are that the other nerds need to watch out for. Zack has now won two Nerd Off’s in a row showing off that he is a bit of a challenge beast and Xander and Katie have brought their team to a win the past two weeks as well. Could these things hurt or help them when it comes to winning the show?

Our rankings this week are based on TV edit, strategy, likability, and performances in the various tasks including the upcoming challenge in this week’s new episode revolving around robots.

8. Zachary Storch (last week 9): Zack lost his cool again last week and it made him a target, but he’s also given one of the best “we nerds need to stick together” apology speeches ever and it seems that his team is ready to move past his antics and work together. We aren’t sure that Zack can undo what’s he’s already created and we think that if the gold team goes up again they will kick him in a pit like Spartans, but at the same time he’s shown that he can win challenges so is it really that good idea to kick him off the team?

7. Nicole Evans (last week 8): We know we say this every week, but we totally love Nicole. The problem is that she is on a losing team and we suspect that if they lose again it will be Zack up against Nicole. It’s not that Nicole is playing the game badly, because she’s not, she’s just in a bad position since the teams are completely unbalanced (especially when it comes to the Nerd War challenges) and with next week’s challenge being robot focused, their team will likely be in trouble again.

6. Kayla LaFrance (last week 6): When the purple team was facing the decision of who to send off into the Nerd Off against Zack, it seemed that the only person that wanted to send in someone that could beat Zack was Kayla. Because of that we worry that she is going to end up being on the outs with her team if they ever end up going into the Nerd Off. Also we suspect that they will send someone from the gold team to the purple team this week to even out the teams and we could see Kayla going over.

5. Jack Hou (last week 7): Jack is a favorite of ours and we feel that he could really go far in the competition, but the thing that is holding him back is just the fact that he’s on a losing team that hasn’t been able to figure out their groove. We want to see a Nerd War challenge that moves away from the purple teams strengths and gives the gold team a chance for people like Jack and Nicole to shine.

4. Brian Davidson (last week 5): Brian was one of the best when it came to the LARPing challenge and it showed his team how far he was willing to go to help bring home a win. He’s been flying under the radar so far this season, and has been fairly agreeable with his team, so there are other’s that will be targeted before him to go home. It’s not a bad strategy, but at some point he will need to step up his game.

3. Xander Jeanneret (last week 1): Xander has been number 1 in our rankings all season, but the past two challenges have had a heavy theatrical aspect to them and Xander has really shown that he is a challenge beast because of it. We still think that Xander won’t be going anywhere any time soon, but the more challenges he spearheads (and wins) the more likely the target is going to shift towards him, because if we were in this game we would not want to go up against Xander in the end.

2. Chris Jackson (last week 4): After winning the first Nerd Off and sending Kelsey home we were thinking that he was going to have a target on his back since at that point no one really knew anyone that well, and they knew Chris was a challenge champ. Since then other people have pulled the heat off of him and he’s been able to slip into a really good position where he plants great strategic ideas and lets other people run with them. It’s brilliant in that it gets Chris’ plans in action and he’s not the target. He’s by far playing the best strategic game this season (and including anyone from last season for that matter).

1. Katie Correll (last week 3): At first we weren’t sure how nerdy Katie really is (and we’re still not convinced that she is the nerdiest person here) but she is incredibly likable, has been an important part in winning the last two challenges (without being the person spearheading everything and making herself a threat) and next week’s Nerd War is all about robots! Everything is set up right now for Katie to come out on top.

Who do you think is going to win “King of the Nerds” season 2? Also if you haven’t heard we are doing exclusive exit interviews with the eliminated cast members each week so click here to see some of the ones we’ve done already. Looking for even more “King of the Nerds” fun? Be sure to check out our weekly podcast about the show and for some more TV updates just subscribe to our newsletter.

Photo: TBS