Board Thread:New on Survivor Wiki/@comment-26279876-20160125041417/@comment-5002930-20170819192540

The person who makes it to the Final Tribal Council and gets the most votes to win deserves to win. Period. I learned this the hard way with Aubry in Kaôh Rōng. As for Russell: no, he did not deserve to win either season. As many others have said, his social game and jury management are abysmal. Every jury is different, which is why we get different kinds of winners every season. In Samoa, Russell completely misread the Galu-majority jury. He thought they would award his self-perceived strategic gameplay instead of voting for the person they who treated them well. Natalie made connections with everyone on the jury, while Russell treated them like shit. I think it was Laura's question that was edited out where Natalie was asked what she knew about each of the jurors, and she proceeded to name all their family members one by one. Hell, Jaison and the six Galus who voted for Natalie even considered splitting their votes 4-3, just to make sure that Russell wouldn't even get second place, but ultimately decided against it. That's how much he pissed them off.

In Heroes vs. Villains, he and Parvati completely alienated the Heroes, especially after the double idol play at the merge. They would read that idiot J.T.'s letter out loud and laugh about it right in front of the Heroes, further rubbing salt in their wounds when they were already down on numbers. Remember his tense confrontation with Rupert the morning after Amanda was voted out? And for all the shit he gave the Heroes, his treatment of the Villains was just as bad. Telling Rob that Sandra and Courtney needed to go because they were useless, when Sandra and Courtney were right there? And if you haven't seen it, Coach's secret scene after his boot was him giving Russell his rosary to solidify their trust. Then at the very next Tribal Council, Russell goes on to blindside Coach. Why is this important? Because if you've seen South Pacific, Coach is very religious. Then Russell later uses Coach's rosary to give his word to Colby and Rupert after the merge, then proceeds to vote them out too. And let's not even forget the extremely callous manner he sent Danielle to the jury. He lost irrevocably Parvati's loyalty after that, and alienated yet another juror. No, the jury that season wanted to vote for someone they respected. Russell was not that person. That's why majority of their votes went to Sandra.

TLDR, Russell's social game and jury management are shit. In no way did he deserve to win either time.