It was another wild episode last week as Tribal Council blew up into one of those instances where it was less about talking with Jeff Probst and more about Survivors just getting up and talking amongst themselves. In the end, it was Adam who was sent home, despite the fact that I said last week that I thought he would get dragged to the end. This week we have the episode that many look forward to more than any, and that is the family visit. There is a little bit of a twist this season, as it appears from photos online that contestants don’t just get to see one family member, but kids are involved as well. This should make it an even more heart wrenching and motivating reward for the players as the chance to spend a night with their families is the ultimate motivation for them at this point.

This week I am most worried for Tony and Nick. Obviously, Nick was on the outs last week before saving himself at the last minute, and it seems like unless someone else messes up badly and puts a target on themselves that Nick is the easy vote. If anyone was to set themselves up to fail with the group, it could be Tony. He has been on his best behavior this season, but any Survivor fan knows that Tony can fly off the rails at any time and make himself vulnerable. He can be wild, paranoid, and make himself an easy vote. I enjoy Tony as a player, so I hope I am wrong here. You will not find Kim listed below despite the fact that she won immunity and has an idol, as I don’t see her winning that again, nor her idol coming into play.

Idols, Advantages and Tokens

With advantages and fire tokens coming into play on nearly a weekly basis, let’s take stock of the inventory of who has what in their bags .

Sophie – Immunity idol, 2 fire tokens
Kim – Immunity idol, 2 fire tokens
Jeremy –Safety Without Power advantage, 1 fire token
Sarah – Steal a Vote advantage, 1 fire token
Michele – 50/50 coin, 0 fire tokens
Nick – 3 fire tokens
Denise – 3 fire tokens
Tony – 1 fire token
Ben – 1 fire token
Tyson – 0 fire tokens

The Survivors

This week I'm putting contestants in order of my confidence in them, rather just from high salary to low. 

Sophie ($21) – While not winning immunity challenges, Sophie continues to perform well in challenges and it feels like she is due to win one. It certainly doesn’t hurt that she is sitting with an immunity idol in her pocket as well, which all but guarantees her surviving the vote. She is in a rock solid alliance with Sarah, and she is also very close with Ben. There really hasn’t been a sniff of trouble for Sophie yet, and even if there was she has several layers of protection.

Ben ($23) – It is hard to say whether his Tribal argument with Adam was a long time coming between two contestants that were butting heads, or was Ben strategically keeping Adam occupied so that everyone else could talk with each other to solidify their votes against Adam? Either way, Ben is cruising. He really hasn’t been a target of a vote yet, and he is looking like he is going to last a long time. As I have stated in previous weeks, Ben is great at challenges, and equally great at finding idols. His kung fu stances in an attempt to stay on the platform last week during the immunity challenge were comedy gold!  He has been in a good number of confessionals to this point of the season, although I wonder if that will decrease now that his feud with Adam is over. His salary continues to rise, and it seems like he should be a great bet to continue after this week.

Denise ($18) – The only reason that I am worried Denise this week is that she has put a little target on her back with her great play. I think voting out Sandra and then winning immunity in back to back episodes is still sitting in the back of player’s minds. However, she was rock solid safe last week, and that is why she is being included here. She could easily win immunity, she could get bequeathed a fire token from an eliminated player as she is popular, and her popularity could also get her chosen to participate in the family reward. She is tied with Nick for the most fire tokens, and has already proven savvy to use them if her name does come up. If someone was to make a list of people who were playing the best game to this point, Denise would have to be in the top two or three for sure if not number one.

Sarah ($17) – Officer Sarah became a target of Nick’s in last week’s episode, and for the first time was in a little bit of trouble of being voted out. However, if you really watched the episode you would have noticed that Sarah wasn’t really a legit target when Tribal Council started. It came down to Nick and Adam, and I think that was for two reasons. The first was that she was good relationships with many players in the game including Sophie and Ben. It also helps that she has a Steal A Vote advantage. Her salary has come way down in recent weeks, but with this advantage in her pocket she is nearly a lock to advance, if she uses the advantage you would get points for that, and Sarah is seemingly a pretty popular Survivor on the island.

Tyson ($19) – This one came down to Tyson or Tony and while Tyson is the bigger physical and social threat, Tony can rub people the wrong way quickly and seems to be more likely for the votes to not go his way. Tyson is one of the best challenge competitors left in the game, and is always fairly popular and could be bequeathed fire tokens when someone is eliminated. Even in last week’s chaos that was Tribal Council, Tyson’s was one of a couple names that really didn’t come up at all. With this week being the family visit you have to figure that even if Tyson doesn’t win the challenge that there is a strong chance that he gets picked to join in the reward considering how much he talks about his wife and kids. is a Survivor legend and funny, and has frequently given multiple confessionals each episode, so there is a chance for more points for both of those reasons. Tyson certainly appears to be safe to survive this episode.

Jeremy ($27) – He remains the highest salaried player on the slate, and Jeremy has been living up to it. He won individual immunity two weeks ago, and was never really in discussions to be voted out last week. This week I am not super high on him just because he is so much more expensive than everyone else, and could make it harder to put a solid lineup together from top to bottom. However, this is the family visit episode, and Jeremy is a big family man. Even if he doesn’t win, it would be hard for the winner not to pick him to join in the reward. You have to figure that he will get a confessional or two this week surrounding the family challenge since his wife Val also played Survivor in the past. Lastly, he has the Safety Without Power advantage meaning he can walk out of Tribal Council at any point and can’t be voted out.

Example Lineup

Sophie
Ben
Denise
Tyson
Sarah