Survivor 48 has been a smorgasbord season of Tribal Councils to say the least. From blindsides to expected eliminations, passionate yelling matches to negotiations. And mixed into it all that, we have seen a few history-making moments.
Most notably, three players have not only been safe from elimination, but safe from attack by their fellow castaways. There are only three players who have not had a vote cast against them in Survivor 48 so far.
Eva Erickson, Joe Hunter, and Kamilla Karthigesu have yet to receive any votes at Tribal Council
Heading into episode 11, Eva Erickson, Joe Hunter, and Kamilla Karthigesu are the only players who have yet to receive a vote against them this season.
For the number of times all three of these names have been tossed around camp as threats, it's quite surprising that none of them have been actual targets of a vote yet. Though, if you think about it, it's also not the least bit surprising. All three of these players have established great security in the game for themselves.
Eva and Joe have made their relationship and Eva's advantages clear as day, which as a viewer might make their target look bigger, but as a player actually makes their target harder to hit. There's safety in numbers, and two guaranteed votes with two advantages behind them are much more difficult to get out without putting yourself at risk.
While Kamilla has been keeping to the shadows, she's still had her alliance with Kyle to shift the spotlight elsewhere should her name come up, which he has. Twice.
But there's still a lot of game left to play, so what could this positioning mean for our castaways moving forward? I always think the best way to predict the future is to look at the past, so if any of these three have a chance at winning, I wondered where they stack up against our other new era winners.
More than 40% of new era winners had no votes against them at this point in their game
In Survivor history, 42% of Survivor winners never received a vote against them at this point in the game.
That's pretty good odds that either Eva, Joe, or Kamilla could keep riding the no-vote train through the next couple of Tribal Councils and possibly be our season 48 winner. But alternatively, the new era winner with the most votes against them going into the Final 7—as well as going into Final Tribal—was Yam Yam Arocho (Survivor 44), who played a very social and strategic game. Right now, the player who fits that description best would be Mary Zheng, who has seen 5 votes against her this season, two of which she negated with her Shot in the Dark to keep her in the game.
Only 1 new era winner never received a vote until Final Tribal Council
While many of the new era winners received minimal votes over the season—Erika Casputan (Survivor 41), Maryanne Oketch (Survivor 42), and Dee Valladares (Survivor 45) each received 2 votes before their Final Tribal while Kenzie Petty (Survivor 46) only received 1 vote against her—the only winner to never receive any votes against them was Mike Gabler (Survivor 43).
Is that because he didn't play a game worthy of being eliminated over? Who's to say?
On the opposite end of the spectrum, runners up Cassidy Clark and Owen Knight received 5 and 4 votes, respectively, throughout the season, which could argue they played the better game as people spent more time trying to eliminate them as threats. But I'm not still upset about how that season turned out or anything...
Rachel LaMont is the only new era winner to save herself from elimination
Knowing that Eva has both an immunity idol and a safety without power in her pocket offers her protection that can further her in the game. Unlike Rachel, both of these advantages are widely known about at the Niu Nai camp, so she will have to work very smart to ensure they are used in her favor and not against her.
And again, Mary has already saved herself with her shot in the dark. We also have Kyle Fraser who prevented his elimination when he played an idol on himself in episode 4—and he hasn't had any votes against him since. Plus, Kyle is the only player left who has voted correctly at every Tribal he's attended this season.
Episode 11 will be very telling of what direction the game is truly going in. Will the core 4 stay true and safe with the their "honor and integrity" alliance or will we get another shake up and find one of our power players sitting on the jury?
Tune in this Wednesday at 8 pm ET on CBS and Paramount+ to see what happens as we get one week closer to the Survivor 48 finale.