Russell Hantz is one of the most notable and successful Survivor players to never win the game. In fact, he finished runner-up the first two times he played Survivor, a feat only matched by a short list of players, including Amanda Kimmel and others.
Despite dominating each of his first two seasons, Survivor: Samoa and Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains, with some of the most diabolical and iconic moves we've ever seen, Russell was not picked by the jury to be the Sole Survivor of either season. And, Jeff Probst thinks he understands why.
In a conversation with Rachel LaMont and Jay Wolff on the latest episode of On Fire with Jeff Probst, Jeff shared what makes Survivor different from all the other reality shows. He claims the jury of players voted out of the game is one of the things that makes Survivor special. He also mentioned the changing set of criteria for determining the winner makes the game unique.
"“I mean, it's very hard for a player who is not liked by the jury to ever win this game," Jeff said. "You see it with Russell Hantz. I mean, he played arguably a very good game."
The jury is the great equalizer that holds players accountable in some respect. As Jeff pointed out, likability is a big part of the equation. It's not always about gameplay in the end when the players cast their vote for who should win Survivor.
In Russell's case, he was so disliked by the jury that, despite many agreeing he might have outplayed her, Russell lost to Natalie White with Natalie picking up seven votes while Russell only got two votes.
Then, in Heroes vs. Villains, Russell finished in third place, overall, and didn't receive a vote during the Final Tribal Council. Sandra Diaz-Twine picked up six votes to Parvati Shallow's three votes.
I think you could argue that Russell deserved many more than two votes at Final Tribal Council during his time in the game, but that's not how it played out.
"He hustled, you know, he did all that stuff," Jeff continued. "But when you got down to the Final Three, people didn't like Russell, so he got two votes. Then, he came back and played again, got to the Final three again, but he didn't get any votes. And yet, fans watching have told me they would have voted for Russell to win, but they weren't on the jury."
"They didn't live with Russell, so they didn't have that extra layer of insight about, 'Nah, maybe you wouldn't.' Trust me, you might not have."
So, there you have it. We all know that Jeff has talked to these former players. He's seen the interviews and moments left on the cutting room floor, so to speak, so I think we have to trust his opinion that, no, we probably wouldn't have voted for Russell after living with him for 20 or 30 days in the game.
Russell has already revealed that he won't be back in the Survivor 50 cast, so it's probably right to assume that his Survivor days are officially behind him.