Picks for Week 1 are officially open! Check your email for a link to make your pick on the website. Picks are due this Wednesday at 5 PM PST. Quick recap this week after a crazy tribal council.

4. Hoopin at Camp- The episode opens up with a montage of Toka playing hoops at camp. No real analysis here, it just looked like a lot of fun. Mike did put all that practice to good use, as he looked like Steph Curry during the last stage of the immunity challenge. With how much he celebrated, you’d think he overheard Thien An’s confessional where she called him a bottom feeder. I think he knew he was cooked if he didn’t come through there, and that’s why he was celebrating like he just won the NBA championship.

3. Jelly’s Sophie’s Choice- Jelly was in a tough spot heading into tribal. She either had to vote out another woman (after seeing 5 straight women voted off this season) or turn on Devin and the Helicopter Alliance. Alexis made a good pitch, but I think Jelly ultimately made the right decision. She’s in a good spot going forward, she’s got a tight alliance that I can see staying loyal until the end, and she also has an idol that no one knows about. #noticing

2. Kilby’s Brutal Rockmogging of Savu- Wow wow wow. What a tribal council. Kilby’s got some brass balls. He could’ve taken the easy route and voted with Savu to take out Lewis, but he decided to take the calculated risk that Savu wouldn’t go to rocks for Linnea. Him and Lewis used Maggie’s 2 extra votes to turn the tables on Savu. He still annoys me (I don’t like the way he looks) but I respect him now. He knew Eric, Sharonda and Christian weren’t about to put their necks on the line for Linnea, and played a high-stakes game of chicken with them and came out on top. It made for some electric TV, but I think he’s definitely the next to go if this tribe goes back to tribal. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised to see the Savu 3 throw the challenge next week just to send him home.

1. Linnea’s Horrible Luck- Let’s list all the things that had to happen for Linnea to get sent home this week:

1. Linnea meets Maggie on Day 1 and gives her a “bad vibe”
2. Rob gets a paper cut on the bottom of his foot
3. Rob’s plan to vote himself out fails spectacularly, leading to Ana getting sent home
4. Rob decides to fake an injury and quit the game the next day
5. Carter feels uneasy on his tribe after losing losing his #1 and #2 alliance members, so he volunteers to go on a journey to Toka camp
6. Carter gets his shot in the dark pulled, and goes to Toka with the opportunity to get an extra vote
7. Carter leaves his bag open at Toka camp, and the other camp goes through it and finds the note about the extra vote advantage
8. Maggie and Brady end up finding the extra vote before Carter can get it
9. Maggie persuades Brady to give her the extra vote
10. Toka wins immunity this week, which allows one of their members to visit another tribe before tribal
11. Maggie volunteers to go and gets her shot in the dark pulled out of the bag
12. Maggie decides to go to Dina over Savu
13. Maggie decides to give both extra votes to Lewis and Kilby and tells them they need to use them to vote out Linnea
14. Kilby decides to stay Toka strong, and is willing to go to rocks
15. Linnea’s tribe bails on her, and are not willing to go to rocks to save her

This is the type of shit that happens to me when I need the last leg of my bet to hit. The odds of this 15-team parlay hitting is probably ten billion to one. If just one of these things doesn't happen, she is still in the game. (Except Rob getting the paper cut, he def would’ve found some other creative way to quit) Unfortunately for Linnea, in this timeline, all these things did happen, and she ends up getting sent home in one of the craziest tribals since Operation Italy. (Shoutout Andy!) She handled her exit gracefully, if I saw Kilby do that nerdy ass run to the voting booth on his way to voting me out, I’d lose my shit.

That will do it for this week. Please don't forget to get your picks in, and I still need payments from about 40 of you who competed last season, so get your buy-ins to me if you want in for this year. Also let me know if you didn’t receive a link to make a pick and I’ll make sure your email was entered correctly. Good luck!