Daniele Donato came in to the Big Brother 13 house with a chip on her shoulder. During a preseason SuperPass event with Ragan Fox, Daniele stated she was “robbed” in season 8. She repeated that same “robbed” sentiment yet again last night in explaining why she returned to the game. That deserves a quick refresher.
In Season 8, Daniele came in second and won $50,000 after her father, Evel Dick, picked her over Zach to go to the Final 2. She was practically gifted $50K and second place after losing the last three HoH comps (Wk 10 + Final HoH parts 1 & 2), yet still complains that she was robbed. I haven’t a clue how she was robbed. While Daniele often likes to make her problems everyone else’s fault (hence the frequently quoted “it’s naaahhhtttt faaaaiiirrr”), she has little room to blame others this year.
A week ago Daniele was sitting pretty in this game. She had a Golden Key through no efforts of her own and could coast through the first four weeks of the game doing nothing but focusing on building social relationships and keeping the strongest alliance, the Veterans, on track to insure her safety. Instead Daniele got greedy, overplayed her hand, moved too soon and too fast, and has now effectively sunk any hope she had at winning the half-million dollar prize. I’m ready to propose Daniele has no chance of winning this season and here’s why.
The Big Brother Jury House will be filled with seven votes. After this week’s eviction there will be just one more week before we’re filling the jury one by one. If the four Veterans can make it another week without losing a member then even at their worst case (all four sent to Jury) they will still have complete control over who wins this game since obviously four of the seven votes is all you need to win the $500K.
The Veterans have already said Daniele has lost their support should she make it to the final two. So in Daniele’s best case, likely in her mind seen as sitting next to any of the underachiever Newbs, if the Vets stick to their vindictive guns then she’ll lose by at least 4-3. Say Daniele is instead sitting next to one of the Vets. Her opposition will automatically get three votes and need just one more to win. Do you think Shelly would ever vote for Daniele over Jeff or Brendon? Not likely.
Even if Daniele outlasts all the Vets the Jury vote is stacked against her immediately. Should she be in the position to bring one Vet with her she’s still can’t lose a single other vote and hope to get better than second place again.
Daniele’s may only have one hope left: evict a Veteran next week before the Jury House. With nearly the entire house against her she’ll have two chances: HoH and Veto. Daniele tied the record for most Vetoes in a season at 5 (tied with Janelle) so she’s clearly a threat on that front and the house knows it. The Veterans are already debating whether to backdoor her at next chance or nominate her up front and let her compete for the Veto. It’s a risky decision and their egos may sink them.
I’m disappointed in the way Daniele played this season. I expected better. She did have a lot to prove, even if I don’t agree she was “robbed” in the past. I imagine she’d have played this game a lot differently (read: smarter) if her father had been able to stay, but does that mean Daniele was always just a second-place player best suited for a supporting role in the game of Big Brother? It’s time to see what Daniele is made of.