Purple Pants Podcast | Post Season w/ Austin Li Coon

[00:00:00] It's the purple pants.

[00:00:07] It's the purple pants.

[00:00:09] Pie cash.

[00:00:10] You better get that box.

[00:00:11] Why?

[00:00:12] It's the purple pants.

[00:00:13] Pie cash.

[00:00:14] You better hurry right back.

[00:00:16] Go.

[00:00:17] It's the purple pants.

[00:00:19] What's going on and welcome've had some great ones. If you have not checked out our Queen Kelly or my very personal one with Katara, go ahead and check them out because they are amazing. Now, I'm a little biased about this one because you know all season of survival 45. with Austin. changed my britchers already. Stop. I'm so excited. I've been waiting for this soap pump to be here. Do we need to leave you to alone? Maybe a little bit at the end. Yeah, you know, it is what it is. Listen, I've been no shy. I've spoke my piece. I've gotten into Twitter fights. I've gotten into fights with Jett.

[00:04:20] I've gotten into fights with Wendell.

[00:04:23] I don't play about my man.

[00:04:25] And you know, I appreciate it.

[00:04:27] Austin, I really do just watch with you. And I'm sitting watching immediately. It's like, this show is freaking awesome. I need to play this game. So that hooked me in and then like binged it all. You know, pretty much the last year, the only show I've watched is Survivor. So I'd say now I'm bigger fan than her, but she got me in. So she kind of gets that legacy. How long was she on Twitter for? Was she on Twitter before your season?

[00:05:42] No, no, she just started. We both got. There's ever a blood verse water. I think Eva could be pretty locked and loaded. I do think she's probably got a better chance of her turn than I do. I mean, everyone wants her. I mean, the thing is though, I think she's too scared to play this game. Like she would love to, but I think the physical side of it, I'm not sure if she's done the

[00:07:03] training to get there.

[00:07:04] I told her if she ever want to get on, I. And lucky for you, one of the males drop out

[00:08:20] and you're able to take a spot last minute.

[00:08:21] How did that feel going in?

[00:08:23] And then how do you think that affected your gameplay

[00:08:26] if at all? felt like the best day in my life, a day that I should never have had. I was literally studying for my midterms at Ponderosa before the game started because I was like, I'm going to have to just go home and immediately go into my midterms and I'm going to fail it. So I really didn't have time to do all this mental prep and also just mental freak out. So I just went out there and I was able to just play and kind of like not think too much

[00:09:42] of it and just have fun.

[00:09:43] While you were at Ponderosa and you are kind of like sizing up the cast, what was your

[00:09:48] initial thought? just to go in with little niche hobby and just do it while you're there and you immediately got allies without telling everyone else, I've got these allies who I already have a connection with. What vibe do you think you were given though? I was trying to give off hardcore server jock vibes. So I was chilling, always smiling too, but making sure I wasn't doing a lot of direct stuff.

[00:11:03] I would get my little bag at Ponderose

[00:11:05] and I'd just do arm curls and stuff set for my strategy going into the game at all. I didn't really think about it. So to be clear, you weren't in a relationship with Bryce during the time you were out there. We took a pause. Yeah, yeah. He let me take a break for the show. Like as any good guy would do for me. Got it. So you get, I guess, called up. You're this alternate and now's like full time. And you

[00:12:23] and your Reba tribe, you guys are on this boat. And I guess now you're too, the guy that I replaced as an alternate, I don't really know too much about it, but he was a bigger guy too. Like he looked really strong, he looked like he'd do well in challenges. So it's not like I replaced someone who was like gonna anchor their team down. Like I replaced someone who also was gonna be pretty solid probably. So yeah, I guess I don't know how that happened,

[00:13:41] but we're gonna-

[00:13:42] I think that's Loki a huge advantage for you too,

[00:13:45] in the sense that if any guy gets, I can't remember on Kageon, it just being like, I can't believe we're here. The cameras are there to like, yeah, my name is Brett, like what was that like for you? Oh my gosh, it's the same thing. I mean, like, cause you get there and it's like, you know what you do, you get there, you walk to your tribe flag and then you introduce each other. And then just like, it's like,

[00:15:01] we're actually doing this.

[00:15:02] Like you watch this happen to every single season

[00:15:04] with tribes introducing themselves.

[00:15:05] Like we're actually of going after seafood, we're going after Jay. And like we were but like we were totally down to roll with them pretty much. We were trying

[00:16:20] to get real tight with them and with everybody but you know with any group you kind of have to have

[00:16:24] people in the background like just in case somethingra like Emily was not an option because we knew winning over knocking out a bellow would literally change the rest of the entire game. So that was our number one priority. We're like, okay, I just beat Lulu then, but then we lost. Hey, Mel, Brian here. Gotta work from home today because the whole family caught a nasty... Daddy! Hey, Mikey! If you're gonna puke, find the popcorn ball! But my availability is 110%, coincidentally so is my fever.

[00:19:01] Kidding. Mel, I'm so cold, but not.

[00:19:03] But I'm gonna get you that budget just as soon as...

[00:19:06] Right, Mikey, like whatever. So no, if I knew that back then, I would have absolutely viewed

[00:20:22] him as a bigger threat than I did at the time. It's think that people that have played more than twice or people in my case I played wasn't a question though, but go on. Go ahead and re- ask your question. The question was you being a returnee player on winners at war. Do you feel like because you had a little bit more than 12 hours, Bruce only had 12 hours and made it well past the merge. How did that fare for you?

[00:21:42] Answer. I still made it further than like a first time player. Okay, if you're back against the wall

[00:23:00] you haven't done enough to build up your resume.

[00:23:02] You want to do crazy shit in order to win some points.

[00:23:05] You're not just trying to get to the end.

[00:23:06] And that's something like as a returning player with multiple advantages and idols, and you're at the top already, then you can't really use it to make flashy plays. The best thing you can do is just to strengthen your relationships that you have to make sure you stay on the top, as opposed like, if you're at the bottom, you got two idols. You can do some crazy stuff and get, try moving to the top. But when you're already in a power position or what,

[00:24:22] what are you gonna do with two idols?

[00:24:23] You know what I mean?

[00:24:23] So you prefer to be on the top, right?

[00:24:25] Cause that's like, I feel. And I guess, you know, even though there was a moment where it was sort of like a girl boy split, even though what was sort of the guy dynamic in the season? You know, it was really fun. Like Bruce and Jake were always on the other side of like me and Drew.

[00:25:42] Like we never really voted together. We never strateg was a major battle. I mean, it was like, how, who is going to get the first key pieces first? And I think the biggest, the, the big start of it was like, winning over Emily, take me out, Brando. And then once we were

[00:27:04] able to get Kelly out, then it felt like, okay, now even mentioning any of these Riva people? Because this fellow group is still, you know, around. But like you said, you did a great job of, I guess, getting rid of those linchpins or like those players that kind of were kind of the gluey type players. And then what I saw as a viewer was, okay, now you have players that are willing to run back and

[00:28:24] share information with various players on the Riva side, the X is on the bottom, Y is on the bottom. And because of that, we were able to, for example, sell to Emily, be like, hey, Emily, Drew and I were on the bottom, the girls are a tight thing, approve it to you. We'll take out J-Mile, it doesn't matter to us, we want to work with you.

[00:29:40] And then on their end, they're like,

[00:29:42] okay, yeah, like seafood, we gotta get rid of seafood,

[00:29:44] or we're willing to get rid of J-2,

[00:29:46] we're not really, shot until Bruce is gone. Once Bruce gone, we were able to take shots.

[00:31:00] But we all thought that we were at the top, honestly.

[00:31:02] So okay.

[00:31:03] So if you're at the top, give me two, three and four.

[00:31:07] Okay. cool, like bad ass, you know? So we felt like Julie was a huge threat going into the end because she had a lot of friends on the jury despite voting them out, which was just like a really crazy good ability of hers. It's interesting that you say that about the four of you how everyone thought that they had like a strong shot at winning because while I was watching as a fan, I'm like, depending on the Kendra vote. And we had, you know, all of us working against Caleb. And we had like, like we were taking turns kind of like picking who goes home in a way. No, I really think the Reba 4 is one of the strongest alliances. Like maybe ever in the sense that everyone was really, you seem like a contributor.

[00:33:40] Yeah.

[00:33:41] Cause we see really strong alliances that stick together, but there's usually a clear hierarchy of like,

[00:33:45] okay, you're on the bottom and you should flip.

[00:33:47] But I think with the four of you, All right, Austin. You? Oh my goodness. I mean, like a Philly cheesesteak, right? Oh, oh. Yeah. Some nice sauce on it, extra cheese. Oh, crispy on the outside bun. But like, Austin! Okay. Have you ever had a Philly cheesesteak? Yes, I have had one. But it was at like a dining court in Philadelphia.

[00:35:02] So it's like not legit.

[00:35:03] I need a real one.

[00:35:04] Anyways, I wanted to ask Austin,

[00:35:06] I was consistently impressed throughout the season vote, right? And that was the same round where we are able to do the Kelly blind side. And Bruce ended losing his vote. He had 80 bucks. He bid 80 bucks on that fish eye first. And I knew he was trying to spend all his money. And I knew he wasn't in my alliance. And if anyone wasn't in my alliance, I didn't want them to lose their money because I wanted them to have a chance of losing their vote. So that's why I bid 100 on the fish eye. I won the fish eye. And

[00:36:22] then when I go up to get it, it's like, okay mind. I mean, we were bros from the beginning and like from day two, we were linked in and we had a final two-packed and I knew he was true to that and I was going to stay true to that too. There were a couple moments towards the end where he started getting a little paranoid and like when he first started really going like we need to go real july, we need to

[00:37:41] then I started thinking in my head like, I'm going to turn on me because like I felt like

[00:37:45] in the final three like with the Reba game or anything. How was how was Drew? Yeah, you know Drew's the type of guy you just got to let him like steam off and chill out and you know He'll be fine like he it's true like after the game ended like he didn't want to talk to anybody for a while

[00:39:02] Like he kind of like wasn't saying anything the group chat

[00:39:05] He kind of just went MIA like I'd have calls them and talk to them everyone had someone else before me in their list. I had a good relationship with Kendra. We had like a little alliance going on at the tribe swapped bellow. Like we were called like the deep dish alien alliance or something. It was a good time. Like Kendra is just a lot of fun. I knew she was never gonna vote for me against me,

[00:40:20] but like also like she was a wild card out there for me

[00:40:23] because I knew she was also still trying to work

[00:40:24] with all the bellow people.

[00:40:25] I didn't really know exactly where her head was at,

[00:40:27] but we had a really the issue at the end of the day. Just.

[00:41:40] I don't see the issue.

[00:41:43] I've read more Katora side things in postgame I do remember like a chakuterie board that wasn't kutering Hindsight Monday morning quarterbacking that decision to take said person because I'm only saying said person because That person that had been took was Okay, right, but that's still no excuse it. You and I have worked through that Austin

[00:43:05] It's still a little sensitive subject threw up, it's okay. But I felt really bad about that. But strategically, I think I made the right move. Okay, now real quick, you have just won the reward. We are your tribe. Oh, you can only pick one person. Oh my goodness. Well, oh, we did it. We won a reward, man. Don't tell the people back there. All right. You're ready to fly over on the helicopter and scream at them and make them feel bad about being left at camp. Oh, yeah. This is the girl. That's what it started. Dude. Oh,

[00:45:40] this is gonna be a good time. All right. Final. Strong. We know we know guys. We okay. Right here. But yeah, yeah, yeah. But to answer that question, you know, I felt D and Drew similarly, I was never going to vote either them out. But

[00:47:00] the only thing I knew at the time, F final four, I knew my best have had to make that decision. I think honestly, probably like most likely I would have put myself in the fire against Gatora just to be totally honest, but I knew like who knows, maybe I would have been able to do it if I actually was forced to make that decision, but I was never gonna vote D out. I was never gonna vote Drew out, but yeah. I appreciate that and I don't mean to take up too much time,

[00:48:20] but like I always feel like the trolls and the people online,

[00:48:24] they're like, oh my God, I can't believe

[00:48:26] but it's like when myself being out there on the island making these decisions because I didn't want to let myself down by then just having to go back and take midterms. So that was the one part I think was the hardest for me to fully adapt to. My last question for you, getting into some post-season stuff, you know, we were hanging

[00:49:43] out before I think the season even aired. and are all on the same fraternity as well. So Austin, what do you think about, what do you think it is about you Chicago guys that has created this recipe for a losing finalist? Do you think it's, it can't be clear coincidence. You know, maybe it's like the Midwestern, like, cause you're just like the Midwestern guy, you know,

[00:51:01] very nice social, like gets along with other people,

[00:51:05] but maybe, maybe a recipe for going far. But then I think just given the fact that we're all sort of college-age kids, they've reminded that life experience or that respect is necessary to win the whole thing when

[00:52:22] we get to the end.

[00:52:23] That would be my theory on it.

[00:52:25] But that is true.

[00:52:26] I feel like the UChicago that, you know, that person that's like, look at me, like how has that been? You know, it's been different. You're right, like that has never been me. That's not what I'm used to. I don't even know if that's what I like. It's like, I don't know. I mean, I've only recently got long hair. I only threw this out from the show.

[00:53:40] Like I feel like I did have like some sort of like,

[00:53:43] like I had like terrible acne up until like three years ago.

[00:53:46] So like, this is all so new to me.

[00:53:48] It's exciting. of my 21, you know, time period. I haven't gotten a 21 yet, but when I do, I like want to make sure I take a great one so that and you know, I can post one of those, but when I get there. Yeah. Yeah, I told you to post one, but that had just been like a year and a half ago. Austin, man, thank you so much for an incredible season.

[00:55:01] Thank you for like being a great sport

[00:55:03] for the support of the Purple Pants podcast,

[00:55:06] Survivor News, like you frame. Yeah, yeah. He just got fed up with my green bubbles, I guess. I'm with that friend. But listen, great season. Again, this has been your post-season survivor news interview with my me and my me and my me.

[00:56:24] Austin!

[00:56:26] Woo!

[00:56:27] Thank you all.