DWTS Season 11, Week 8 – Dancing by the Numbers

A.K.A – How the hell do I know who’s going to go home? 🙂

Well, there are times I wonder why I bother and this is one of those times. But then, I remind myself that the math really wasn’t as favorable to Rick as it seemed. Bristol only needed 11k votes (1.09%) and Kyle only needed 5,500 votes per million votes cast (or 0.55%) – chump change.

That does NOT mean that Bristol (or Kyle) does not have a huge fanbase – they could indeed have large fanbases. We just can’t really be sure of that. If either Jennifer or Brandy goes home tonight, it will show that their fanbase is relatively sizeable.

So, where do we stand? Well, the spread is a little bit better this week (if your name is Kyle, Jennifer or Brandy, that is), but still not enough to guarantee anyone safety.

The Judges Scores and Percentages

Place Celebrity Score Percentage
1. Jennifer 57 21.51
2. Brandy 57 21.51
3. Kyle 56 21.13
4. Kurt 48 18.11
5. Bristol 47 17.74

As you can see, Brandy and Jennifer are a good 3.77 percent higher than Bristol. I’m inclined to think that the two of them are safe – but this season, you never can tell. If one of them goes, I’m leaning towards Brandy just because of Jennifer’s history. I’m hoping neither of them goes home, though – that would be a real shame. On the other hand, if Jennifer went home I could relax on Monday nights. 🙂

Bristol and Kurt are our bottom dwellers this week; lets start with what it would take for Bristol to stay. For Bristol to stay, the following would have to happen:

– Bristol needs 3,800 more votes per 1 million votes cast than Kurt.
– If Kurt has a nice big fanbase and she can’t catch him, she would need 34k more votes per million than Kyle for her to stay and for Kyle to leave.

For Kurt AND Bristol to stay and for Kyle to go home, the following things BOTH have to happen:

– Kurt has to get 30,200 more votes per 1 million votes cast, AND;
– Bristol has to get 34,000 more votes per 1 million votes cast.

That’s a lot of votes, normally. If they succeed at that, Kyle goes home. What would it take for Brandy or Jennifer to go home? The following:

– One of the ladies gets ONE more vote than the other, AND;
– Kyle gets 3,800 more votes per million votes cast than the loser between Brandy and Jennifer, AND;
– Kurt gets 34,000 more votes per million votes cast than the loser between Brandy and Jennifer, AND;
– Bristol gets 37,750 more votes per million votes cast than the loser between Brandy and Jennifer.

How the heck likely do you think this is?? Well, ordinarily I would say “not very likely” because the bottom two really aren’t that good at dancing, with Bristol edging out Kurt. But there are a WHOLE lot of variables at play here. We have producers that insist on showing Jennifer in pain and weak. We have Maks getting into fights with Carrie Ann for which he has since apologized (some claim that Derek and Shannon went home after they got really mad in confessional – I argue she was going to go anyway, but how do you know?). We have a youngster that is learning how to dance which appeals to some segments and who has a mom who is very popular in some circles (but also reviled in many others). We have a very popular football player and a little-known charmer. Who the hell knows who’s going to go home?

Another little issue at play here is – when good dancers go home before their time, what do their fans do? This isn’t a few weeks ago when Kurt needed 48k and got it – it’s a different environment. So, are the Audrina fans going to vote Brandy and Jennifer because they’re mad that Kurt and Bristol – lesser dancers – are still there? How about Rick fans? I think we can be sure that some percentage of those voters are going to vote for someone else. I would be willing to bet that they vote for either Kyle, Jennifer or Brandy.

For all the reasons above, I’m going to say that either Kurt or Bristol will go home. We’ve had so-called “shocking” eliminations two weeks in a row – it’s time for something to work out in a normal way. 🙂 That’s my hope. I’ll probably be wrong.

So tell me – how wrong am I?