The reality show Survivor and the Washington Football Team have mostly existed in different worlds. Until now. Surviving Snyder, a podcast from Entertainment Weekly editor and DC native Dalton Ross, connects them in an unlikely and hilarious way. The first episode dropped this past Thursday.
Ross describes the show as the “weirdest, most niche podcast imaginable”; its name derives from Ross’s not-at-all-subtle disdain for Washington Football Team owner Dan Snyder, who he refers to as the “human plague” shortly into the first episode. “I’ve carried my fandom with me…I live in Giants country, unfortunately,” he says about New Jersey.
Ross has covered Survivor for EW for years, and two veterans of the show join him as co-hosts: Rick Devens of “Edge of Extinction” and Brendan Shapiro of “Ghost Island.” All three are dedicated WFT fans and originally had a group chat to discuss the team. “We basically just turned the text chain into a podcast,” Ross says.
On the show, Ross shares several reasons he considers Snyder the “worst owner in professional sports,” including not just its workplace culture, but also its dismal record since Snyder bought the team. “It was hard to pare down,” Ross says. “That podcast could have been five hours long.” Snyder’s 22-year-long reign of ineptitude provides lots of material. “I feel really sorry for younger people because if you’re 30 years old or younger, you never really have known this team to be good,” Ross says.
Surviving Snyder will also feature other Survivor alums. The first episode features “Boston” Rob Mariano, a Survivor winner and five-time player, who discussed his time playing Survivor and his love for—you guessed it—the New England Patriots. Ross says the podcast will continue to release episodes once a week but will release two a week once the regular football season begins so the hosts can recap both Washington Football Team games and episodes of the upcoming Survivor season.
