Learning to recognize the "decoy winner edit"

Especially in recent seasons, production seems to have a trend of building up a non-FTC player as a "decoy winner edit" to add suspense heading into the finale.  This person is not to be confused with the runner up or second runner up (who also sometimes have edits that could be considered odd winner edits).  The person receiving the decoy winner edit often, but not always, is the last boot (in modern survivor, the fire challenge loser), but does always make it to the finale.

Many people have been fooled by decoy winner edits before.  So how can you recognize the decoy winner edit, and learn not to "fall for it"?

The important thing to remember is that a decoy winner edit is not simply a second person with a winner edit.  It's a fundamentally different edit, with surface resemblance to a winner edit.  The last four "decoy winner edits" (Tai Trang, Devon Pinto, Donathan Hurley, Kara Kay) all had weaker pre-merge content than you would expect from a winner (with the possible exception being Kara).  Their edits usually spike just after the merge and are strong for the majority of the post-merge, but then drop in visibility again for the last 2 episodes before the finale.  Which is a key difference between a decoy edit and an actual winner edit, as the winner edit stays consistent, or even increases slightly right before the finale.  And then, as if it's a "surprise", the decoy winner edit usually spikes again during the finale itself right up until that person's elimination (an example of this is Kara's strong edit during the DvG finale.  Even though I had ruled her out as a winner contender going into the finale due to her low-vis ratings in eps 12 and 13, I briefly had her as my winner pick right before the fire challenge.) 

The takeaway: Although editors do a very good job trying to "fool" viewers, we can usually outsmart the editors by not paying too much attention to a player that has an edit spike at the merge after a low-mid-vis pre-merge edit, especially if that person then drops in visibility again right before the finale.  And then even if they have a great finale, don't get fooled again in thinking that maybe they will actually win.  Instead expect them to probably lose the fire making challenge.