Steve Moses went on the block five times in Big Brother 17 and survived all five. Twice he won the Power of Veto and used it on himself. Once he won the Battle of the Block and dethroned the woman who had nominated him. And once, at the final five, Vanessa Rousso broke a 1–1 tie to keep him in the house. He then won the final Head of Household and evicted her.
- Season: Big Brother 17 (2015) — winner, 98 days
- Jury vote: 6–3 over Liz
- Voted Steve: Shelli, Jackie, Becky, Meg, James, Johnny Mac
- Voted Liz: Julia, Austin, Vanessa
- HOH wins: 3 — week 7 double eviction, week 11, final four
- Veto wins: 2 — weeks 1 and 7, both used on himself
- Times nominated: 5 — weeks 1, 2, 7, 9 and the final five
- Final HOH: Vanessa took Part 1; Steve took Parts 2 and 3
Five times on the block
James nominated him in week one; Steve won the season’s first veto, used it on himself, and Jace went up in his place and out 12–1. Becky made him a pawn in week two, and he and Jason won the Battle of the Block and took her crown. Becky nominated him again in week seven — veto again, saved himself again, Vanessa up as his replacement, and the house flipped to evict Shelli 8–0. Austin put him beside Johnny Mac in week nine and the vote went 5–0 the other way.
The fifth nearly finished him. Vanessa was HOH and nominated Steve and Johnny Mac; Johnny Mac won the veto and took himself down, and Austin went up in his place. The vote split 1–1 — Liz to evict Steve, Johnny Mac to evict Austin — and Vanessa broke the tie in Steve’s favour. He won the very next Head of Household on a tiebreaker question: Johnny Mac answered 3,600 seconds, Steve answered 601.
Cutting Vanessa
At the final four Vanessa won the veto and, as the only person with a vote, sent Johnny Mac out. Steve told the cameras he could not evict Vanessa — that he would not be sitting there without her help. Then Vanessa took Part 1 of the final HOH, Steve edged Liz in Part 2, and the feeds caught him minutes later whispering about the woman he was about to cut: “I just want to know how to make her not feel like s—.”
Three days out, alone at quarter to one in the morning, he rehearsed his final-two speech aloud. “My goal coming into this game was just to survive the first eviction because I knew I did not have the social skills to get far in this game.” He counted his own record — “Also I won two power of vetos” — then ran straight into the jurors he had never really spoken to: “I can f—ing skip Julia and Austin unless I’m with Vanessa.” The same week he was telling Liz and Vanessa, entirely unprompted, about his man crush on Jace — a houseguest who had been gone since the first eviction of the season.
Part 3 was a quiz. Steve beat Vanessa 5–4, evicted her, and sat down next to Liz.
The 6–3
Shelli, Jackie, Becky, Meg, James and Johnny Mac voted for Steve. Julia, Austin and Vanessa voted for Liz — Vanessa casting hers against the player she had personally kept alive at the final five. James won America’s Favourite ahead of Johnny Mac and Jason. On finale morning, before any of it had happened, Steve’s goodbye to the cameras was aimed at whoever was watching: “if you want to get here you can do it! Because I was never going to make it.”
