Russell fans blame the jury. Everyone else blames Russell. The jury is never wrong; they can't be.
What they can do is award the title to a lesser player. Which happens quite frequently. I call it immaturity, for reasons I've already explained. You and I, evidently, have a fundamental disagreement on this point.
Russell actively ruined his chances of getting votes. He was completely played by his entire alliance (sans Shambo), who knew he was an obnoxious presence, and knew that he was the perfect shield and goat. Nobody from his alliance removed him because they couldn't lose to him. He was a sure a bet as can come in Survivor.
...You and I obviously didn't watch the same show. There was never once, at any point, even the slightest indication that his alliance was playing him. Stumbling ass-backward into a situation where in order to punish someone else for outplaying them, the jury votes for you =/= playing that other person.
Good Survivor players are able to balance the social, numbers, and physical games. Russell's approach was completely one-dimensional and not suitable to win Survivor. Russell's gameplay in Samoa could never win Survivor, as not a single jury would ever give him the win, despite what many odds some would wager against. He had the chance to bring people like Shambo to the end, but that would've never enter his thought process, even after losing the game handily.
Because, as I've said, the jury wasn't even interesting in giving him a fair hearing. They made up their minds before the final tribal council. Is there a rule against it? Nope. Does that make it just? Nope.
Sabotaging your own tribe early on? Bad gameplay. Voting out strong members over obvious weaker ones early on? Bad gameplay. Showing people hidden immunity idols again and again? Bad gameplay. Revealing you have lots of money at home? Bad gameplay. Playing in a way that people you can beat get voted out? Bad gameplay. Making superfluous alliances that backfire and cause them to hate you? Bad gameplay. Playing a one demensional game? Bad gameplay.
The first two points: actually, this helped him gain complete control of Foa Foa, and didn't even remotely come into play with a jury that was all-Galu except for Jaison, who definitely didn't care about earlier votes or know about the sabotage.
Showing hidden immunity idols: Not sure how it counts as bad gameplay when it doesn't result in anything bad happening to you.
Money at home: I can agree on this.
The way he played: Again, I disagree. He took two idiots who didn't do much of anything to the end. There's no logical reason to expect that this will hurt you.
Alliances: we've seen it time and again. Sometimes the people who it win and we're all "Awesome strategy!" When it doesn't work, people want to say that it was poor strategy. I think it's a pretty great strategy either way. People are morons to fall for it, but fall they do.
One dimensional game: Disagree. If you think that he got to the end without a social game that helped him maintain control of his alliances...I'm not even sure what to say to that.
I have to turn in for the night, I'll check back tomorrow. So long everybody!
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Evacuate? In our moment of triumph? I think you overestimate their chances.