Zae Frederich on his dramatic exit from ‘Big Brother,' Jimmy's HOH win, and why he wasn't ‘fanboying' over Rachel

Yahoo

24-07-2025

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Isaiah "Zae" Frederich may have only lasted one week in the Big Brother 27 house, but his brief stint was nothing short of dramatic. The 23-year-old rookie clashed with "BB queen" Rachel Reilly, who warned, "If you come for the queen, you will get beheaded." Sure enough, Zae was evicted in a 9-5 vote over Rachel's 'Mom Squad' ally, Amy Bingham, under the chaotic HOH reign of Vince Panaro last Thursday night.
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"Obviously, it's not a great feeling," Zae tells Gold Derby. "Nobody goes into the Big Brother house wanting to get 17th place, but I'm trying to have a positive outlook. I wasn't 17th out of 17, but I was 17th out of tens of thousands of applicants. I'm really grateful that I even got the opportunity to set foot in the house."
Zae admits he wasn't much of a Big Brother fan heading into the house, so he had no idea that Rachel was such a star. In fact, he had no idea who she was. "A lot of people loved Rachel right when she stepped foot in the house," he explains. "It was a big thing for everyone. I wasn't fanboying over her — I just looked at her as another player. If anything, I looked at her as more of a threat and I wanted to get her out because people were scared of her."
"People were so scared to make moves against her," Zae continues. "They said, 'I don't want to be on the wrong side of the vote as Rachel.' I thought that was strategically a dumb move. She hasn't done anything in this game just because she's done something in past games. I wasn't scared to stand up to her and take shots if I had the opportunity."
Asked if he regrets pulling that trigger too soon, Zae stands firm. "I don't think so," he asserts. "My fate was already determined. By the time Rachel told me I knew I was already on the chopping block if I didn't win the Blockbuster competition. I do think if I would have lasted in the game a little bit longer I would have given her a run for her money. I would have put her up, I do think I would have been able to rally a lot of votes, and there's a chance I would have been able to take her out of the game."
"I don't think it was a bad strategic move to come after her that early," Zae insists. "As a physical player, if I'm sitting on the block week one, people look at me as a threat and I'm probably going home. My strategy was to make her look like a bigger threat. If people like Amy are working with Rachel, Rachel is a bigger threat than me. I was hoping they would utilize me to target Rachel because everyone else was too scared to do it."
To hear more from Zae, including his thoughts on Jimmy Heagarty's HOH win, Keanu Soto's chaotic gameplay, his close bond with Zach Cornell, and the evolving house dynamics, watch the full interview in the video above.
Plus, we dive into BB27 spoilers — from brewing house fights and secret powers in play, to the Veto meeting reveal and which players will be sitting on the block heading into Thursday night's live eviction episode!
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