Guillermo Rodriguez has spent almost his entire Dancing With the Stars Season 35 run at or near the bottom of the judges’ leaderboard.
Yet week after week, he is still there.
And if viewers continue supporting him at the level they have so far, one of the most controversial victories in DWTS history suggests something surprising:
Guillermo doesn’t necessarily need to become the season’s highest-scoring dancer to have a path to the Mirrorball.
The clearest example is Bobby Bones.
Bones competed with professional dancer Sharna Burgess during Season 27 in 2018 and quickly became one of the show’s biggest fan favorites despite consistently receiving lower judges’ scores than several of his rivals.
He wasn’t considered the strongest technical dancer.
In fact, he went through almost the entire season without receiving a single 10 from the judges.
But his personality, humor and enormous connection with viewers kept him alive.
Then came the finale.
Bones and Sharna repeated their Cha-Cha and received 24 out of 30.
That was dramatically lower than several of their competitors.
Milo Manheim and Witney Carson received 30 out of 30 for their Charleston.
Evanna Lynch and Keo Motsepe also earned 30 out of 30.
Alexis Ren and Alan Bersten scored 27.
On judges’ scores alone, Bobby was clearly behind.
Then everything changed during the freestyle.
Bobby and Sharna finally earned their first perfect 30 out of 30.
But even that meant Bobby finished the finale with 54 out of 60, while both Milo and Evanna finished with perfect 60s.
It didn’t matter.
When viewers’ votes were factored into the result, Bobby Bones and Sharna Burgess won the Mirrorball Trophy.
The result immediately became one of the most debated endings in Dancing With the Stars history.
Bobby had connected with viewers so strongly that his fan support overcame a significant judges’ scoring disadvantage.
And the fallout eventually helped change the competition itself.
Beginning with Season 28, DWTS introduced the Judges’ Save.
Under that system, the bottom couples based on the combined judges’ scores and viewer votes could be placed in danger, and the judges then had the power to decide which couple would remain.
The change arrived directly after the controversy surrounding Bobby’s win and gave the panel another way to protect technically stronger dancers from being eliminated solely because of public voting.
But here is where Guillermo’s Season 35 situation becomes especially interesting.
The Judges’ Save no longer exists.
The show removed it beginning with Season 32 after executive producer Deena Katz explained that producers wanted the ultimate results to reflect America’s vote rather than having judges potentially reverse what viewers wanted.
That rule has not returned for Season 35.
Instead, judges’ scores are combined with viewer votes to determine which couples survive.
Once those totals are calculated, Carrie Ann Inaba, Derek Hough and Bruno Tonioli don’t get an additional opportunity to rescue another contestant over Guillermo.
And Guillermo has already demonstrated how powerful his public support appears to be.
He began Season 35 with just 10 out of 30, then received 12 and 15 over the following weeks.
During Mariah Carey Night, Guillermo and Witney Carson once again finished at the bottom after their Samba received only 13 out of 30.
Yet they survived.
Ciara Miller and Brandon Armstrong were eliminated despite scoring 21.
Guillermo’s popularity extends well beyond the ballroom.
Jimmy Kimmel has repeatedly promoted his longtime sidekick’s DWTS run and encouraged viewers to support him, while Guillermo has become a viral underdog throughout the season.
Even John Oliver revealed that his young sons had become so invested in Guillermo’s journey that they were checking whether he survived eliminations.
That doesn’t mean Guillermo is destined to become the next Bobby Bones.
There are still many weeks remaining, and judges’ scores remain an important part of the equation.
As the number of contestants decreases, consistently finishing far behind the other couples creates an increasingly difficult mathematical disadvantage.
But Bobby’s Season 27 victory proved that disadvantage isn’t always impossible to overcome.
And there may actually be one major difference working in Guillermo’s favor.
After Bobby won, producers created the Judges’ Save partly to give the judging panel more influence when popular contestants with weaker technical performances reached danger.
That protection is gone again.
So if Guillermo continues receiving enough votes to overcome his judges’ scores, there is currently no final judges’ decision standing between him and another week in the competition.
Witney has already defended their continued run, pointing to Guillermo’s work ethic and the amount of time he spends rehearsing despite starting the competition without dance experience.
The judges may be measuring technique.
Viewers appear to be responding to something different: entertainment, personality, improvement and connection.
And Dancing With the Stars has seen that combination win before.
Bobby Bones entered the Season 27 finale against dancers receiving perfect scores and still walked away holding the Mirrorball.
Eight years later, Guillermo Rodriguez is building a strangely familiar kind of run.
Whether it carries him all the way remains unknown.
But history has already proved one thing:
On Dancing With the Stars, the lowest judges’ scores don’t automatically mean the end of the road — even when the Mirrorball is on the line.
