Tom Sandoval Is the Number One Guy in the Group (Derogatory)

Real Vanderpump Rules fans know there are certain canonical lines: “I’m the devil and don’t you forget it.” “It’s not about the pasta.” “I’m the number one guy in the group.” That last one is spoken during a fight in season 4 between Tom Sandoval and Jax Taylor, after a night of copious drinking and, judging by the bulging eyes and saucer-like pupils, pasta. (Or is the code word tequila?) Jax calls Sandoval “a weak link” before saying, “Dude stop acting like you’re the number one f*cking guy in this group, man. I’m the number one guy in the group.”

Since that fateful moment in 2016, many a scholar have set out to determine who is, in fact, the number one guy in the group. In May, TIME bestowed the honor to James Kennedy because of his reunion quips—like when he called Sandoval “a worm with a mustache.” But is he really? A lot has changed in the Vanderpump Cinematic Universe since Jax fought with Sandoval over who’s really the top dog. Cast members have come and gone; couples have broken up and formed anew; affairs have changed the course of reality TV history as we know it. So I thought it was high time we recalibrate the numbers and decide who’s really the peak of this pack.

But therein lies the problem.“What exactly makes one of these guys number one?” I thought. “Jax is no scientist; he didn’t lay out his methodology.” Is the number one guy in the group the most famous? The one with the highest net worth? (According to Google, Jax and Sandoval are tied, which seems unbelievable given that Sandoval owns portions of businesses and Jax’s beer cheese never got off the ground.) The hottest?

Then I realized I was focusing on the wrong thing—the key to this ranking lies in “of this group.” This group. What undeniably makes the cast of Vanderpump Rules unique is how shitty they are. Let us not forget, Scandoval is far from the first time someone on this show has cheated on their significant other with another member of this show. Even the Real Housewives have certain lines they won’t cross. In order to focus on who’s the number one guy in this group, we need to really get in the mindset of this group. So to determine who sits at the apex of this amoral entourage, we have to work backwards. In essence, who’s the worst?

A disclaimer: Each man starts at zero points in this system, because they are zeroes as humans.

James Kennedy: Funny One-Liners Can Only Do So Much

• Spitting on Kristen’s door: -900 points

  • Calling her a whore: -500 points

• Body shaming women, including Brittany and Katie: -200 points for each instance

• Cheating on Raquel with Lala: -1,000 points

  • And lying about it for 5 years: -1,000 points

• “Does anyone remember when Jax f*cked Faith?”: -250 points

• Calling Sandoval a “worm with a mustache”: +100 points

Total: Roughly -3,950, but that almost feels generous, and the body shaming is hard to calculate because there are simply too many instances

Tom Schwartz: His “Aw, Shucks” Routine Isn’t Fooling Anyone

• Dumping a drink on Katie: -300 points

• Breaking the one post-divorce boundary he’d agreed upon: -500 points

• “Making out” with other women while dating Katie: -500 points for each offense; additional -250 points for each time he lied about it.

• Telling Katie, HIS WIFE, that he hates the sound of her voice and describing it as “a cacophony of Katie”: -250

  • Knowing how to use the word “cacophony” correctly: Begrudging +50 points

• Proposing to his girlfriend of 4 years with a ring on the string after she made it clear that she wanted a nice proposal: -300 points

Total: At least -2,250, though his lies are impossible to count, could be -10,000 for all I know

Jax Taylor: The Male Ramona Singer

• Cheating on Stassi with a girl in Vegas and getting her pregnant: -2,000 points

• Making Brittany get bigger boobs than she wanted, saying “I’m not paying for something I don’t like”: -900 points

• Sleeping with Kristen, his ex-girlfriend’s best friend: -1,000 points

• Cheating on Brittany with Faith: -1,000 points

  • While at the home of an elderly woman, who was in the house: extra -1,000 points, that's an affront to old people generally

• Blaming his cheating on Brittany’s weight gain: -1,000 points

• Going to Laura Leigh for her addiction support group, then dumping her after: -900 points

• Dating Carmen and Tiffany at the same time: -1,500 points

• Getting tattoos of Stassi’s face and Carmen’s name: Not actually harmful, just stupid. Zero points, I just wanted to bring it up.

• Telling Brittany to make him a sandwich: -100 points

• Giving us this iconic line off of which I based this entire ranking: Fine, +50 points

Total: -16,050 or so, but again, the math gets tricky when you're this crappy of a person

Tom Sandoval: Ruiner of White Nail Polish

• Cheating on Kristen with Ariana: -500 points if all they did was in fact make out at the Golden Nugget; -1,000 points because I’ve never believed that

• Cheating on Ariana with Miami girl: -1,000 points

• Lying about Miami girl when she confronted him at SUR: -500 points

• Cheating on his girlfriend of nine years, with whom he was about to fertilize eggs, with HER BEST FRIEND, who’s also a castmate of the show: -10,000 points

• Sleeping with Ariana after cheating on her with Raquel because “she kept her T-shirt on, it was really hot”: -1,000 points

• Saying that at the reunion WHEN YOU KNOW YOU’RE ON CAMERA: -1,000 points

• Single-handedly supporting Los Angeles’s sequined pants industry: +1 point

Total: -15,500 points

**Judge’s Note** I am just now getting word from our analytics team that since Jax Taylor was fired from the show and no longer “in the group,” he is hereby disqualified from being the number one guy in the group. That means Tom Sandoval, on a technicality, is officially the number one guy. Much like how he sold out his recent shows because he was literally giving tickets away.

The problem with holding any one of these guys up on a pedestal (which, at this point, they're the only people actually doing that other than TIME magazine, I guess?) is that, if you look too closely, that pedestal is made up of shattered pieces of women’s self-esteem. The currency they trade in is not Pumptinis or shares of ownership of poorly named restaurants, but gross behavior. They treat women like shit. That's their whole deal.

So for the be-all and end-all answer to this time-honored quandary, I’ll kick it to the very originator of the phrase. Last month, a fan took to Twitter to ask Jax Taylor who he thought was the alpha male. He appropriately replied Ariana Madix. (Hey, a broken clock is right twice a day.)

You Might Also Like

• Here’s What NOT to Wear to a Wedding

• Meet the Laziest, Easiest Acne Routine You’ll Ever Try