It seems to me that Ishe is getting a deliberately skewed edit. In fact, it's possible that he's being edited as the "villain" of the show.

1) In the first show, we saw (on the Yahoo! site) that Ishe and Jonathan were close because of their religion and their experiences. But we weren't shown that on TV. Thus, in episode 2, when we see Ishe pulling for Jonathan, it looks like he's doing it to spite Jesse.

2) In episode 2, again on the Yahoo! site, we saw Ishe walk off the show after Jesse trashed him in the press conference. He was clearly emotionally exhausted at that point. Note that, at least as far as I can remember, we never saw Ishe trashing Jesse -- we just saw Ishe saying that it should be his choice when (not whom) he fought.

3) Cameramen had to have filmed the handshake deals between the two sides about the remaining matches, including the deal between Jimmy and Anthony to fight each other -- the deal that Sugar Ray discussed in last week's video clip. Yet we haven't seen hide nor hair of those deals.

4) We also saw Anthony siding with the team plan on the Web site (when Sergio and Miguel wanted to deviate from the plan). Yet, when Anthony double-crossed everyone and picked Brent, we've seen Anthony self-righteously claiming that he was the one who had to feed his kids ... and we've seen what looked like Ishe trying to bully him otherwise, even though, in context, it would be seen as Ishe sticking up for the other fighters and for the handshake deals that they all made.

5) When Ishe returned from defeating Ahmed, the title of the clip on the Web site is entitled "Ishe: Sore Winner." I defy anyone to find anything in that clip to justify the title.

6) When Ishe made what seemed like a very principled decision to not participate in this week's reward for the West (and one which Ishe stuck with, even as Ja Rule was handing out $2500 watches right next to him), the Web site discussed Ishe's "pouting," and it captioned the picture of Ishe sitting out with the phrase, "There's no "I" in team but there is one in Ishe, who boycotts the West's Reward." We also saw Alfonso agreeing to forget about Anthony's actions before the reward. Which seems less phony to you: throwing a fit and then changing your mind before the reward (as Alfonso did), or sitting the reward out (as Ishe did)?

7) Here's this week's Yahoo! question for the show, which seems to me to be trying to build up the Ishe-as-bad-guy idea:
Ishe has talked trash with opponent Ahmed and teammates Jesse and Anthony. What will he do next?
- Challenge Tommy to a cuss-off
- Out-pray vanquished Bible-study buddy Brent
- Criticize Jackie's fashion sense
- Audition vs. Sly for the lead in the next Rambo

...and so on.

So why make Ishe into a villain? Is it because he behaved as a villain? Well, no -- for example, he hasn't nagged anyone into building a shelter in a flood plain shortly before the river rises.
Is it because Burnett sees him as a villain? Unlikely. Is it because nobody else among the final eight is willing to state his feelings as strongly, and Burnett knows that every reality show needs someone like that up front? Possibly. But there must be a reason.