Well, let's look at who the 2nd placers were compared to the 1st placers:
Kelly comes second in season one and cannot be considered to "mastermind" anything; she constantly waffled back and forth, compared to the winner, Richard, who was very consistent and open about his motives. If anybody "masterminded" that season, it was Richard, and he won.
Colby comes second in season two after knowingly taking Tina to the end after she ran the game from start to finish. If anybody "masterminded" that season, it was Tina, and she won -- and Colby took her to the end specifically because she was stronger competition.
Kim Johnson does not mastermind anything; in fact, she turned down multiple opportunities to change the game. She loses to Ethan because he is more popular while she generally alienated people.
Vecepia lied and manipulated and masterminded, but she did so in a respectable, effective way, in contrast to Neleh who wouldn't really own up to anything she did. Neleh loses specifically because she was seen as a pretty girl who followed orders, so this one played out the exact opposite of how you're saying they always do.
Clay was about as far from a mastermind as it gets. Brian is the dominant strategic, social, and physical force throughout the entire season and easily wins the jury vote over the relatively lazy and abrasive Clay.
Matt did not manipulate anything. He just sort of hung out, won a few challenges, but mostly alienated everyone with a general awkwardness and strange sense of humor. Jenna, meanwhile, is incredibly popular and made a lot of friends on the jury, and she pulled off a very impressive challenge streak at the end once her alliance implodes around her. She wins in a landslide.
Lillian Morris did not mastermind anything. She got voted out on Day 9 for being a menopausal trainwreck nobody wanted to hang out with, then got voted out of the Outcast tribe (and thus back into the game) for being a menopausal trainwreck nobody wanted to hang out with, then followed orders throughout most of the post-merge, even when she disagreed with those orders, and was overall one of the worst players ever. A pretty easy vote for Sandra, who got along with most of the jurors most of the time, had a solid strategy, and was very consistent.
Rob heavily mismanages the jury and treats jurors coldly, ruthlessly, and abrasively to an extent that is neither necessary nor wise. Amber was equally responsible for the success of their alliance but managed to secure key votes throughout the game without openly jerking off to herself, so she handily wins.
Twila made promises very hastily and pretty much openly didn't care about people she didn't like. She was a crucial part of the endgame alliance but cannot really be considered a "mastermind" by any reasonable definition of the term, while Chris was one of the most charismatic people to ever play.
Katie vs Tom may be the easiest jury vote ever and I don't think I even need to say why she was no seasonal mastermind compared to him.
Stephenie is brought to the end by a slew of people who know she will never win a jury vote because she openly treats everybody like garbage and considers herself to be above almost everyone else. It is a miracle that she managed to get even one jury vote.
Danielle is lazy around camp and generally an unlikable human being. Certainly not a mastermind in any way.
Yul wins over Ozzy (who was mostly just good at challenges) and Becky (who was the inferior version of Yul) after regularly being considered the seasonal mastermind.
Dreamz loses the jury vote because he's an idiot who betrays people seemingly at random, has 0 grasp on how Survivor works, and is a fundamentally annoying human being. Dreamz is pretty much the last contestant in the world who can be described as a "mastermind." Cassandra's loss wasn't really explained by the edit, but apparently she was a vicious shit-talker off camera. There was no real singular "mastermind" to this season. There was a group making group calls, and Earl was easily the most charismatic and pragmatic of that group.
Courtney making it to Day 39 is a miracle since she only signed up because casting promised her she'd be the first boot and could then go on a free vacation. Amanda is about even with Todd in terms of "masterminding" but then completely fails to own up to it at FTC, while Todd openly owns his game from start to finish, so similar to Vee vs Neleh, Todd vs Amanda was an instance of the jury specifically rewarding the person who was seen as more of a "mastermind."
Amanda, once again, is seen as wishy-washy and fails to really establish a coherent image of herself. The core alliance of that season functioned very strongly as a unit where everyone brought something to the table with no one singular "mastermind": Parvati was needed to rope in Alexis and Natalie (the latter of whom was needed to manipulate Erik and Jason), Cirie formally establishes the crew and gets Ozzy out and plans to get Erik out, Amanda manipulates Erik and establishes the power structure within the alliance by taking Alexis out. Everyone was about even in terms of manipulation throughout the game, but Parvati was the more respctable of the two finalists.
Sugar openly didn't expect or particularly want to win; she just wanted to fuck with everyone. Susie was just playing to get as far as she could and was content with second place. Neither one can be considered a "mastermind."
J.T. is pretty much the king of Tocantins and is majorly responsible for Jalapao being able to manipulate the core Timbiras at the merge and is just about the most charismatic player of the season. Stephen plays some role in roping in the lesser Timbiras, but is certainly no "mastermind", esp. compared to Stephen.
Russell losing seasons 19 and 20 is probably the main person you're thinking of here, but him losing the jury vote had nothing to do with people being "sore losers" and everything to do with him being a horrible douchelord to people 24/7 with absolutely no regard for the fundamental structure of the game. (And his achievements as a "mastermind" are heavily overstated anyway.)
I wouldn't really say that any one of Sash, Chase, or Fabio could be considered a "mastermind"; alliances came together as groups in that season for the most part. Of the final three, Fabio was the most well-liked.
Phillip and Natalie Tenerelli are as far from masterminds as you can get.
Albert and Coach are also pretty far from being masterminds. Albert was feckless like Mick, while Coach constantly tried to espouse virtues of honor and integrity even while betraying people. Meanwhile, Sophie was the dominant strategic force in the season, was seen as such by jurors, and was rewarded accordingly compared to the shallow Albert and the spineless, idealistic Coach.
Sabrina and Chelsea being less of masterminds than Kim again speaks for itself. Kim ran One World basically from Day 1 to Day 39.
Mike mostly did what he was told by more proactive strategic players, while Lisa had some good ideas but never got them to materialize; neither was a "mastermind" in any sense of the word.
Sherri was a proactive strategist at some key points in the game, both early and late, but she heavily failed to present this to the jurors. Dawn was probably a more dominant strategic force than John Cochran, but she was also seen as very unlikable.
Gervase and Monica being less of masterminds than Tyson again speaks for itself. Gervase was banking on Tyson losing an endgame challenge, which never occurred, while Monica knew she was losing the whole time and just wanted to stay loyal.
Woo basically did what he was told all the time while Tony was the dominant strategic force of the season.
There was no one mastermind in the most recent season; a lot of people, including all three finalists, were making key decisions at key times.
So.. I don't know who exactly you're referring to here. My guess would be that you're talking about Russell and Coach and maybe Rob, but those don't hold much water, and in any case they certainly don't amount to 99% of all the seasons in Survivor history. The notion of the "bitter jury" is a huge, huge misunderstanding, but even seasons that are widely misinterpreted as such are relatively few and far between.