Jacob Theory

Okay, this may be a shot in the dark, but what the heck, I think it'll be fun to talk about.

I have a new theory about what why they're positioning Sawyer into a leader position.

I think Sawyer may turn out to be Jacob. He's the king of many names, so it wouldn't be terribly hard to believe if he created a new alias.

If the current Sawyer that we know, is on the island with the Dharma initiative and kind of falls into a leader position and then ends up being on the island for a long time...

It looks as if he might still be on the island when Ben arrives as a child. (Ed actually suggested the Ben/child arrival to me). I think Sawyer might know or will know that adult Ben kills off all of the Dharma Initiative personnel. So he will be forewarned. If Sawyer is on the island that long and so long prior to Ben, he will certainly have powers far superior to Ben or at least Ben will think so.

I also think it is possible that Sawyer will still be on the island when his plane (from season 1) crashes on the island. So he'll end up operating under the alias of Jacob to secretly control Ben and to avoid interaction with himself (2 of Sawyer) or with some that know him.

Jacob characteristics that make me think he is Sawyer:

It appears that Jacob displays a certain fondness to Locke. Jacob or the island want Locke to become the leader or "The Others". We know Sawyer was on Locke's side when the group split and he seems to have a lot of faith in Locke.

Jacob displays a curious fondness to Hurley. He allows Hurley to see the cabin when no one else can and we know Sawyer loves Hurley.

Pickett, one of the Others, gets upset when Jack does surgery on Ben and says "Shepherd wasn't even on Jacob's list". We know that Sawyer has hard feelings about Jack because of Kate. I think that situation is about to unravel in the next episode.

Jacob mysteriously befriends Christian Shepherd (Jack's dad). We know that Sawyer and Christian met in a bar.

I haven't guessed at the connection with Claire and Jacob yet, except that she's Christian's daughter and she is reunited with him at the cabin.

That's as far as my ideas about that go for now.