Rittenhouse Poll, jury decision: guilty or not guilty???

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39. I was pretty certain that he won't get convicted (except for the gun charge)

but as a layman, I don't know why the defense would accept allowing the lesser charges. It was explained to Rittenhouse that the lesser charges may lower the chance to get convicted for the severe charges but in exchange there's a chance to get convicted for the lesser charges that would still result in some serious prison time.
If the defense were very confident, I'd assume they wouldn't accept the lesser charges. I think they allowed provocation to be considered by the jury which to my understanding attacks the self-defense claim (at least against Rosenbaum).

I'm just confused because I thought the defense was in the driver's seat in this case.

Correction: The provocation that the jury can consider referred to Rittenhouse doing the provocation while the provocation as a factor for the lesser homicide charge would have mattered if Rittenhouse had been provoked. So that was part of my confusion. I removed that part from my post.