Challenge Total Madness Player Preview: Asaf Goren
One of my favorite subplots about Asaf’s casting for Total Madness is the fact that they don’t mention Are You The One? in his bio. They have quietly phased AYTO out of the casting pool as nobody from AYTO 6–8 have appeared on the show. Not mentioning he is from AYTO could be a pointed move, or it could be the fact So You Think You Can Dance is a much more known show, and Big Brother Celeb Israel is the show people from Israel know him from.
Asaf is a fame-hungry man who will try almost anything. He will be on whatever show his agent can get him onto, and he’s been trying to get on the Challenge for years. The Challenge is the best reality television show you can get on if your goal is to try and stay on television for as long as possible.
Introducing Asaf: Season 4 of AYTO premiered in 2016. Asaf appeared on that season as an uber hyper party guy with an Israeli accent. As a character, Asaf was like a television at full volume, and the only way to turn down the volume is with the remote control. And then the remote control became lost forever, so you had to decide whether you want a super loud TV or no TV at all. Bunim-Murray chose not to have the full volume TV known as Asaf for four years.
However, Asaf has drummed up enough positive news (specifically winning Big Brother Celeb Israel) that MTV is now willing to pay him the rookie appearance fee. Out of the entire cast, Asaf is the biggest outsider aside from Jennifer Lee. Players no longer feel a need to stick to their Are You The One family like they did 8–9 seasons ago. Asaf needs to kick ass in the daily challenges and eliminations for him to succeed.
Player Vitals
Asaf Goren: 28 Years Old, 6'0, ROOKIE Season, Professional Dancer
Skills and Physical Strength: The last MTV show he did was Are You The One Second Chances. The AYTO version of the Challenge that only had one season where Devin won, and Tori Deal was the runner-up. Asaf did terribly on this show. After finishing second place in the first challenge alongside his partner, Asaf finished 8th out of 9, 8th out of 8, 7th out of 7, and 6th out of 6 in four straight challenges until they got eliminated. They weren’t athletic exhibitions, but considering AYTO competitors generally struggle mightily in daily challenges, it scares me that Asaf’s problem-solving skills were bad among a large group of AYTOers.
From a fitness perspective, Asaf is in great shape. He is a legitimate professional dancer; his cardio, core strength, and balance must be excellent. I wish Paulie were on this season because Asaf would probably be dancing at a high level in the house, and then Paulie would try to match him because, in Paulie’s mind, he’s also a professional dancer. At the end of the day, Asaf’s abs don’t matter if he can’t figure out the right strategies in the challenges.
Edit: He won Celeb Ninja Warrior Isreal, according to Asaf. I can’t find any video of it, though.
SSMP (Social, Strategic, Mental, and Political) Game: He used to be good friends with Tori. Asaf and Tori did a music video together at one point and filmed YouTube vids together. As good of friends they have been, I am afraid Tori won’t care for him at all in the house. Tori is not the type to go the extra mile to protect someone like Asaf when he could have a big target on his back due to the fact he is a brash rookie with no connections. She will continue to make YouTube videos with him off the show, but she’ll likely only worry about making sure that Jordan doesn’t get in trouble.
Aside from Tori, Asaf has no connections. I am not sure how Asaf should play this season. If he acts like himself, people will throw him into elimination early as he will be making way too much noise for a rookie. If he stays quiet, he will likely still go into elimination early and won’t get recast unless he goes on a crazy elimination win streak. In terms of puzzles, Asaf will do very poorly. He proved on AYTO Second Chances that he wasn’t the sharpest tool when it comes to anything reminding a puzzle or memorization game.
Eliminations & Winning Potential: If Asaf’s dance training translates in the field of competition, then he should be fantastic at most eliminations. I can imagine him flying across the cage in a game like Knot So Fast. He could probably tear apart obstacle courses and shock people in endurance challenges.
Or we get the guy who finished last on almost every AYTO Second Chances challenge, and he falls hard and fast. I am pessimistic about Asaf on this show. He reminds me of Bruno from Invasion. Ironically, Bruno got a crazy amount of camera exposure for his brief time on the show and even got to make out with Jenna Compono.
