Halford & Brough in the Morning - Bats Go Silent and Goalie Drama Brews
Episode Date: August 21, 2025Jamie and Dan tell us what happened in the previous day of sports as they break down the Jays' frustrating 2-1 loss to the Pirates, spotlighting their offensive woes and the ripple effects of Vladdy�...�s absence. Later they debate over Canada’s Olympic goalie depth chart. This podcast is produced by Andy Cole and Greg Balloch. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.
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Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da.
You're listening to Halford and Brough.
The pitch to Schwarbur.
Swung on.
Hit high, deep, right field.
Back at the wall and looking up, and that is gone.
Just cleared over the railing.
People want to know, why they don't know about it.
People want to know a lot of things.
Come on up, baby.
Let's go!
Mazzarella sticks for everybody!
Mazzis sticks!
I could go for some mozzarella sticks.
That sounds amazing.
At this hour of the day?
Absolutely.
Mozilla sticks, let's go, 6 a.m.
Traditional Italian mozzarella sticks.
I love that
there's so much going on
that mozzarella sticks
made the intro
made the intro
you know it was a busy day when
we're really leaning on
wacky baseball commentary this week
it's coming through for us big
all right it is Halfordham Brough
here on SportsNet 650
happy Thursday everyone
as Reach loves to say
the penultimate day of the work week
yes the penultimate day of the work week
the penultimate day of
of us working together
of Jamie Dodd and Dan Richo
That's right
As Halford and Brough
And we are broadcasting live
From the Kintech studio
Kintech footwear and orthotics
Working together with you in step
As you heard it is myself Jamie Dodd
Dan Richo here filling in for the guys all week
We also have producer Lina
Now do you have what we learned
An encore performance
Or was it a one night only
No, I won't be a one-hit wonder
Oh wow, all right
I look forward to that
And we got Laddie here as well
Hello, hello
Hello, Laddie
I'm glad you hit your catchphrase
correctly
I had to make sure
Yeah, I had to make sure today
Yeah, I was literally thinking
What's Laddy gonna put in the intro today
And Moots at L sticks
Was not on the bingo
Was not on the bingo card
No, didn't have that one either
They were talking about
What was it?
Was it the cheese steaks?
The Mets apparently set the record
for eating cheese steaks in the Phillies clubhouse.
I guess the club the Phillies provide cheese steaks to the visitors.
And the Mets account to slow them down over a hundred in one day.
Well, now we know why the Mariners struggled to watch in Philly over the last three days.
It's a brilliant tactic.
Here guys.
Here.
Just take some greasy Philly cheese steaks.
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visit sands dash trustee dot com 650 650 is the dumbbar lumber text line metro vancouver's trusted
choice for contractors and rental warriors for over 50 years visit them at one of their
three locations to serve you or online at dumbar lumber dot com we're uh already actually it was
late last night reached we're getting some blowback in the dumb bar lumber tax line people were
very mancouver tourism takes
People were very, very mad about my chirping of Thomas Mueller doing his tour of Vancouver on the bicycle.
I mean, I'm just saying maybe wait to tour the city until you actually get a win.
That's all I was saying.
Man, I'm really loving the...
Until then, you're locked up in a cell.
Exactly.
Don't do anything.
You're chained to the training pitch.
Do not leave it, even though you're Thomas Mueller.
early what we learned people can't understand sarcasm i really think you should lean into the
anti being the anti thomas muller guys everyone else loves them we're all over the moon oh my god
a legend is here and he loves the city dan richio just standing up and saying no it's it was my
moment to be like uh steelers fans were back in the day when they got so upset levy on bell
released a rap album well maybe that was just because they thought it was a terrible album
That would probably take me off as well.
A little bit of both, maybe?
Yeah, probably a little bit of both.
You should be breaking tackles, not on a rap album.
What's the matter what you?
At least make it good if we're going to do that.
Has there ever been a good athlete rap album?
Good question.
I don't know.
Clint Dempsey.
I think people said Damien Lillard's was pretty good, I guess.
Was it?
That's what I've heard.
I'll take your word for it.
Me too.
People sweat.
Anyways, all right.
You can send your What We Learn submissions in now.
we'll do that at 830. Lina's got one. I've got one I'm very, very excited about, but we need some from you as well. So text in 650, 650 to the Dunbar Lumber text line, hashtag WWL, what you've learned in the last 24 hours in sports. Looking ahead to the guest list starts at 7 o'clock. Adnan Verk from the MLB Network will join us as he does every week. And lots of interesting stories to discuss around Major League Baseball. Of course, the Jays and the Mariners. Jays will get into it. What happens.
happened, but they drop a series against the pirates.
Mariners, we know, continue to struggle.
The Yankees have kind of turned it around now.
Dodgers, some interesting storylines there.
So a lot to get into with Adnan Verk at 7.
At 7.30, we will chat BC Lions with the Moge.
And I understand we're also going to find out what Moge's favorite part about making the road
trip to Toronto is, probably a restaurant.
If I know Moge, usually that's what it is.
Toronto's got restaurants.
Toronto has a lot of great restaurants.
So we'll look ahead.
I don't think he's up at the C.N Tower being like,
ooh, look at the glass floor.
Is that the ROM?
He's like, I got to go to the ROM every time I'm there.
Do people in Toronto view their own city as a tourist destination as well?
I don't think they do.
I never did when I grew up there.
So 7.30, it's the Moge, chatting BC Lions.
And at 8 o'clock from Seattle Sports in Seattle,
covering the Seattle Seahawks.
He's been at training camp doing great work on the beat there.
Cameron Van Till will join us.
We'll get the lowdown on the Seahawks.
Doesn't sound like their starters are going to play in their final preseason game.
So what is still to be decided at Seahawks training camp and in the preseason?
And we'll look ahead to the regular season for the Seahawks as well.
So 8 o'clock Cameron Van Tilch chatting Seahawks, 7.30 the Moj.
7 o'clock, Adnan, Verk.
That's what's coming up on the show.
First, let's tell everybody what happened.
Hey, did you guys see the game last night?
No.
What happened?
I missed all the action because I was.
We know how busy you are.
life can be.
What happened?
You miss that?
What happened?
What happened?
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C.A.
And we will start on the diamond with the Jays who lose 2-1 to the Pirates.
They dropped the series two games to one.
George Springer hits a lead-off home run.
and the Jays, they get nothing after that.
They only manage three hits on the day.
Two of them were from Bo Bichette.
So only two Blue Jays managed hits yesterday, George Springer and Bobichette.
Suboptimal against one of the worst teams in baseball.
Not what you want to see.
And it wasn't even Paul Skeen's pitching for the Pirates.
And games like that, one, even though it's just a, it's only been a two game absence for Vladdy.
It really makes you miss having Vladdy in the lineup.
It also, for me, really makes me.
wish that they had added another bat at the deadline in tie france i know he had a hot start but
that doesn't count that's that's not the bat i'm talking about to add to the lineup and um
we can talk a little bit about this with the mariners as well but this has been i think you know
the two big concerns are with the jays have always been the the power pitching both in the
yeah in the starting rotation and in the bullpen do they have enough guys that can miss bats
consistently when you're going up against the best lineups in the game in the postseason
And the other big concern on the offensive side is, okay, hey, it's great.
They've changed their offensive philosophy and it's a lot of contact and they're willing to lay down buntz and, you know, take the extra base.
They're always putting the defense under pressure.
Does that approach have enough upside in the postseason?
And it does kind of remind me of, you know, almost the difference between kind of a scrappy team in the NHL and the regular season who finds ways to grind out goals.
a team that can generate grade A scoring chances consistently, right?
And I don't know if the Blue Jays, and they certainly don't with Vladie not in their lineup,
I don't know if they have that gear.
And you look at the lineup yesterday in the bottom of the lineup, right?
Ty France, Nathan Lucas, Davis, Davis Schneider, Andre Jimenez.
Davis had a good year at the plate, but, and you know, Nathan Lucas has been a nice story.
And then you've got other guys who weren't in the lineup, but, you know, Miles Straw,
he's been a decent player, but it's just Ernie Clement, like, yeah.
Are those guys going to be able to keep it going?
Are those really the guys you want fleshing out your lineup in the big moments?
Coming up to bat in the big moments when you desperately need a hit.
Again, no disrespect to any of them because they've all contributed in different ways to the Js this year
and help them win.
But I think it's very, very fair to have skepticism about that approach and about that type of
lineup composition going into October.
And a game like today kind of gives you the evidence why you might want to be skeptical.
There's yesterday.
There's an element here.
of like we haven't seen a lot of these guys actually have offensive success to this level for much of their career.
Sure, you've seen it from George Springer. Yeah, you've seen it from Vladdy. Yeah, you've seen it from Bo.
But the rest of the lineup, you know, you feel like the next time or whenever they do have a slowdown, whenever they do have a slump of any kind, that that's just going to be.
the way that it is, but ultimately, like, I look at the roster and I actually look at the statistics
from a team perspective. And basically all across the board, Jamie, they are one of the better
hitting teams in baseball. It's true. You know, you look at their on-base percentage. They have the
best on-base percentage in all of baseball at 337. Now it is boosted a little bit by their
batting average on balls in play. So they-
There is a little bit of luck that goes into their offensive numbers.
But generally, you know, this is a team that gets it done in a lot of different ways.
And it feels like a lot of it is small ball, but their top 10 in slugging percentage,
their top, their best in the league and on base percentage.
I'm not sure.
Because I'm with you.
Like there is an element of like, I don't trust this.
Something you can't quite trust.
There's an element of, I don't know if I should trust this, but then I look at the numbers and I'm like, well, what am I not trusting?
Because the elements are there for what they've done so far this season is one of the better hitting teams in all the baseball.
And I do think, though, because you're right, what they've done to this point is really impressive, right?
And they have been one of the better hitting teams.
It's not like they've struggled at the plate, but you also have to factor in how likely are some of these individual performances to continue.
And the one that stands out for me is Tyler Heideman, the backup catcher.
And he's played 50 games.
He has a big, big rival of Tommy fan.
Tyler Heiman has a 400 on base percentage this year.
And if you follow Tyler Heidman's career, it's probably not going to continue.
He's probably not going to be a really, really valuable hitter.
He's a backup catcher.
That's what he's there for.
But they've gotten, you know, 139 plate appearances of really, really valuable offense.
out of them this year. Well, you can't bank on that continuing. And I would say, like, a similar
thing. And we've seen slowdowns at different points from, you know, a guy like Ernie Clement,
right? Can you really bank on it in the key moments? That's the question for me. And it's,
it's the kind of thing that, as you said, you're kind of relying on a lot of those, the balls you're
putting in play, dropping for hits. And guys that haven't done it before. When the defense is turning
them into outs, it can look pretty ugly like it did yesterday. Like Ernie Clement, I came into
the season, um, going to be honest, not the biggest and most confident person in Ernie Clement
being essentially an everyday player for the Blue Jays. And he's, you know, he's, he's done extremely
well, you know, uh, he's been about as good, um, wins above replacement wise as Bo Bichette this
year with nine homers, 65 runs scored. He just absolutely crushes lefties as well.
which has been very helpful for the Blue Jays and some of their splits
and why they've had success against lefties this year.
But, you know, I get to a playoff series.
Am I going to trust that player a ton if they're still playing every day in those spots?
Probably not.
And those are things that I don't think you can avoid with this Jay's team.
At the same time, you know, the flip side argument of that is,
well, this style of baseball, this.
putting balls in play often in getting runners station to station and finding ways to grind
out runs is something that I do think is helpful come postseason, like having some of that
in your game, not just waiting for the home run, waiting for the big hit, which might not
come, especially in cold weather environments. Now, that's not always the biggest fear for the Blue Jays,
given they play in a dome come October,
but those are things that we always hear annually about playoff baseball.
Like you can't just sit there waiting for the three-run home run.
You've got to be able to find a way to grind out runs.
And this Jay's team has that in their identity,
whereas the Yankees don't necessarily do.
And we've seen the Jays have success against the Yankees this year.
We're seeing it with the Mariners right now where if they don't get enough home runs,
their offense just doesn't really go at all.
So I do like that element of the Jay's offense similar to the Clevelands of the past,
the Tampa Bay Rays of the past, and, you know, the Kansas City Royals team that I know it's 10 years ago now,
that beat the Jay's in the 2015 playoffs, like they were all about scratching together runs.
Yeah, I do think you need to have more of a balance of and the Jay's have.
And I hear you, right?
If you're totally reliance on the long ball, that can look ugly as well if it goes away,
it's just inherently harder to hit home runs.
But I also think typically the best teams have that power ability.
The best teams,
the teams that win in October have a really good power hitting lineup.
And again, it's not perfect.
There's no one magic trick to guarantee that you win the World Series
or guarantee that you go deep or anything like that.
But I would feel a lot more comfortable.
And look, even in the Jay's lineup,
I mean, you've got Dalton Varsho,
who's kind of the flip side of what we're talking about, right?
Where he's not going to hit for average,
but when he does connect, he drills the ball.
He's only played 40 games,
and he's among the Jay's leader in home runs this year.
He's got 13 homers in 40 games.
It's not a bad.
Strikes out a lot.
Hits a lot of home runs.
And that can be frustrating as well.
But I think a little balance in the Jay's lineup would go a long way.
And again,
well, if they get Santander back, I mean,
geez, wow, that's true, true desperation hours over here.
I'll be fine when Santander comes back.
Not that he was anything.
He was great when he was playing.
Not that he was any great shakes when he was.
when he was playing either had just the six homers in the first 50 games of the year that he did play
and having a shoulder injury is probably going to suck the power out of you but but other than that
great a great addition to the lineup if he can come back into the lineup at any point this year
there is potentially another power bat that you get into the lineup that was that's some of the
most cope high grade cope that I've ever heard on the show we're past the trade deadline
We are. There's no other acquisition. There's no other acquisition coming. There's no help coming.
So the help that's coming is Anthony Santander and not much else.
Okay. Also on the Jays, they of course had this rotation dilemma to sort out with Shane Bieber being activated.
He's going to start against the Marlins on Friday making his Jay's debut. Also his first start in the majors since I think April 2024.
So that's going to be fascinating. As a result of that, the Jays are sending Eric Lauer to the bullpen.
at least temporarily to make room and they're not going to go to the six-man rotation.
They're going to skip Eric Lauer's turn through at least this time.
And I will say, and look, Eric Lauer, another one of these players who's just been a fantastic story for the Jays really came in and stabilized their rotation and gave them some huge, huge starts, kind of before Max Scherzer had found his form when they were looking when they desperately needed another reliable arm there.
He's been a great story, but this always felt like the most obvious solution just because he's the,
least established guy and for as much as Jose Barrios has struggled recently I think it has to be
more extreme for you to start sending him to the bullpen and look hey if barrios has another rough
outing here on this turn through the rotation maybe you put him on the IL you do something like that
give him a chance to kind of reset a little bit but so often these decisions you're just made kind
of based on the weight of the player right and Eric Lauer has the least weight in the in the
rotation. So he was always going to be the logical guy to send to the bullpen.
Well, he's, he's been one of the best surprises of the Blue Jays season, Eric Lauer.
Not that he's a soft tossing lefty, but he's, you know, not throwing heat.
No. He's been getting by, not a guy that has had a tremendous career by any stretch of the
imagination. You'd have to go back to 2022 to see his best seasons with the Milwaukee Brewers
and what he was able to do there.
But this was unexpected to get this out of Eric Lauer,
almost up to 100 innings, nearly a strikeout per inning,
and an ERA to this point under three.
Now, some of the underlying metrics say it should be closer to four for Eric Lauer,
so he is getting a little bit of luck.
But he's still getting more results recently than Jose
Barrios has. Now, that doesn't put into context. You know, Barrios has been a long-tenured member of
the Blue Jays rotation, the contract, very respected member of the clubhouse, the contract, and what he's
meant to the franchise over the years. So that's why you go with Eric Lauer. It's the easiest and most
obvious decision to make to put him as the long man in the pen for now and skip his turn in the
rotation and decide further out what you want to do, but it's, it's the best of a
not great set of options that the Blue Jays have.
You just hope that they all, they all understand what it comes down to it, that it is a
competition.
Yeah.
And it has to be merit based.
There's no easy solution, but having said that, it is kind of a good problem to have.
Like you've got six starters right now, but you at least feel pretty good about throwing
out in a major league game.
and we'll see what happens with burrios here and well if beber's good as as we expected to be like
you're going to have to do this somebody's going to end up with the short end of the stick yeah it's
probably going to be lauer who ends up as the long man in the pen and then you're going to have a
further tough decision to make when it comes to the playoffs and a very difficult conversation
probably with jose barrios that he's not going to be on a playoff roster yeah or at least he's
going to be in the bullpen yeah if you haven't was the long man but we'll see
It's going to be asking. Hard decisions. Hard decisions to make.
I almost feel like, as of today, I feel there's almost no road into a playoff rotation for Jose Burrillas.
It would be very, very difficult.
Yeah, very difficult for him to make it.
That's the story with the Jays. Again, they've got the day off today.
They will take on the Marlins.
And we should note, Vladdy didn't play yesterday either.
But sounds like there's a good chance he'll be back in the lineup tomorrow against the Marlins.
Meanwhile, the Mariners got swept in a nightmare series in Philly.
They lose 11-2 yesterday.
Pitching staff really, really struggled in this one.
This time it was Luis Castillo.
It was the cheese sticks.
Maybe the cheese sticks.
He gave up three runs in four innings.
Then the Phillies roughed up the bullpen late as well.
I actually think they're just desperate to get back to the heavy gravitational pull of two mobile.
Like my pitches aren't working.
This light gravitational pull.
Even Luis Castillo having trouble.
there in Philly on the East Coast.
They got to get back to the friendly confines of T-Mobile Park.
This has been as ugly as stretch as you could have imagined for the Seattle Mariners.
And I'm still optimistic about the Mariners as a whole.
I don't think they're going to drop out of a playoff spot.
But, you know, after the great vibes of the eight-game win streak,
they've essentially pissed it all back away for the team
and giving it all back up in the standings.
And just the offense isn't really there right now.
You know, you get a couple of solo home runs, but you're not getting a whole lot else.
And it's the complete opposite of the Blue Jays where the Mariners are over-reliant on the long ball to get them offense.
And they don't have enough guys that are able to get on base.
And when the offense struggles, you really feel it.
And it just feels like absolutely nothing is going on and nothing is coming.
nothing is happening and it's very frustrating so hopefully they get back home back from the east coast
and they can get settled back into what we saw earlier after the all-star break from the Mariners
and the thing with I mean one the jays dropping the series to Pittsburgh now the Yankees have
kind of turned things around in a big way they've won five in a row they beat Tampa yesterday
the power is back for the Yankees right now 14 home runs in their last two games so all of a sudden
the Yankees only four games back of the Jays for the ALE East, but you look at the Mariners,
well, Houston finally scored some runs yesterday. They managed two to break their shutout
streak, but still lost 7-2 to the Tigers. So the Mariners have lost five in a row, but Houston's
lost four in a row. So it's really just been the status quo in the ALA West. And then even if you
were worried about the Mariners really slumping and, you know, coming back to the wildcard
chase, like the teams that are theoretically chasing a spot, the,
chasing them for that final wildcard spot.
Kansas City, Cleveland,
they haven't really shown much.
I know Kansas City got hot there.
They lost yesterday.
Cleveland has really fallen off.
Texas, who was hanging around for a while,
has really fallen off.
So there doesn't seem to be a lot of imminent concern,
I think, for either the Jays or the Mariners.
I will say, and last week, Laddie and Josh were like,
oh, the Yankees, they're dead.
You don't have to be concerned about the Yankees.
I was like, wow, crazy overconfident talk.
And now they're only four games back.
that could definitely still shape up to be a tight race in the ALE East.
14 homers for the Yankees in the last two games.
It's pretty good.
Yeah, that will get the offense going a little bit.
In a minor league park.
Yeah, that helps.
Yeah, I guess.
Every time I look at the baseball.
Or are the fences shorter?
Every time I look at baseball's league leaders, I'm like, wow, all these athletics are having
such great years.
They must be great.
Oh, yeah.
They're playing in a minor league ballpark.
This must be the best lineup ever.
The race park is designed.
the same dimensions
So that's why it's very
hitter friendly. That's why it's very hitter friendly.
It's another minor league part.
Absolutely.
But the Royals are just two and a half
games back of the Mariners for that third
last card spot.
Do the Royals scare you?
No.
No.
Not at all.
Not at all.
I have Randall Gritchick.
Yeah, that's scary for them.
I guess if the Mariners keep losing.
If the Mariners keep losing,
then obviously it comes into play.
They have Vinnie Pasquantino as well
One of my favorites.
My cousin Vinny, he's great.
The fact that Houston has kept losing
through this stretch, though, I think, has gone a long
way to kind of calm things down
for the Mariners. And what could have been
a disastrous stretch is like frustrating
instead of, oh my goodness, the sky
is falling. All right, that's
what happened yesterday.
We will continue
open segment up next. Now,
of course, we always love to chat
to Team Canada Olympic picture here
on the show during the summer.
The man who's putting that team together,
St. Louis Blues executive, Doug Armstrong.
He was on radio in Toronto
with some interesting commentary about what
he's looking for when he's building that
team, whether it'll just be Four Nations Redux
and especially what might be
happening in the crease for Team Canada's
Olympic team. So we can get into that conversation next.
Send your text in 650, 650 to the
Dunbar-Lumbered text line. It is, Halfer and
Brough here on Sportsnet, 650.
That's right. It's Frash Thursday here.
Oh, get the post. I love that.
I don't believe in hitting the post on like the What We Learn theme, but hitting the beat drop.
That's what I'm all about.
I want to start it in rhythm.
On thrash Thursdays, you got to do it.
You don't want to start talking off the beat.
That would just be annoying.
I kind of wanted you to start the segment in like a James Headfield voice.
Yeah, Josh tried that last week and it did not go well.
It hurt his throat.
I was like, wow, that was a bad decision, Josh.
You do not sound good like that.
Josh with the like softest voice at all of 650.
Justin and Nice fan did tweet the clip.
Miles Manor Josh.
Coming in.
Coming in hot.
Yeah.
I want to know more about Justin and East fan.
Like, I really do.
Does he have an archive of all of, of, of, of 650 segments?
He is like the unofficial, yeah, archivist of Sportsnet 650.
Is Camberra paying him for this?
Because it feels like, it feels like he's got a large archive of 650 content.
Yeah, I wonder what the, like, the hard drive setup is.
Yeah.
Well, it's all properly tagged, I'm sure.
Yeah, you can quickly reference many different moments from the Halford and Brooklyn.
All categorized and, yeah.
When I was with Randipe last week, he put.
pulled a old reach deep video
that's incredible. That's doing password like
three years ago. At least
three years ago. Yeah. About more, yeah.
It's like, what happened? That's incredible.
How did you even find this?
He's joining in the spot too. He's quick.
I appreciate it. That's great. Was it Josh saying that he found
like an old high school clip of like a video he made back in high school?
He can find anything, man. He can find anything.
Any information about us. He's found A-Dog. Like A-Dog used to act back in the day.
Like way back in the day he found that.
Wow.
A-Dog hadn't even seen it.
So I'm not the only former actor at the station.
Not that, well, you were an actor?
I trained to be in it.
Really?
And then it didn't go for a time.
A Canada's Wonderland.
I was, yes, I was a scare actor at Canada's Walsh.
Last week, we had told that.
What?
Yes.
I did not know this.
People wanted to know.
We got a text yesterday about it.
Apparently Randeep was saying that I was a gremlin or something like that.
It's not true.
I was not any kind of a gremlin.
What is a scare actor at Canada's Wonderland?
It's like, it's like fright nights at the P&E.
You know, so I was one of a,
of the people that goes around scaring guys and girls so what were you dressed up as uh first year i was uh i was in
the the corn maze and i was a i was a corn stalker wow so i was the costume for a cornstalker i was
dressed like a scarecrow uh and i would i stood on a stock all night well wow jumped off my uh
jumped off my steak at people that would be scary yeah that would be scary we ever close to getting
Or did you ever get hit?
I once got poked in the eye, which was very, very frustrating.
They thought I was a statue and they poked me in the eye, which was not fun at all.
No, that's not great.
That's good acting, though, if they thought you were a statue.
It's a compliment, really.
It was my tableau skills back in grade 9 drama.
What was the moment for you where you were like, acting's not for me?
The sports radio.
Was it that?
Was it getting poked in the eye?
Honestly, when I started in acting school, there was a couple of, like the dance classes,
because it was theater
it was theater school
more than it was triple television
so the dance classes
the clown classes
I was going to say the clowning
because I've done some training myself
The clown classes were something else
It gets quirky
Yeah
So if you
Okay
I know we were supposed to talk about
Doug Argus from it
This is incredible
Jamie has gone full Zach Alfenacus
And it's between two ferns right now
This is a rich vein
of material here.
Were you like into theater?
Why did you go to theater school?
I was like a theater guy.
I was a theater guy in high school.
What on earth is happening here?
I crushed it and I convinced myself that it was a path I wanted to take.
Do you have a favorite musical?
No, I don't really.
So you're not that passionate about it?
No, I guess not.
I guess not.
But I did enjoy like acting quite a bit.
Fair enough.
I was Mr. Salt and Charlie.
in the chocolate factory.
I also played
I was Mr. Beaver
in Lion the Witch and the Roredrobe.
Okay.
Which was a lot of fun.
I played a small part in Dracula
and Beauty and the Beast plays as well.
With the church,
I was Pontius Pilot
during a Passions of the Christ.
Huge role.
Yeah, I was Pontius Pilot.
I remember the priest
was the director and Father Mike
and he was like,
at the time I didn't wear contact
and he was like, you can't.
Pondes' Pilot doesn't wear glasses.
Bonsch's Pilot doesn't wear glasses.
Or you turned down for Judas, so they gave you the next step.
Father, I'm pretty much blind.
I don't know if you want me up there without my glasses on.
He's like, no, you're doing it.
It's just squint.
It's fine.
Oh, my goodness.
This is incredible.
The things you learn after seven years of working with a guy.
Anyway.
Reach was a corn star?
No, no, that's corn stalker.
Corn stalker.
Key different.
difference there. Key difference, folks.
Key difference. Halvindam Brough is brought
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one. 650, 650, of course
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What we learned is coming up at
830, although I don't know that I'm going to learn anything more interesting though. I've just
been learning about reach here. Metro Vancouver's trusted choice for contractors and rental warriors
for over 50 years, visit them at one of their three locations to serve you or online at
Dumbar lumber.com. All right. I mentioned it before the break. Doug Armstrong, of course,
executive with the St. Louis Blues is also in charge of assembling team Canada's Olympic hockey
roster. He was in charge of that same task for the four nations as well. We know
how that turned out. And with their orientation camp happening next week in Calgary, Armstrong has
been out there talking to the media a little bit. And it's always fascinating in these situations
because we could, you know, plugged in hockey fans could probably nail the roster with,
I don't know, at least 85% accuracy pretty easily, right? Like beyond the six, they've already
named. There's another group of, you know, 10 players maybe that have a very, very good chance
of being there.
Well, there's not going to be
a ton of turnover
from the four nations.
You wouldn't think so.
They're talking maybe
three or four guys
in and out,
something like that,
probably.
We'll see.
But it depends,
of course,
how everyone performs
in the early part
of the NHL season as well.
The one exception to that,
though,
might be the big
spot of concern
for Team Canada
going into the Four Nations,
which was, of course,
in the crease.
And it was Jordan Bennington,
yeah,
Aiden Hill and Sam Montembow,
who got the call.
Those were the three.
The three goalies,
at the Four Nations. Now we know what Jordan Bennington did. And considering the lack of depth
at the position for Team Canada, I think some people might be tempted to say, well, those guys were
there. They won. Jordan Bennington has the relationship with Doug Armstrong in St. Louis. It's
probably just going to be those three guys again. But Doug Armstrong was on in Toronto yesterday
on our sister station, the Fan 590 in Toronto, talking about the roster generally, but also about
the goalie situation. Here's what he had to say.
Doug.
Well, it's interesting. It's the opposite
of what people think. It's that I believe
and I've told the other
goaltenders, that's that I've talked to is that
that's the most wide open
competition on our
team right now. And
there's probably eight or
nine goalies that are fighting for three spots
but it just didn't make sense
to bring that many. So we,
instead of picking one or two and
separating, you know, two
guys from the other five or six not invited. We decided just to bring the three, but let everyone
know that this is great competition. It's part of the most wide open part of the competition.
And I talked to those other goalies that aren't there. They understand that and they understand
that being on the long list is like being at that camp. If they're the best goalies come January
1, they're going to make this team. That is Doug Armstrong, who's putting together Team Canada.
And yeah, as I was saying, those are the three goalies who are on the four nations. They're
also the only three that got invited to the orientation camp in Calgary next week. And that's
a little different than how Team USA did it. They invited the extra goalie, so they had four. It was
Joey DeCord for them. And as you hear Doug Armstrong explained there, they didn't want to,
you know, you're probably only going to take four, right? Because there's so many, so much
net time to go around at these. So they didn't want to kind of incorrectly suggest one guy was
ahead of everyone else in the pecking order by inviting him to this. And he says there's maybe
eight or nine people fighting. That's a little hard.
deep list.
It's a little, because you, like, just, you just go, are there even nine Canadian
goaltenders in the NHL these days?
You go to NHL.com and you can look at the goalie stats and sort by country of origin
and you look at the Canadians.
I'll just, I know it's wins, so don't, but just to illustrate games play.
Wins are a team stat, Jamie.
But just to, I'm using it as a proxy for like how relied on they are by their team.
So it's Aiden Hill.
Okay, he's going to be there.
Darcy Kemper.
Yeah, I can see him as an option.
Logan Thompson, big controversy
that he was left off. He's certainly going to be in the mix
this year. Sam Montembow, he was there.
McKenzie Blackwood, makes sense as a candidate.
And Jordan Bennington rounds out the six.
Number seven on the list is Stuart Skinner.
Yeah.
It's really, really difficult for me to imagine
Stuart Skinner on Team Canada's Olympic team.
With his sub-900 safe percentage.
Number eight on the list is Calvin Pickard.
Oh.
Then you get into.
He also plays for the Oilers.
He also plays for the Oilers.
Then you get into Cam Talbot, Joel Hofer, Tristan Jari, Scott Wedgwood,
Mark Andre Fleury, who's retiring.
Apparently teams have been asking him to come out of retirement, so maybe Team Canada will too.
After that top six, which wraps up, which is Hill, Kemper, Thompson, Montobo, Blackwood, Bennington.
And that's already not exactly a murderer's row.
There's some nice players in there, but it's not like, oh my gosh, what an embarrassment of riches.
after that top six for Canadian goalies in the NHL,
it drops off in a hurry.
So I don't know who goalies 7, 8, and 9 are in Doug Armstrong's mind.
And maybe he just threw that number out kind of imprecisely.
But interesting that he perceives it as, as he said,
the most wide open competition on the team.
It's wild to think that there isn't any great,
not that there isn't any great options.
But I sit here today and I say Jordan Bennington's probably starting game one of the Olympics for Team Canada.
It feels like he's got the inside track, certainly.
Especially with how he played last year at the Four Nations.
And they don't win that final against the U.S. without the way Jordan Bennington played.
He was the only guy that they played in the Four Nations.
They didn't go to anybody else.
And I know, like, Bennington's got his question marks.
He didn't have the greatest of seasons on paper for the St. Louis Blues.
but he's a big game player. He showed up and he's got more of a track record than essentially
anybody else on this list not named Mark Andre Fleury. Now, if we assume Jordan Bennington,
um, Sam Montembow and Aiden Hill are the three. Who's number four on the list? And,
for me, I can't really, I think it's between Logan Thompson and McKenzie Blackwood as they round out the top five.
And I know that there's a lot of question marks around Logan Thompson and, you know, his connection with the Vegas Golden Knights and Bruce Cassidy and how there's not a lot of trust there.
Even Pete DeBore had had Logan Thompson as well in Vegas.
So there's obviously something there. But I mean, he was one of the best goalies in the league last year.
if he continues to do that through the first half of the season,
you'd have to be pretty hard-headed
to not look at this player as a potential option for you
at the Olympics when Canada does not have a surefire option
like other nations do.
I think Logan Thompson is clearly to me first in line to take a spot.
And as you said, there was all this reporting
or early suggestions about maybe the work ethic
and the professionalism in Vegas
and how that put him in tough to make the team.
And also, I think people forget
the team was selected last year in like early December.
And so you're only,
you were only really talking about,
you know,
six or seven weeks of performance.
So I can actually understand.
I wasn't as aghast as everyone else that he was left off the team because you're
talking about such a small sample size,
especially for a goalie at that point, right?
Where it's like,
oh my gosh,
he's got this 940 save percentage.
Like,
yeah,
in like 15 games,
right?
If he,
now he continued to be one of the best goalies in the league.
And then if he carries it over to this season,
then at,
a certain point the performance becomes undeniable. And I think you have to say and do your
due diligence and just think, okay, whatever issues maybe our coaching staff had with him in
Vegas, whatever caused him to be traded from Vegas to the capitals, because they soured on him
a little bit. He's put that behind him and he's probably put it together and become a really good
goalie. I think he pretty clearly has the best opportunity to supplant one of the goalies.
I wouldn't completely rule out Darcy Kemper either. And I know he's getting.
getting older. Yeah, at a great year for the LA Kings. He had a great year for the LA Kings. And if
look at Darcy Kemper, you know, of course, winning the Stanley Cup with the avalanche a few
years ago as well, he's shown that when he has a really good defense in front of him,
he can be really, really good. Yeah. Like he's going to make those saves that you need him to make
playing behind an excellent defense or a really talented team. And guess what? If you're the
goalie for Team Canada, you're going to be playing behind a really, really talented team with a strong
defense. So I think that combination of kind of the track record he has, winning a Stanley
Cup, the fact that he is more of a veteran and very experienced, I think he would be number
two of my list as guy who has a chance to bump out one of the incumbents. I feel like McKenzie
Blackwood is higher on that list for me than Darcy Kemper. But we've named six. Yeah. And
it's really hard. There's still three more. That is apparently on Doug Armstrong's list. I'm going to
give you my best guess as to who the other three names are. Cam Talbot had a really strong
year for the Detroit Red Wings. I think he could be a possibility. The other goalie in St. Louis,
Joel Hofer was really good for the Blues last year, splitting time, mostly splitting time
with Jordan Bennington. And then, man, this might be a long.
shot, but there's a ton of hype around this kid, and he looked good in the short sample
with the Columbus Blue Jackets, but is, do you think Jet Greaves?
No.
Could potentially be a deep, I do not.
You know, as a guy that's, I'm just saying on the radar, given he's maybe Canada's best
close to the NHL goalie prospect right now.
Yeah.
Man, he has played 11 games last year and was really strong.
He's got a total of 21
NHL games under his belt.
Like, what would his
first few months of the season
have to look like for him to break?
You know what I mean?
We're talking about like a 940 save percentage.
Seriously.
He'd have to be great.
He'd have to be not just like,
oh, he's really, he's been good.
He'd have to be a phenom
to have a chance to make this team, right?
I mean, we're talking about,
and I know it's different because the depth of competition
is so much higher,
but we know how much team Canada values
the big game experience, the mentality, the professionalism, all of those things.
And that's one of the reasons why it's going to be so hard for Macklin,
Celebrini, and Connor Bedard to crack this team.
So then if we're not looking at one of these young guys then, it's Stuart Skinner,
Tristan Jari, those are the guys that would round out the top 10, maybe Jake Allen as well.
Yeah, Jake Allen, I guess.
But, you know, now we're really, we're reaching deep into names that could make those
guys, I think if anyone outside the top six
makes it, something has gone really wrong.
Either or that player has just had a phenomenal season.
Yeah.
I do think, and as Doug Armstrong said, now he said January 1st.
I don't know what exactly the date is where they have to name the team, but it is later
than it was for the four nations.
So they will have a bit more of a runway in the season, a bit more opportunity for guys
to show like, hey, I'm not just having a good month.
I've really added this to my game or this is the level you can expect.
it gives them a bit more time to kind of make those tough decisions.
They're going to have their first get-together meeting as a group for Team Canada
at the Hall of Fame weekend in Toronto.
Then they're going to reconvene so that they'll start to really get their list down in pencil,
I guess, around the Hall of Fame weekend in Toronto.
Then whittle it down a little bit more when they get into December
before they get closer to the actual announcement of the team.
It is a bit of a longer list.
26 names make the list this year versus the Four Nations, which was just the 23.
But as far as the goalie conversation goes, Bennington won me over at the Four Nations.
So I can't as much as there's other names here.
And I think Logan Thompson, McKenzie Blackwood are the two for me that have the best chance of getting into the Team Canada conversation through the first half of the year.
I still think I would put, I'd say the smart money is on Bennington starting the first game of the Olympics for Team Canada.
Yeah.
When we get to Milan later in February.
Somebody texts in, what about Connor Ingram?
And that's actually a good name.
Now, he, of course, was going through the player assistance program, but I saw, I think it was yesterday that he has cleared it and is eligible to return for Utah.
And he'd had a really good season or a couple of seasons prior to that with when the team was still in Arizona.
Now, again, our guy, goalie guru, Kevin Woodley, for a long time was on Kenner, Conneringrum as being one of the more underrated goalies around the league before he broke out.
Again, I think we're talking probably more of a long shot there, but given that he does have at least a little bit of a track record of being a strong NHL goalie, somebody who if he comes in and is performing well for Utah, although there even because it's a goalie, it would be a goalie tandem.
Like, is he going to get enough action?
Yeah.
That's a big part of this, right?
you have to be playing regularly for your team
to be able to change the mind of someone
like Doug Armstrong. I guess
you know, now that
this comes to mind,
you mentioned Joey DeCord getting the
call for Team USA.
Was that just Team USA being like
we don't want Canada to like
really explore his dual
citizenship any more
than they possibly can? Or Switzerland
apparently. He's got triple citizenship.
You know what? We're staking our claim
to Joey DeCord. Sorry, Thatcher.
but we're just bringing Joey DeCourt in here
so that he doesn't go play for anybody else.
They're trying to like cap tie him in soccer.
We're inviting him to camp.
Kind of feels like it.
You know, like that's the crazy thing.
It's, um, I don't know,
maybe because I'm crazy into this whole conversation.
But like, you know, I've done it numerous times
where I just like go through players to double check their nationality.
And it's like, oh, well, Anthony Stolars had a great year.
Is he, no, he's, no, no, no, I know.
Every player you go to.
No, no, Dustin Wolf, American.
Joseph Walt, no, no, he's also American.
No, John Gibson, definitely American.
I should remember that.
But it's just like you go down the list and it's like all these guys.
A lot of them are American.
So it makes it an interesting conversation.
And as Doug Armstrong said, the most wide open position for Team Canada going into the Olympics.
Just one other quote or a couple of quotes here to pass along from Doug Armstrong.
Again, this is on Fan 590 in Toronto yesterday, just about the overall philosophy.
He says, we want a strong, hard defense that can play in front of our net, and we want to be able to play and get inside.
We want big, strong players that can play in hard areas.
As Brian Burke said, arrive with ill will.
That's the type of player that we want to have.
Everyone has great skill.
We just want to play with great determination.
nation. So in other words, Sam Bennett is a mortal lock for this team. He is going to be on it.
Evan Bouchard on the outside look at it. You maybe bump your Tom Wilson stock up a little bit there based on that. I know we've heard his name that Team Canada was pretty interested in taking him at different points. So interesting. And you'd also look at, you know, that's why Colton Pereko was on the team.
Sanheim, right? Those types of guys. I don't know if both of them are going to make it again, especially with what Thomas Harley did. But a philosophical note there to keep in mind from Doug
Armstrong. The other interesting thing to remember with the games being in Milan, you would think
they're playing on the bigger international ice. But they are playing on NHL sized ice in this
new rink. Yeah. So no concerns about how does this guy's game translate to the big ice. It will
be an NHL size rank. All right, 650, 650 is the Dunbar Lumber text line. Up next, we are going
to chat with Adnan Verk. Lots of different stories happening around Major League Base
right now, not just with the Jays and the Mariners, although we'll certainly touch on those
teams with Adnan, but around the league as well. I want to get Adnan as well to weigh in on
the Quentin Tarantino debate we were having earlier. The big beef. Yeah, what is his, what is
Quentin Tarantino's best film? Is that an Tarantino guy? Do we know? Laddie, do you know? He's just a
movie guy. I feel like he's got to be into at least one Tarantino. We'll find out. He's a Tarantino guy.
All right. If you're not a Tarantino guy, then you're not welcome on the show. Wow. Are you
going to tell him that? No, because I love
Adnan. Adnan's always
welcome on the show. We'll have to make an exception
for him anyways. Adnan
Verk up next year on Halfordembroff
Sportsnet 650.