Halford & Brough in the Morning - BC Lions Head Coach Buck Pierce + What We Learned

Episode Date: July 22, 2025

In hour three, Mike Halford & guest host Jamie Dodd chat with BC Lions head coach Buck Pierce (1:19) ahead of Sunday's matchup versus Hamilton, plus the boys tell us what they learned (27:00). 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.

Music 803 on a Tuesday. Happy Tuesday everybody. Halford Brough featuring Jamie Dodd. We're on Sportsnet 650. Halford Brough of the morning is brought to you by Sands and Associates. Learn how a consumer proposal reduces your debt by up to 80% with no more interest. Visit them online at Sands-Trustee.com. We are in hour three of the program. BC Lions head coach Buck Pierce is going to join us in just a moment here to kick off hour three. Hour three of this program is brought to you by Campbell and pound real estate appraisers trust the expertise of Campbell and pound. Visit them on the internet at Campbell dash pound.com today.

We are broadcasting live from the Kintec studio, Kintec footwear and orthotics, working together with you in step and guests on Sportsnet six 50 call in on the hotline powered by power West industries. Don't get caught in the dark when it matters most. Visit them at PowerWest.ca. Today, they keep the lights on. Let's go to the Power West Industries hotline right now. Our next guest is the head coach of the BC Lions, Buck Pierce joins us here on the Hellford and Brough Show on Sportsnet 650.

Morning Buck, how are you? Hey, good. How are you guys doing? We're good. Thanks for taking the time to do this. We appreciate it. So I was listening to your media availability after Saturday's loss to the Rough Riders, How are you? Hey, good. How are you guys doing? We're good. Thanks for taking the time to do this. We appreciate it. So I was listening to your media availability after Saturday's loss to the Rough Riders and you said you had to go back and look at some things on tape. One, have you had an opportunity to do that already?

And two, if you have, what did you see after the loss to Saskatchewan on Saturday? Yeah, absolutely. You know, too many, you know, big plays given up, you know, defensively, you know, especially early on in the game. We had some communication errors in the back end that led to some big plays. So we've got to clean those up for this week. You mentioned there the communication errors that lead to the big plays, and that's always tough to recover from for a football team. You've diagnosed the issue.

How do you go about cleaning it up in a hurry in time for next week's game? Yeah, I mean, you address them. You know, we've, we've done that. We look at different ways to, you know, coach, um, you know, coach it better. How do we put our guys in different positions? So they, you know, don't make those mistakes. And then, you know, ultimately, you know, it's also on the player to understand learn and grow, you and grow from those experiences.

So yeah, that's the great thing about the CFL and pro football is you play next week. So implementing our plan, getting ready for a good Hamilton team coming into our place, we got to make sure we're on top of things and we play a much cleaner game. You know, another thing with the CFL is the old adage is it's not how you start, it's how you finish.

And we've seen teams get off to slow starts before and make runs and, you know, when the weather gets worse and the season gets longer, as a coach, how do you balance between, you know, acknowledging that it's still early and there's still room to grow, but also having a sense of urgency that you are seven games into the season and you had a chance to go four and four against Hamilton on the weekend? Yeah, it's about our process and sticking to our standard of what we do.

No matter the outcome, we continue to grow and get better. And we look at the things that we need to get better at. And that's no difference wherever you are in the season. Up to this point in the season, we've made enough mistakes that we should be at a point right now to where we're not making those mistakes anymore. We haven't played as consistent as we needed to play early in the season. Um, but we've taken strides, we've taken strides as a, you know, I just like to see us, you know, put it all together this week for sure. How would you evaluate your quarterback Nathan Rourke's performance so far? Uh,

you know, I dealt with injuries of course as well, but just overall, how would you evaluate his season so far? Yeah I think he's doing a good job you know continuing to grow throughout the offense you know the guys you know love being around him you know excellent leader you know he's he's you know one of the you know smartest quarterbacks I've been around I've been around a lot of good ones you know in my time in the CFL and professional football, you know, he wants to be great. He's still bringing guys along,

learning a new system, learning an offense, continuing to communicate with the things that he needs done. And there's a lot of growth that happens over the course of that time. But yeah, I've loved working with him and his ceiling is extremely high. So we're looking for a lot of good things as we go down the stretch. Justin McInnis, who led the CFL in receiving yards last year, finished the weekend with

one catch for 28 yards, the second straight week where there hasn't been a ton of production from McKinness what do you guys need to do to get him the ball more often? Yeah you know get it to him a little earlier in the game you know you know a lot of times with you know different things you know the ball just doesn't find you you know but a guy with Justin's you know ability you know I to do a better job of getting him some looks early and some things that get him going. We want to be able to spread the ball around. We want to be able to get as many guys touches and

involved in our offense as possible. James Butler being another one, making sure that we're staying on the football field and when we're getting first downs, the ball's able to be spread around. So we gotta make sure that we're staying out of second longs. We're getting first downs on first downs and staying in manageable situations so we can get more plays. You play this weekend, not just another game, but another game at home and there was a great crowd there

for the Rough Riders. I'm sure it will be the same for Hamilton. How important is it for you as a coach for your team to really maximize your home games in front of your fans? And I think especially when a team's coming from all the way out East like Hamilton is this weekend. Yeah, absolutely. It's a huge advantage for us. You know, we love our fans. our fans you know they're loud you

know they should they they show up early they bring a lot of energy you know to the building and you know we have one of the best venues in the CFL and when that place is rocking it's it's tough for any opponent to come in so we got to make sure that you know we we feed off their energy off off our fans. And we put on a show for them. This is our opportunity to play in front of our home fans. We got to make sure that we go out there and perform. I know you're always going to be more focused on your process, as you said, and what your team can do better.

But as you prep for Hamilton this week and start to dive into the game plan, what stands out to you about your next opponent? Yeah, I mean, defensively, you know, you look at, you know, where they are, uh, you know, they've, they've won four in a row. They do a good job of running to the football. You know, they play with great effort. Um, and they take the ball away. Um, you know, they've had multiple interceptions

the last number of weeks. Usually with their special teams, they have a very dangerous returner. You know, he's already taken a couple back this season. Offensively, they're very explosive. You know, Hall of Fame quarterback, I believe, I Mitchell, you know, he's got some downfield threats in Kenny Lawler and Tim White. So, you know, we got to make sure that, you know, we know where all those guys are at, at all times and, uh, you know, we're, we're locked into our details.

It is the lions. It is the tie cats. It is this weekend. Once again, at BC place buck. Thanks a lot for taking the time to do this today. We appreciate it. Best of luck on the weekend against Hamilton. Go get a dub.

Hey, thanks so much. Thank you. Uh, buck Pierce, head coach of the BC lions here on the weekend against Hamilton. Go get a dub. Hey, thanks so much. Thank you. Buck Pierce, head coach of the BC Lions here on the Haliford and Brough show on Sportsnet 650. Friendly reminder, July 27th, this Sunday, bring the family to celebrate generations of Lions fans at the Family Traditions game. As your Lions, as we mentioned, take on the Ticats.

Get your tickets now at bclions.com. Okay, we're gonna run through a couple different things. We had in the chamber on the docket, things we haven't had a chance to get to yet. Wanna play some audio yesterday? We haven't done a ton of NFL this week. We are gonna start that tomorrow. Brady Henderson, our Seahawks insider from ESPN

is gonna join us for the start of Seahawks training camp. And the start of training camp always means a variety of things. It's an increase in media coverage. Of course, everyone starts to get off their summer vacations and get back to work. There's always the contractual stuff. Guys either holding out or I suppose the new one is the hold in where they kind of show up, but they kind of don't. You go around the league and you see which ones are drawing some attention and we go to Dallas where the Micah Parsons contract situation got spicy yesterday when Jerry Jones

owner general manager sound piece soundboard spokesman I don't know why but he does anyway Jerry Jones seemingly apropos of nothing just kind of jumped up in the middle of a Q&A session and decided to address the Micah Parsons contract situation in a way that only Jerry Jones could. Here's the audio from yesterday, Jerry Jones on Micah Parsons. Just because we signed him doesn't mean we're going to have him. He was hurt six games last year. Seriously. We've signed, I remember signing a player for the highest paid at the position in the league and he got knocked out two thirds of the year, Dak Prescott. So there's a lot of things you can think about when you, just as the player does, when you're

thinking about committing and guaranteeing money. So this conversation that Jerry Jones had, it drew the ire of a lot of people in the NFL because it sounded as though he was complaining about Mike Parsons getting hurt in the past. And Dak Prescott. And Dak Prescott. And numerous people, including former star defensive lineman in the NFL, JJ Watt, took to social media to say,

there's nothing players love more than when the owner complains about getting hurt while playing for the team and putting their bodies on the line under their previous contract. Now Parsons is an interesting one because he is a bona fide star in the NFL and we've seen edge rushers of his ilk get paid

and he wants to get paid. And contract disputes are nothing new when it comes to Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys. As a matter of fact, Jerry Jones referenced a 1993 holdout from Emmett Smith where that bled into the regular season. They went a lot and then lost a couple of games in the beginning of the year,

but then went on to win the Superbowl after Emmett Smith's contract dispute got solved. I always find the Jerry Jones dynamic a fascinating thing. Because it can only exist in that one singular vacuum. Like I don't think there will ever be another. No. Across any sport in the national football league. He's from a bygone era where there's that singular person

that's in control of everything that goes on and it's gonna be like that until he's no longer able to serve in that capacity and someone suggests that he might already be at that level. We always joke it'd be the equivalent of like Francesco Aquilini holding court after a Canucks game to talk about the injuries suffered by Tyler Myers during the game, which Jerry Jones has done before. He does post post game scrums It's amazing in the in the hallways of the of the stadium wherever they are Even if they're on the road and the media just gathers around and it's like what do you think about the decision to kick on? Fourth down there and as the owner Wild yeah, and the other thing that's I mean it's equal parts disturbing and brilliant

it's brilliant because disturbing and brilliant. It's brilliant because it gives you the kind of sound bites and clips. Like Jerry Jones really should be on a panel on one of the major networks talking about the National Football League. Because he's unfiltered, he has takes and we love a good take. Boy does he.

And there's very few people on the planet that are as knowledgeable about the NFL as Jerry Jones. He has been in charge for forever and he has had immeasurable success. Granted, it was almost three decades ago as the owner and general manager of the Dallas Cowboys. But in this new current landscape and climate and the way that the game has changed

and the executive has changed, I'm not sure you can actually win a Super Bowl with a guy in charge like that. Yeah, and you said he's kind of a product or a holdover from a bygone era. I think that's a good way to put it. We had Nick Shook on the show on Friday, just to kind of look ahead to training camp

and talk a little about these contractual situations. And this was even before this latest audio, but the Micah Parsons thing was a story. And what Shook said was the role of executive has just kind of passed Jerry Jones by it has grown and it's become so much more complicated the league has advanced so much and you listen to what he's laying out there first of all Mike Parsons missed four games last year he's also been those are the first four games he's missed in his four NHL NFL seasons yep

so he's been not just incredibly productive, but incredibly durable as well. And now you're throwing out the four games he missed as a reason you're not. Are you only going to sign NFL players who are impervious to getting hurt? Good luck with that. Good luck with that. It's now here's the thing. We talk about this now by the time things matter and training camp is a couple of weeks in and maybe they've played a couple of exhibition games, they're going to get this done and it'll all be a bunch of noise and bluster, which brings you back to like why in the first place and especially because this isn't his first rodeo with this scenario specifically where you have a player that you need to keep.

You want to keep. There's no debate about that. Even with Dak Prescott for all the debate about his ceiling and can he win those Super Bowl of them and all of that there was never any question that they were going to like let him walk and try their hand at the draft they were always gonna keep him and what they did was they dragged their feet other guys got signed the market kept getting reset and then they had to make him the highest-paid player at the position ultimately they did it with CD lamb as well and now it is like this is not a novel situation. You have a very productive player that you want to be a foundational piece for your team. Sign them sign them at

the earliest opportunity. Yes. Guess what guys can get hurt but you have to take that risk that's part of the game. Otherwise the market's going to keep getting reset. We saw that with TJ watt last week and the price is just going to go up and up and up and the inability to take that in to really understand that and process that and put it into practice is baffling. You'd also like to give your new head coach Brian Schottenheimer like as good of an opportunity to succeed. And I'm not sure that this helps. Anyway, we'll put a bow on that. But by the way, the reason I mentioned JJ Watts social media post on X

is that Micah Parsons decided to retweet said post, which gives you an idea of where things are at between Parsons, Jerry Jones, and the Dallas Cowboys right now. On the football of the North American variety bracket soccer, I do have some news to pass along from the Vancouver white caps. So earlier in the show, in case you missed it,

we went down to Austin, Texas to speak to Sebastian Burrhalter, who is in Austin for the MLS all star game. Seb is in the middle of a great year. He earned his first ever cap for the us men's national team and played a big role in their runner up finish at the gold cup. He's also been fantastic for the white caps this year in a midfield that has often been comprised of himself, Andreas Kubas and Pedro Vite. Now, if you haven't been following along, the white caps recently sold Vite to Liga MX club Pumas.

And that has left a pretty significant hole in a midfield for a team that has done very well this season, be second in the Western Conference. Well, today the Whitecaps announced that they may have at least in some way, shape or form filled that void. They have announced that they have acquired Japanese born Peruvian international Kenji Cabrera. That's right. The Japanese Peruvian duo, very famous in soccer circles.

He's a under 22, he's 22 years old and he's part of their under 22 initiative. Now without going too far down the road of the MLSCBA and what this means. I don't know, I've got time for it Mike. The MLS has allowed clubs to sign, I believe it's four players, 22 or younger, to pretty lucrative contracts that don't work against the budget. It's kind of like a designated

player for young players, if you want to think of it in the most simplistic terms. Kenji Cabrera is one of these. Now, the reason I bring this up is that the Whitecaps previous U-22 initiative players were Pedro Vite, who went on to become a terrific signing for the club, and Eddie Urcampo, who has become a very good player for them this year. So if that's the historical context, there's going to be pretty high expectations on Cabrera coming in and playing for the Caps. From what I have been told, he is a very, very intriguing prospect. At 22, he's already made the call up

to Peru's senior men's national team, which is a big feather in his cap, given that recently he was making inroads with the U-20 team. So to sort of ascend to the top national team in such a short period of time, it's a big feather in his cap. When we will see him play, remains to be seen.

They still have to work out his ITC, which is International Transfer Certificate, Visa, Work Permit, Medical, all that stuff. But it is a good sign for a white caps team who needed to fill the hole left by Pedro Vite, and they've done it now with Kenji Cabrera. So my question for you is, is this a one-to-one replacement for Pedro Vite and they've done it now with Kenji Cabrera. So my question for you is, is this a

one-to-one replacement for Pedro Vite? Not necessarily in terms of the impact he's going to have right away because Vite was excelling for the Whitecaps in midfield, but in terms of role. Is this, he is, plug him in, he's going to play the same role and then hopefully next year or down the line he can have the same impact. So the interesting thing is that in the press release, the Whitecaps referred to him as quote, a versatile playmaker with the ability to play centrally or out on the wing. So I do wonder if they're thinking about,

let's not define his role right away. And I think most importantly is let's not call him the Vitae replacement because I'll say this Vita was fantastic this year. Like there were times where I thought he was the best player on the squad and that's the squad that has four MLS all stars. And there were times where I thought, and I think this is partly why the sale went through. He had the most appeal because of his age and his technical ability as opposed to some of the other I

Would I've been to one white caps game this year and I was Honestly, I was blown away by VT and you mentioned his technical ability and the touch that he had and the skill that he showed What I took left foot really? But clearly above typical MLS quality and it stood out a lot in person. So I think you're right to say it's probably expecting a lot for any signing to come in and immediately replace that. I think the hope probably, as you said, one, we'll see, he's versatile. Maybe we end up playing him on the wing, but I guess the hope is that he can grow into that role in the near future. Yeah, he's young and he doesn't have a ton of experience playing anywhere outside of

Peru. So you've got to look at it and say this, can you temper expectations in this year where expectations are high? There might be a second transfer here and what it might end up being is a guy that is a little bit more older, a little bit more experienced and maybe has played more MLS. Like veteran MLS midfielder to come in and, you know, know Hey keep this spot warm for Cabrera while we figure him out because it is difficult to move leagues Midseason especially when you've never had a big transfer before if you've gotten used to it We've seen veteran guys come aboard like Julian Gressel came here and played right away and fit him because he kind of understood how The league works and how to play

Fafa Pico was another guy that came in and did the same thing. So it'll be interesting to see what happens here. I think there might be another move to come now. So has Peru is was he playing in Peru? Yes. Yes. Is Peru in their season or are they off? Because that's always a dynamic with MLS, too, right? Is sometimes you get these guys in the summer window. You're in full swing.

Everyone's in midseason form and they've like I've taken two months off and they have to get up to speed and training. I believe they are out of season but he was called up to the Peruvian national team in the spring slash late summer so I'll have to double check on that one. We're way up against it for time by the way but before we go to break I do need to once again tell you about Jan Pro from warehouses to washrooms and everywhere in between Jan Pro keeps workplaces tidy clean and disinfected for a free quote visit them online at JanPro.ca we're going to go to break we're going to come back we're going to do our what we learns and

most importantly you're going to do your what we learns get them in Dunbar Lumber Text Line is 650 650 hashtag it WWL and tell us what you learned over the last 24 hours in sports Let us know send it in it's your chance to be on the radio That's all coming up next on the health of the breath show on sportsnet 650 What'd I say? Talk to the audience! Oh, God, this is always dead. It's what we learn time. It's what we learn time. It's what we learn time.

On the show. 8.31 on a show. Visit them online at sans-trustee.com. We are in hour three of the program. It is what we learn time. Hour three is brought to you by Campbell and Pound real estate appraisers. Trust the expertise of Campbell and Pound. Visit them on the internet at Campbell-pound.com today. Jamie and I have what we learns. That's right. I didn't even ask.

Basketball Ben or Adog. I fear the answer. I kind of have one. It's funny, but it's pretty small. Ben, do you have one? No, I know what your eyes might be, so I'm just gonna ride with that. Okay.

You know what, Adog? We're gonna let you do your little tiny one. Yeah, your cute little one. Your cute little one, but it's gonna go last., little guy goes last the little unintimidating guy finishes up strong We're gonna start with Jamie Jamie has what we learned Jamie Dodd Jimmy Dodd as they call them hi made though That's right. Did you learn our last 24 hours in sports? I learned that the NHL is going to collaborate, do a collab as the kids say with Syria, the Italian soccer league. Of course the NHL players go or many NHL players going to the Olympics

in Milan in February. And as part of that, you know, they do their annual, they do their North American media tour and their European media tour every summer, which means, you know, Elliot Friedman gets a all expense paid trip to some city in Europe to do a bunch of interviews, which is very nice. He deserves it. This year it's, it's Milan and it's on August 22nd, which is the day before Syria's season opens. So they're going to take this kind of natural confluence of schedules and they're going to try to get a bunch of NHL players. They say, you know, visiting different grounds in and around Milan. They're going to try to get a bunch of NHL players. They say, you know, visiting different grounds in and around Milan.

They're going to be at AC Milan season opener at the stadium there. And then they're hopefully going to have all these opportunities for the, the players of the two sports to, to interact. And they said, this really came together. Pirolo. And I think it was Marco Matarazzi went to a New York Rangers game. That's right. Yeah. In March and they did the kind of Jersey swap thing with because of been a jet afterwards and it kind of got a lot of attention in the NHL was like, wait a second. People like this kind of thing. We're going to try to do

more of it. So it does sound like a pretty cool idea, right? A chance to get NHL players, European NHL players in front of an audience that wouldn't necessarily be paying attention to them all the time and also promote it in Italy going into the Olympics. I also have a question for you, Mike. Yeah, we often do the thing of which NHL players would thrive in other sports, which Syria player would thrive in the NHL. Okay. So this is always a tough one because everything is predicated on the ability to so presume they can skate, say, presume they can skate.

OK, well, it's funny that they mentioned Pirlo on Madarazi because Pirlo would have been dating myself here because he no longer plays, but he would have been the ultimate. Oh, God, this is going to sound so dumb, but like a power play quarterback. Okay. Yeah, you know, it's a premier distributor I have such a hard time doing this though because again like what what makes a lot of the Modern footballers great is their pace. Aren't there a lot of like hard-nosed midfielders from the Baltics in Syria Feel like one of those guys if you put them on skates, they do pretty well. Yeah, they're yeah I mean, okay, so Sarah's very cagey defensive league by reputation sure

I just got a lot of like hard nosed offensive you mentioned like there's a lot of like Croatian Bosnian Serbian of that ilk But you know, there's a variety of quality defenders. This is not to dismiss any of the Italian defenders as well. So you could have a lot of good, like, defensive defensemen. Sure. Yeah. Home defensemen. But again, the mobility of the players

in Syria is so hard to relate to it because, you know, I mean, what's the one thing we always point out when it's like, well, he's not a good skater. Right. And it's like, if you can't skate. So I have a hard time wrapping my head around it. But as it pertains to the actual story, there's a couple of really interesting things here.

One, we had Marty Walsh on the show, I wanna say last week or maybe the week prior, NHL, PA, Boss, every time we've had him on, he has talked about the, like, the new ventures that the union has undertaken both from a business sense, but also from a global initiative sense, they're really proactive in trying to do new things.

This is very new. It's not anything groundbreaking. There's a lot of TED Talk, and especially the headline talking about a global content partnership. Yeah. A lot of it is just photo ops and like, we're going to trot out a couple of NHL players to the San Siro and see what happens and take pictures.

But the idea here is trying to infiltrate a European market that the NHL probably doesn't have the strongest foothold. We're not talking about Sweden, Finland, Germany, Czech Republic, the ones that they traditionally go to, right? Even Switzerland, Austria, which have more of a hockey culture.

Right. And the interesting thing here is that, you know, Rob Zep is a guy that's in charge of a lot of the international stuff, and they've tasked him with more and more. Now, the other conversation we've had a lot as we look at all these other leagues, especially the NFL, given the NFL season is coming up, is the global initiatives. Like the NFL right now is making inroads in a lot of places where they haven't before by playing games. Like you're gonna play a game in Australia this year. They've gone countless times to the UK. They're really making more inroads in South America. The Brazil games are a big deal.

I do wonder if the NHL is looking at that and saying, like, we've already got a great foothold in a lot of our traditional European markets, where do we go next? Yeah. And the Olympics being in Italy, that's kind of a no brainer and a layup. I do wonder in terms of globalization, where they're willing to go next and what the initiatives are going to be from the PA,

because I think they've got a bunch of possibilities. There's no reason why after doing big scale events, like the winter classic and the outdoor games, they don't shift that whole production to, can we start doing this internationally? Cause I'm going to be dead honest, the winter classic is kind of run its course in terms of being a must see marquee event.

And a lot of the outdoor games have as well. They're like 10 years ago. Right? After the first one, I'm like, okay, cool. Yeah, I get it, they're outside. Yeah, that's neat. Does it remind you of being a kid? Yep.

All right. There's only so many things you can do. Now they have the production ability, both in terms of the infrastructure to build out these events and to televise them. I do wonder if there's a pivot from, do we stop going to Fenway Park every second year for a game and do we try and use all of those resources to do something international?

I've always thought, and I hadn't necessarily thought about an outdoor game, but doing something in massive global cities like Paris or London, where hockey isn't really a big thing, but can you get eyeballs on it? Even staging a Canada-US game there or something. You know what I mean? That would kind of draw some attention. The other thing I'll say about this partnership with Syria that's interesting to me is of course the NHL as a league has had maybe a bit of a frosty relationship with the Olympics, of course missing the last two. So interesting to see them really embrace it and say, okay, it's not ideal. We don't like shutting down our season for three weeks. There's all this

weird stuff with the Olympic committee where they get all these rights that we don't like as well, but we're doing it. It's on the schedule. So let's embrace it. Let's make the most of it that we can and look for those opportunities. Like now that I'm thinking about it,

it's like, could you conceivably do an outdoor game at one of the historic stadiums in Europe? Yeah. Because again, right now, is there anywhere in North America where they haven't gone yet? No, that would be like really exciting. Cause right now, what you're talking about

with outdoor games is they're going to places like Florida and they're like, but it's more of like a, can we do this? As opposed to, wow, the first time that they played a game at Fenway or Wrigley or a Yankee Stadium like once you do it once the allure kind of goes away we were at the game the big house in Michigan which was a hundred and ten thousand people are close to it and it was a great spectacle but to do it again there wouldn't be a hook no I'm looking it up I think they should do a game at the Panathenaic Stadium. Panathenaikos? At Athens, Greece,

which is the home of the very first Olympics. Hey, dog. Now, HL should do a game there. While your pronunciation leaves something to be desired. Panathenaikos? And I like Panathenaikos, and I like that. But there's no OS at the end. It just says P-A-N-A-T-H-E-N-A-I-C. Panathenaikos Stadium. Okay, well I think the club that you're talking was panathenaicos I want to say but we might be talking about two different things I'm talking about the stadium which held the very first Olympics which still exists Athens Greece, I get still a working stadium. You could buy tickets for it. It's still there Obviously been slightly modern. Do you mean like the first Olympics?

I'm sorry late 90s. We are talking about two different things Not the ancient Olympics surely. Yeah in 1896th century. We are definitely talking about two different things. Not the first, not the ancient Olympics, surely. Yeah. In 1896. OK, yeah, yeah, yeah, OK. That makes more sense. Anyway, moocow, all that. Ah! Very robust discussion there.

We did it. We did it all. Hey, since we were just talking about Chris Kreider, there's a new piece up in the athletic courtesy of New York based hockey writer, Peter Ball. Ball, he's got an article in which he breaks down Chris Kreider's departure from the New York Rangers with Chris Kreider.

Now the most interesting quote might not be coming from Kreider, it might be coming from his new teammate, Ryan Strom, who said that Kreider actually kind of facilitated the move to Anaheim by choosing his landing spot in that he wanted to become an Anaheim duck. He said that a lot of different reasons for that one. Obviously he had a couple former New York Rangers teammates there in Strom and in Jacob Truba. He also said that he was very intrigued by the recent hiring of head coach

Joel Cuenville and talked about a lot of the young players that they have on the team, including Leo Carlson, Mason McTavish, Cutter, Goche, and Troy Terry's not all that young anymore, but still relatively young. My question is this, as we look into a season for the Vancouver Canucks, where they're looking to get back into the playoffs and we look at that Pacific division, do we dare take Anaheim a little bit more seriously this season or are they still off from being a team that's legitimately a challenge for a play? I think there's a chance for them to challenge for a playoff spot

but mostly because of the coaching change from Cronin to Cuenvo. Cronin, apparently a disaster there, right? Everything you heard about it was it was just not going well. Despite the fact that they played some decent hockey after the awful start to the season, they got better as it went along, but they were really bad. So you're hoping for the big bump from the coaching change, but I don't like the Crier thing. I don't think it's going to move the needle that much. If they are going to make the playoffs, it's going to be one about Quenville, but also about Leo Carlson and Mason McTavish and Manchukov and all the young players.

Dostal and that. Yeah, D all the young players. Dostalin. Yeah, Dostalin taking those next steps. It's great that they went out and got Kreider and Truba, but overall I've been really underwhelmed with what Pat Verbeek has done building out that team around the young players. So you're really, really betting on those young players taking the next step. Again, if you look really closely, you squint, you look at it, you can kind of talk yourself like I thought Granlin was a good pickup for them. I don't love Granlin, but I think for them, sure, because they have the cap space. And they're like, we can over pay Mikhail Granlin. We don't care. He's going to be a versatile center for us. And I do I did like

the way that he played in Dallas last year. If you want to talk about guys that sort of had a career revival going from a non-playoff team to a playoff team. But we've handicapped the division a handful of times. And I keep coming back at Anaheim with a question mark because you know that they're gonna be better. I don't think there's any question about that. You add guys like Granlin and Kreider and really not take anyone off the active roster and you're like, yeah, you're gonna be a better team.

The question is how much better? I actually kinda think they might be addition by subtraction with Zegras out of there, honestly, is I think that they looked at him and said, there's talent, but we need to continually find places for you to play and it's not working for either of us. And I wonder if that frees up some more minutes for some other guys.

And you're right, like Quentenville, say what you will about the hire and it's always gonna be a polarizing hire, but he is a guy that has an unquestioned level of success in the National Hockey League. Everybody's gonna He's won so you would assume that's gonna replicate itself in some way shape or form in Anaheim Anyway, go check it out at the athletic. It's the new article. It's up now. It's a slow summer So you may as well read it mooc out That's the motto of the athletic right now. What else are you doing? Just read it. Okay. Let's fire up the dot matrix. Hey, what else are you gonna do? Wait, we don't

want to hear a dogs. Oh my God. You little ones. See if it grows into something more. I am so sorry. Oh no, it's fine. I am so sorry. There's so little you forgot about it. Yeah. You won't be after you hear it. You'll be like, no, we should have skipped this. OK. Courtesy of the Toronto Star, City News Toronto as well for making me aware of this. The TTC, Toronto Transit Commission, are very angry at people online right now

for making fun of their new transit cops, which they're calling the Provincial Offenses Officers. The POO. Yeah, because people are making fun of the acronym online because of course it stands for poo And so people are just calling them the poo everywhere online and the TTC is pleading with people Please stop calling them the poo They're the provincial offenses officers and they're actually doing a very good job making sure people don't you know? Skip over the fares and try to get onto the the the trains and the buses for free

Yeah, they're working very hard the poo are so please leave them alone But of course people aren't leaving the poo alone They're making fun of them excessively online and the TTC is even blasting back at people online You know stating that stop talking so much about poo and focus more on the job the poo is doing I think the TTC can win this battle It seems definitely like a winnable battle that they've decided to pick What I want to know is because these things go through a committee, right? Yeah, and so many different people would have had the chance to be like, you know what out of all the acronyms

You can come up with maybe poo isn't the optimal one. So here's the catch Andy is that the POO Existed in Ontario's legislation well before the TTC started using it. In fact, they inherited the poo. Well, that's their problem. They have to get rid of the poo and come up with something more tasteful. By the way, in terms of a strategy to combat negative perceptions, they've decided to shame people for making jokes about the poo. Yeah, which is of course just making it worse. Yeah, of course. Going online saying, please don't call them the poo, they're the provincial offenses officers, is just making people want to call them the poo even more.

This is another classic case study for my soon to be PR firm, Mike Alfred PR, say nothing, do nothing. Say less things? Yes. Here's the thing. Someone would have brought this up, the laugh cycle would have lasted max 24 to 48 hours. People would have got all the poo jokes out there. Yep. And it would have moved on.

For example. They would have flushed them. Yep. See? Yep. Get it out of your system. Yeah. Now here's the thing.

It's Tuesday, July 22nd and I believe the Coldplay couple happened on Saturday the 19th. That was a Saturday show. It's already run its course. We've run out of memes, we've run out of Photoshop's, everyone's made their jokes. Yes the guy's life is ruined, but I lose track of that But the cycle Can only last so long but they are also asking for provincial enforcement enlisted enlistment Which is making it worse because they're asking for the P now as well So it's it's it they keep digging themselves. You need to keep the poo going. Yeah Exactly. I think we should end it. I made up the P part by the way. That's not you. No kidding

I think we should I think we should end this poo with a moo What was what were your golfing buddies saying about the show again Ben that they're it's so intelligent On the show just talking to people and they're just like you guys sound really smart. Yeah, that's what everyone says You're so intelligent with those all the sports all of you know, I'm like, yeah, that's us The discourse is at the highest level of management. They're not there. They must have been referring to another show I was like I wanted to say it. I was like, are you sure? Yeah They thought you said you worked for the CBC or something. Yeah. Wow, you guys are so smart sophisticated every now and again,

someone from city news in the building will walk by and just be like, they're paying you guys for this still. Like you're still doing it. Oh, I get asked that all the time. Hey, we're giving people news. Yeah, that's true. People need to know about the poo. Do not mess with the poo. Let's dive into the Dunbar Lumber text message in basketing here. Six 56 58 year old, we learns in what we learn is humanoid edition as always brought to you by AJ's pizza on East Broadway. Our favorite

the white Vesuvio featuring roasted mushrooms, house made Italian sausage and extra creamy ricotta only at AJ's pizza order online at AJ's dot pizza. All right. We'll go into the one that came in the most often which was announced this morning from basketball Phil here. The Raptors are coming to play. Yoke, it's Jamal Jamal Murray and the nuggets October six at Rogers arena. Yes. Preseason NBA basketball back in Vancouver. I believe last time was 2023. The Raptors were here, but they will play the Denver Nuggets, which they play last time. I don't know how far you're the basketball guy, basketball, Ben basketball, basketball is in your name, you know,

all guy, but it's pretty significant team, right? The Denver nuggets recent NBA champion with, with Yoke Hitch and Jamal Murray, a Canadian star. It's also fascinating in light of what we talked about on the show yesterday, which is that reports are out there. And I don't think it's been confirmed by the team, but that the Dallas Mavericks are going to have training camp in Vancouver.

So three NBA teams are going to have training camp in Vancouver. So three NBA teams are going to be visiting Vancouver in September and October. A little confusing to me that the Raptors aren't playing the Mavericks like you guys are already in Vancouver. Why don't we just play you. But anyways the whole situation is confusing. I have a conspiracy theory here. We've been talking a lot over the last couple of weeks about Seattle's hopes to get an NBA expansion team and I think it was softy yesterday who said that you know, maybe the Portland The NBA was kind of using Seattle as a cudgel against Portland like hey if you guys don't figure out the arena We might just move the team up to Seattle. My conspiracy theories is what's happening here with all of this

attention being heaped by the NBA on Vancouver. What are we going to do what are we going to start talking about. Can Vancouver get an NBA team back. Are they interested in coming back to the NBA market. They're using us to try to scare Seattle and say hey you guys have been just assuming you're getting into team back for a decade now. Don't it's don't think it's going to be that simple. We've got other options, some of them in the Pacific Northwest as well that we could easily go to. We love Vancouver as a market. So you, you ownership in Seattle, you be better be ready to up your game, up your price or

else we could easily go to Vancouver I think this is a shot across the bow at Seattle. Do you think it'll sell out? Yeah, last time. Yeah, I did. It was okay one. I am intrigued by your ideas. I would like to subscribe. Yeah newsletter The last time that the Raptors played in Vancouver was indeed 2023 the opponent was the Sacramento Kings I'm glad we got that sorted out. Yeah, that was the most important part of the entire story. I don't really in a rare moment of untakery from Halford. I don't really know what to make of this. I did not anticipate not have a by bingo card that the Dallas Mavericks were going to hold training camp in Vancouver.

When that news came down, courtesy of NBA insider Mark Stein, we addressed it on the show yesterday it's pretty surprised there hasn't been a lot of follow-up information no like you said the Mavs haven't made it official we don't know where they're gonna be they're testing the waters to see Vancouver could indeed support a team well the in the exhibition game coming back the confluence of NBA not involving the Mavs that's the most baffling thing it's like it would make so much Yeah, you're here Just stick around for like a another couple days and play the Raptors and do my Bill Simmons thing is like is the NBA in

Vancouver having a moment I don't know early it is are we having a moment the WNBA is playing a game here in August as well I believe a big basketball times here. Yeah Again, not a hundred percent sure. Okay, Justin and East Van, hashtag WWL on the basketball tip. What we learned, SGA is set to achieve one of Hamilton's highest honors. He will receive the key to the city at the Lions Hamilton Tiger Cats game on August 7th. I don't know if this is a joke,

I don't know if this is real. I know that our running gag here is that laddie, Greg Ballack, our usual producer, was at one time the starting point guard. And Shay Gilders Alexander was his backup, because they went to the same high school in Hamilton. His prodigy. Yeah.

There's something about you. Glad he taught him everything he knows. The idea of Laddie playing basketball is just inherently funny to me for some reason that I can't place. He said SGA had to change schools. And I was like, was that because you were the roadblock to the starting point guard position in that Hamilton High School. It might have been

Do you think you will ever get the key to the city? Yeah, well if he keeps producing this show Yeah, absolutely. It's part of the smartest show on sports radio We have a lot of P.o.o related tax. It's making it very do we Table saw James suggesting the crime reduction action plan. Yep, yep. Spell that out. JT and Van Isle suggesting the security help in transit.

That's a good one, too. That's a good one. That's a good one. See, there's so many more options than the poo they could have gone with. Very clever, everybody. Do you think they talked about the fact that it spelled poo?

That's what I wanna know. And decided, you know what? Because it's a committee. There would have to have been 20 people in a room being like, this is the way we're going. the fact that it's spelled poo. That's what I wanna know. And decided, you know what? Because it's a committee. Screw it. It's a committee. There would have to have been 20 people in the room being like, this is the way we're going. They made the classic mistake of overestimating the public. They were like, you know what?

Yes, it spells poo, but people will take it seriously. They understand, no one's that juvenile. And then we all put our hands up and said, hold on a second. Yes, we are. We are that juvenile. We're gonna prove you wrong. All right, the show is over, everybody over everybody someone say mercifully the show is over

Thank you all for listening and thank you all for contributing for yet another day, Jamie You're out of here for the week now. Thanks for riding shotgun the last couple days It's been a pleasure working with you Josh Elliot Wolf and I yeah, I was Josh and the giant water bottle tomorrow I can't wait. I really can't wait. We're back tomorrow. Thank you all for listening today. Signing off, I have been Mike Alfred. He's been Jamie Dodd. He's been Adog.

He's been Basketball Ben. This has been the Alfred and Bruv Show on Sportsnet 650.