Halford & Brough in the Morning - Could Tavares Get Traded Back To The Islanders?

Episode Date: August 19, 2024

In hour two, Jason Brough and guest host Josh Elliott-Wolfe chat with Sportsnet NHL analyst Justin Bourne (2:31) on the latest news around the league, plus they speak with best-selling author Ian O'Connor (24:22) on his new biography on Aaron Rodgers. 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.

702 halford and brough no halford it's josh elliott wolf here with the returning jason brough halford and brough is brought to you by the delari family of honda dealers experience the delari difference today visit your nearest delri Honda dealer today, and you can text in 650-650, the Dunbar Lumber text line. Get your what we learns in. The Bridge Street Dunbar Lumber in Ladner has moved to progress away in Tilbury's Industrial Park. More room, more product, more awesome. Details at DunbarLumber.com.

We are coming to you live from the Kintec studio. Kintec, Canada's favorite orthotics provider, powered by thousands of five-star Google reviews. So, Orfite, what are you waiting for. Kintec, Canada's favorite orthotics provider, powered by thousands of five-star Google reviews. Sore feet, what are you waiting for? Kintec, that's what you're waiting for. I just have one question before we get to Bourne, because I know Bourne's been playing a lot of golf. I texted him yesterday.

He's like, I've been on the golf course for most of the summer. What did Ben say about my golf game on the radio? He said you were, well, he seemed semi-surprised, but he was like, he's pretty good. Semi-surprised by what? Semi-surprised by how said you were, well, he seemed semi-surprised, but he was like, he's pretty good. Semi-surprised by what? Semi-surprised by how good you were. And he said your self-talk wasn't that bad. No.

We had a really good, like, man, that guy can bomb it. Ben? Like, he is, it was regularly 300 carry from him. He hit a ball. I don't know how many people have played cap listening. It's pretty exclusive and only very important people get to play it. But there's the first hole there that used to be a par five, but they took back and it's par four now and it's downhill,

but it's fairly long. And I think Ben's second shot was like 70 yards. So his drive, although it significantly went downhill, I think it went 370. Wow. Like it was just like, your ball's down there. Yeah. And I hit a good drive for me.

And I'm like, hey, Ben, how's it going down there? Yeah, that was incredible to watch. And unfortunately for Ben, I then spent that evening just texting him like, what did you think about my swing? What do I need to do differently? And he's like, oh, God. He actually seemed excited about that. He was like, I actually had tips for him.

So I guess he was into it. You could definitely tell he was trying to be very polite. There was a long pause after we asked him the question. He is a nice young man. He looked a little worried. How do I phrase this? Then he was like, wait, I am leaving on Thursday. What do I care?

Justin Bourne, we welcome him in. NHL analyst for Sportsnet. Where's your golf game at, Justin? Well, you know, I play it all the time. It's better than it's been. I was a decent golfer up to about 18 years old. I played competitively on some junior tours. And then I played golf five times a summer for the next 20 years and sucked.

And then this summer I'm finding it a bit again. I'm having a good time out there. Are you just playing or are you really in it to get better? You know, I am in it to get better? You know, I am in it to get better, but that's coming from someone who's practiced like zero times. So you're not in it to get better. No, you're right. But I do feel like because it's been so long since I played seriously,

I need to play enough to establish a baseline of like, what am I again as a golfer? I don't even know what you need to work on when you don't play. Cause you go out and you suck at everything. Yeah. Um, before we get to any of the Leafs talk or the Oilers talk, um, I know you've been on the golf course, so you probably haven't been thinking like, what are the Canucks going to do with Pod Colson?

But they traded Pod Colson to the Edmonton Oilers for a fourth, fourth round draft pick. And I guess it's just a general question for you is, when do you know it's time to cut bait on a former top prospect? Yeah, I love that question. I think it's actually maybe the one that NHL staffs are most afraid of making, that call that it's time to move on from this guy. But if you had a cutthroat management group i think you could do great in trading people who still have names before

everyone figures out that they're disappointing like you know what's funny is i had the thought today about that askarov from nashville like what do they know that we don't know that they're all in on Soros for this long-term deal? Like, he still is a big name to me, but if they don't want to play this guy in the NHL soon, what do they know that we don't know? So I guess the answer to your question is, you know, you probably know like three or four months before the rest of the hockey world

that your player is going to be disappointing. And I would like to see more teams take the risk of moving on from that guy you might get burned one out every five times but you usually know before everyone else knows there's such a fear in vancouver because of cam neely like and that was a long long time ago oh my god there's this like oh god you know they traded cam neely and he went away, went and became a hall of fame player. And, and I think that just hangs over everything. Um, with the Canucks, even though, you know, like most of the Canucks fans now, they never even saw Cam Neely player. Don't even remember the situation or don't remember like Barry Peterson

was a pretty good player. It was obviously a mistake to trade cam neely but yeah i agree with you and and and i and i think it's probably easier for a management group like rutherford and alveen to trade away a guy because they don't have to admit the mistake on it way easier yeah what have you seen in an experience when you worked for organizations about the loyalty that organizations have to draft picks that they made as opposed to the ones that they didn't you know so i spent two years at the toronto marlies with keith adubas there and just seeing some of the players that we had at the time that were named players who it wasn't quite happening for. We had a defenseman, Andrew Nielsen, I think he's playing. He's still playing. He was a very good player.

He scored a ton of points, a rookie big guy, but it just wasn't there. He didn't have the foot speed, didn't quite think at an NHL level. And I remember just being like, they had only recently drafted this guy. And you can't, you know, you can admit you made a mistake, but you have to at least see that mistake through when you've made the pick. I feel like it's much easier, as you said, to act like you're cleaning up someone else's mess.

You want to do it your own way. You know, the, it is, it's just really hard, right? Cause you're the second you trade a guy you just drafted you are putting a black mark on your own resume you were saying that you know this is something that i've messed up whereas if you don't make the trade you could say just give them time it can happen it's still coming you can kind of punt that failure down the road so you see teams really hesitant to to say you know unless it is a new ownership group who loves to point the finger at the last group and say they made a mistake. So Bourne, the Oilers made a couple of trades. They also traded away Cody Ceci in a cap dump. And a lot of them now

expect them to match Broberg's offer sheet with the St. Louis Blues. A little less certain on Holloway because they did get Pod Colson, but bringing it back to Broberg, who's going to have a cap hit if the Oilers do match with them of what, what was it, four and a half or something like that? Yeah, 4.5. So how much pressure is on him

both from a fan perspective, but also like with your teammates and with your organization because you went out and got a cap hit that you wouldn't have got with your team and you made it difficult on your team, even though you got all these rights under the CBA, you got all these rights under the CBA.

Yeah. How difficult is that going to be for him? How much pressure is it going to be for him to perform at the level of a four and a half million dollar defenseman? I think it, you know, there's no doubt that there's more pressure, right?

Like there just is. I would love to say that there's not because of this not because there just is more pressure when you make more money. In this salary cap era, of course. You don't blame the guy. I don't think there will be character judgments or moral judgments on a guy for signing an offer sheet. I do think that there's just going to be stricter hockey judgments. Hey, you're paid this much and we need that much in return. So it'll get a little bit harder in terms of expectations. But, I mean, was this not wonderful? Like, was this not a very, those are two really logical offer sheets to me that even if they don't help you, they made life harder for your competition

and not sure if NHL teams know this around the league, but you want to beat the other teams that are in the league. That's kind of an underrated part of the whole thing. So I loved what St. Louis did there. Don't blame the guys for signing it. And good for Edmonton. They found a way to keep good players. This is just a lot of wins all the way around for me.

Every time we see offer sheets, and it isn't frequent, but every time we do see them, it's like, hey, is this opening the door for more offer sheets to potentially start happening around the league? Do you think this is actually a time where teams start to look at it and say, hey, maybe if we look for these lesser valued players, we can make this work a little bit easier? Or is it still going to be GM's afraid of doing this? No, I do think that it'll change. And I know that sounds silly because we've heard people like me say things like this

all the time. But Doug Armstrong is not some upstart young gm trying to change the culture he'd been in the game boys he's been around and if doug armstrong can do it who can't he's as classic a old school hockey guy as there is no longer can a gm say well you know we've got relationships to worry about like you know doug went out there and did it so i think that's great i mean hey we just saw tyler dello get an ag and did it. So I think that's great. I mean, hey, we just saw Tyler Delo get an AGM job in the league.

I think there's going to be a bit more ruthlessness around the league based on just the way things are moving. Yeah, Tyler's like super mean or he used to be on Twitter. Oh, he's so mean.

He's the best. I love him. Yeah. What is the perfect scenario for an offer sheet? Because people always throw out, you know, like the best players. I'm like, well, they're just going to match that.

What are some scenarios that absolutely have to be part of the formula for a successful offer sheet or at least an offer sheet that makes things interesting? I think the trick is to kind of find guys like the Brobergs and Holloways, but to really go above and beyond on the one-year contract where you just say, this is a cap-strapped team. And again, that's another factor is you'd like to do it to a team that's up against cap issues and say,

we're just going to take this guy you can't afford to pay. We're going to pay him something exorbitant in the first year. You know, there are qualifying offers that you, you know, would come with a big one-year deal but you can renegotiate below that number and so you can kind of look at if it is say to the player look we both know you're not worth all the money we gave you last year no one is going to give you that we did you a favor there you do us one we'll you know we'll do a long-term deal for a lower AAV something like that where you then get to keep the player that you've stolen

at a number that's a bit more reasonable. So I think these are the level of player that teams will be looking at, and these are the type of guys you want to get locked up before a team starts to sniff around. Bourne, what are the chances that John Tavares gets traded, and if he does get traded, have you been hearing all this speculation

about the new york islanders hold on is this a joke part of the interview what did i miss the islanders i saw some gambling odds that had tovaras to the islanders at like minus 120 no you didn't really i don't know maybe it was a dream buddy i was just on long island and i was at uh multiple islander heavy events and john tavarez is not welcomed back by the fans on long island he's not you know like maybe it'd be different what would be different is he would have to wave to go there right so he would have to like make a statement that he wants to go back but it's not warm and fuzzy there yet i there i didn't talk to anyone who's like ah there to me to him so that would be fascinating okay i just i just don't see it happening

period right he's got the the one year left of the deal and came to toronto like it's really hard to see these things happening. It doesn't mean they shouldn't. It's like qualifying offers. Should he get traded? Probably. And he should probably agree to it. Should Marner?

Yeah, probably. But it's like so many things have to fall in line. And everyone is so risk-averse and job-protective. They do not want to be the one who took a big swing. And it just feels like in Toronto, they're like, we changed the captain, we fixed it, because they know that nothing bigger is going to happen. Are you a boxing guy at Allborn?

Yeah, I like boxing. Okay, do you remember when Pacquiao and Mayweather finally fought and the fight was, like, terrible? Yeah, because they were 80. That's why I feel like about Tanev and Riley together. Like, for 10 years, everyone's been like, Chris Tanev is the perfect guy for Morgan Riley. And then they get them and you're kind of like,

yeah, but they're both old now. I know. And what's funny is the Leafs were that team back in the day, right? Brian Leach was here. They had a bunch of old guys here just past their prime. I forget the whole list of them all but uh yeah that kind of fits the mold even more recently with getting joe thornton and patrick marlowe and all those guys so uh the ghost of chris tana let's hope he can play hockey too

because uh i like the player i like the guy but i'm with you it's tough to see him being the exact guy they've wanted him to be at this age. What are your projections for the Leafs this year? My hot take is I would not be one bit surprised if they missed the playoffs. I'm not loving the vibe there. It feels like there's too many people still waiting for the other shoe to drop, whether it's in the Marner situation. I still look at their defense and I go, I don't know if it's good enough. I don't know about their goaltending.

What's your feeling on the Leafs? I guess it's like I don't understand the predictions like that necessarily. It's like what's changed about the Leafs? Marner and those guys are all a year better. Presumably they're not going to be like we're talking dead prime. The guy's still there. Regular season has never been an issue for these guys. Matthew Nyes should be

better. Bobby McMahon was showing signs of being good. The D-Core I don't think is worse. Maybe it's not much better, but I still think they're going to be really good. I think they're probably a 105, 110 point team that has a great chance of getting eliminated in the first

round again. Born. Thanks for joining us today. Are you playing golf today? Absolutely. No, today's the day off. I got a member guest up at Coffinwood here in Toronto the next,

the rest of the week though. Okay. Well play well and enjoy the rest of your summer. And we'll, we'll talk when hockey starts up for real. I look forward to it. Thanks for having me guys. All right.

See you, buddy. That's Justin Bourne, a friend from Sportsnet. Yeah. I mean, listen, a lot of the times I like these hot takes.

Halford gets to have all these ridiculous hot takes, but you know, my, my hot take is like, I'm not, not at all bullish on the Leafs. I think they've just got like a lot, like I realized they've still got some good players.

You know, Matthews is going to score goals. Mitch Marner is going to put up points. bullish on the Leafs. I think they've just got like a lot, like I realize they've still got some good players. You know, Matthews is going to score goals. Mitch Marner is going to put up points. William Nylander is going to do the same. It just feels like they're just at this point where everyone's like, okay, well, is Marner going to be with the team for long? And I don't know. The vibes are bad.

The vibes are bad. Like who are their goalies? They have, well, Joseph Wall. Yeah. And then I forgot who they, they signed a backup. Laddie's back. Laddie, who are the Leafs goalies this year?

They signed Stolarz. That's who it was. So what do you think about the Leafs goaltending this year, hadn't it? You've always liked Joseph Wall. I've always liked Joseph Wall. I've always liked Anthony Stolarz. So I was just on a Leafs podcast actually the other day, hadn't it? You've always liked Joseph Wohl. I've always liked Joseph Wohl. I've always liked Anthony Stolarz.

So I was just on a Leafs podcast actually the other day and I said after the last decade they'd had in net, it's weird saying that I'm actually kind of confident in their goaltending. Right. And they have some decent prospects coming through the pipeline as well. In terms of goaltending.

In terms of goaltending. So I'm really high on Wohl. Injury concern is kind of the big thing with those two goalies. Stolarz has had some injuries over the years as well and is a big dude. So that's really my only concern going into the year for the Leafs is that their goalies stay healthy. That's your only concern for the Leafs? Well, no, that's my only concern in terms of their goal-taying.

I think they've got major questions all over the lineup. I have less concern about the talent of their goaltenders more so than I just think they might have trouble staying healthy yeah that's fair um the the one thing born we we started talking to him about that i found interesting is specifically in regards to the pod calls and trade i've always wondered what the next evolution of like capitalizing like there's always something that some gms are ahead of the curve on that ends up making their team better for longer than other teams that are trying to catch up to them and I kind of wonder if the next thing is trading young players before they failed as prospects when you know that they're

failing as prospects yeah if you've got the guts to do it yeah but if you know that they're failing as prospects but there are some guys that, you know, I remember when Philip Forsberg was traded. Yeah. By the Washington Capitals for like Marty Erat. And there was all sorts of things that came out of the Washington organization after that.

And what they didn't publicly say, it was reported. They're like, yeah, they'd soured on him a little bit. They wondered about, I think it might've been his skating or something. I don't know. It was a long time ago, but they'd soured on him a little bit they wondered about i think it might have been his skating or something i don't know it was a long time ago but they they'd soured

on him and then they got it completely wrong like completely wrong but you gotta but i get i get yeah i get what you're saying right like if you bring in a guy and you're excited to draft him but then you have six months to get to know him and to work with him and to see his work ethic. And then all of a sudden you're like, oh God. This is bad. We had bad intel on this guy or whatever. Yeah. But I think just being a good general manager takes courage.

You have to risk making bad moves. You have to put your ego on the line and if you manage scared it's the same thing in media if you write scared if you're on the radio and you're scared to say anything that might anger people or if you've got an opinion you're scared to do that you're not going to be successful you know jim rutherford has made a ton of trades in his career. He's blown a lot of them. Yeah. But he's also nailed a bunch of them,

and he's won Stanley Cups because of that. You've got to feel confident saying John Tavares is getting traded back to the New York Islanders. You've got to be confident. I was just surprised when I saw that. That would be wild. I get these. I'm trying to find it, too. You'll be surprised to know

that I get a lot of PR emails from gambling companies. Have you guys heard that? There's a lot of gambling talk. It's really big right now. It's really big, yeah. I'm getting it a lot. It's like it became legal

and all of a sudden the leagues embraced it and everything. I don't know. It's crazy stuff. And I saw that and I was like, minus 120 for the new

york islanders i gotta find it is it is it like minus 120 that if he gets traded it's to the islanders or it was like where yeah i can't remember i gotta find it yeah i will find it it's possible i dreamt about it but um it rolled in with the confidence of like dude this dream that i had was well when i saw it and then when i heard born and i knew because he's got obviously ties to uh the new york islanders organization he's the son of bob born and um and he attends all sorts of islanders events and uh when i saw that i was like there's no like the fans turned on Tavares big time, and rightly so, right? When we're talking about fandom. This is rough Skittle brow.

What's that? Perhaps you dreamt it. Remember Simpsons? I'm fine. Just give me a beer and some Skittles. Okay, I got to find it. What do we got coming up on the show? We got Ian O'Connor coming up next.

This is going to be a really interesting interview. Ian O'Connor is a longtime writer. He's written on guys like Bill Belichick, Mike Krzyzewski, a famous college basketball coach. And now he's got a book coming out on Aaron Rodgers. And Ian has done all the big shows. And now he's kind of petered out a little bit. He's like, okay,

I guess I'll do Halford and Brough in Vancouver and talk about my book. Um, but I'm really interested to talk to Ian, not only about the subject of Aaron Rogers, what did you learn about Aaron Rogers? Um, who did you talk to about Aaron Rogers? How much did you talk to,

uh, with Aaron Rogers? Um, and what have you heard since the book has come back, come out? What has been the pushback? And more from like a journalistic perspective, how do you tackle a project like this? So Ian O'Connor is going to come up next on the Halford & Brough show.

And then at 8 o'clock, Rick Campbell, the head coach of the BCc lines will join us after i guess uh i'm not going to call it disastrous because it was nathan rourke's first time playing meaningful football in a long time um but it was not a good performance by him or the bc lines in fact nathan rourke after the, cut off the reporters and said, hey, just before anyone asked any questions, I wasn't okay with that. That was bad.

He apologized to pretty much everyone in the world for his performance. So we'll talk to Rick Campbell about that, how they're going to handle the quarterback situation going forward. And we'll talk to him about a team that's struggling right now. Four straight losses for the BC Lions

who started out 5-1 and now they're 500. It is time now for the Canadian Football Report brought to you by Securian Canada, the official life insurance partner of the CFL. So the BC Lions they lose yesterday 20-11 to Winnipeg. Edmonton with a big win over

Hamilton 47-22. Montreal squeaks out a win over the Rough Riders, 27-24. So the Lions kind of keeping pace, thankfully, with Saskatchewan. And the Ottawa Red Blacks take on the Calgary Stampeders. Red Blacks win by two. They beat Calgary, 31-29. So an update in the West Division. Saskatchewan still at the top because they

have a tie they're 5 4 and 1 bc at 5 and 5 winnipeg and calgary on their heels both at 4 and 6 and then edmonton at 3 and 7 that was the canadian football report brought to you by securing canada the official life insurance partner of the CFL. It is Halford & Brough, and before we go, Jam Pro, the leaders in commercial cleaning and janitorial. If your workplace demands a clean environment, contact Jam Pro for a free, no-obligation quote.

Visit jampro.ca. It's Halford & Brough on the other side. Ian O'Connor on Sportsnet 650. 732, Halford and Brough. No Halford. It's Josh Elliott-Wolf, Jason Brough here as well. We'll be joined by Ian O'Connor in a moment. We're coming to you live from the Kintec studio. Keep getting your,

what we'd learns in on the six 50, six 50 Dunbar lumber text line. How for new profits brought to you by the Dilawri family of Honda dealers experience the Dilawri difference today. Visit your nearest Dilawri Honda dealer today. Let's go to the phone lines. It is Ian O'Connor, author of Out of the Darkness, The Mystery of Aaron Rodgers. Really appreciate you taking the time, Ian. And we'll start off

just by what was the motivation behind this book and choosing Rodgers specifically? Good morning. Thanks for having me on. And I actually was scheduled to do a LeBron James biography. And another LeBron book came out, and I thought there to do a LeBron James biography and another LeBron book came out and I thought there might be some LeBron fatigue if I continued on. And at the same time, Aaron Rodgers got traded into my backyard here in the New York area. And I was thinking he's been a pretty compelling and mysterious guy, at least from afar. And I was fascinated by him. And I'm drawn to subjects who have a distance to them, a mystery about them, such as Derek Jeter, Bill Belichick, Coach K at Duke. So I thought he'd be a great

subject to tackle. And so that's why I did it. And it was a challenge. He is elusive. He's a contrarian. He's a rebel with a cause, sometimes a rebel without a cause. And, and so, uh, it was one of the great challenges of my, uh, authoring career and, uh, but I'm glad I did it. And I think, uh, I finally brought, uh, some light to the, to the mystery of Aaron Rodgers. When did Aaron Rodgers become this controversial figure that joined the American culture wars? Because for years he was just like, that guy's got a really good arm. He's a good quarterback. And then all of a sudden we're all talking about Aaron Rodgers.

Yeah, it's a great question because actually he was considered one of the good guys in sports in the U.S. because he supported Colin Kaepernick's protest. He was one of the few white athletes to admit publicly that NFL owners were keeping Kaepernick out of the league because of his protests. And there was a case where a fan shouted out an anti-Muslim slur and Aaron Rodgers rebuked that fan publicly and President Obama sent him a letter of appreciation and thanks. And he was involved in a charitable cause supporting victims of the war in the Congo. And so he was being praised by the same media members that ended up turning on him after COVID. COVID changed his life. And those four words in

August of 2021, when he was unvaccinated and he said, yeah, I've been immunized. And that was not the truth. He misled people. And a few months later, when the truth came out, he was blitzed with a relentless stream of criticism and rightfully so the way he handled it. And he did admit to me he made a mistake. He does not admit mistakes in pretty much any form or arena. And he did that day when I sat down with him in Malibu at his mansion on the Pacific Ocean, which was an interesting day. But yeah, that's when his life changed. He took a public relations hit that day that he still has not recovered from. Tell us about your conversation with Aaron Rodgers. When you write a book like this,

do you typically like to have like three or four conversations with them? And you maybe have a first conversation, then you go do some research, talk to some other people, and then come back to others, come back to them with like, how did it work with Aaron Rodgers? Well, I handed in the book actually, without talking to him, this was in January. And I had interviewed 250 people, and he would not respond to my messages. I went through the New York Jets. I went through his agent. I went directly to him. I sent him some of my books, and I just got nothing but indifference.

And, okay, it's an unauthorized biography, so he certainly doesn't owe me anything. And then all of a sudden, in February, I got a message from the Jets saying, Aaron's now willing to see you. So I flew out to Los Angeles and drove over to Malibu. And and it was listen, I could have used 15 to 20 hours with him to talk, really to have him tell me his life story. But he didn't want to do that. So it was more after talking to all these people, including his parents, who've been estranged from him for 10 years now. It was just him checking facts and giving me his version of stories that I was told and adding context, sometimes countering stories and refuting them or trying to. So he definitely made the book better. And I appreciated the fact that he was

willing to engage on very sensitive subjects, including his longstanding estrangement from his family. The book is called Out of the Darkness, The Mystery of Aaron Rodgers. Why the title Out of the Darkness? Well, he went on a darkness retreat. Yeah, I know. Right. And so it's kind of funny because he was there four days and after two days, I think he wanted out of there. He had had enough, but he did leave the darkest retreat in Oregon, in the wilderness, and said it helped him make his decision that he wanted to continue playing football. He no longer wanted to be a Green Bay Packer. And I think he saw great opportunity in the New York Jets because they haven't appeared in a Super Bowl since January of 1969, as hard

as that is to believe. So Tom Brady has seven Super Bowl rings. Aaron has one. Brady is the player he will always be measured against. And I think he realized, well, I'm certainly not going to catch him in terms of rings. But if I could win one in the Big Apple in New York City, coming from the smallest market in the NFL, it's going to feel like I won three rings.

And he's right. I think I've been covering sports for about 37 years in New York and if he wins a championship with the Jets I think that'll be the biggest story I've ever covered so a question so if people come up to you and now you've written this book on Aaron Rodgers and you've spoken to a lot of people about him and you've even spoken to Aaron Rodgers if I were to come up to you and just say, like, why is he the way he is? What would you say? Well, I think we can start with conspiracy theories because he studied the first one he got fascinated with in high school, the JFK assassination. And he came to the conclusion, like a lot of people have, that it was a conspiracy

and a government agency was involved. And from there, the conspiracy theories grew. One of his friends told me when we were growing up, we believed in magic and miracles. And when you believe in magic and miracles, you believe in the possibility of everything, including conspiracies. Aaron has always been wired to ask the question, why about everything in his life? Why are we doing this? Why are we doing this now? Why aren't we doing that? It's why, why, why? And he's been that way with his coaches in Green Bay and certainly now with the Jets. So he grew up in a very devoutly religious home, an evangelical Christian upbringing in Chico, California, north of Sacramento. He rebelled against that religion. He's no longer religious. He's spiritual, but not religious. And that rebellion planted the seed for other rebellions.

I also think the fact that he was constantly overlooked in his football career, no scholarship offers out of high school. He had to play at the local community college. He falls in the draft. Everybody thinks he's going first to San Francisco. He falls to 24 and the Packers on national TV, he's embarrassed. He's humiliated. He is the first NFL draft reality show, and he carries that with him to this day.

So I know that's a long answer, and there's a lot to unpack there. But I think in terms of him having that chip on his shoulder, being defiant, being a conspiracy theorist, what I just explained to you is is the root of all that what is his current relationship with his family not good it's still estrangement uh it's been going on forever and there are it's not just one issue there have been a lot of issues he's had with his brothers they've had with him religion was a part of it early not really so much now olivia munn the actress was blamed by the parents and other family members. She only confirmed some thoughts Aaron had about the family unit revolving too much around his success and fame. And he hasn't dated her in seven years, so it's

certainly not all her fault. And I think there's one hopeful scene in the book of last summer at Lake Tahoe, the celebrity golf tournament Aaron plays in every summer, his father put himself in the crowd in the hope of seeing him. Aaron saw his father and actually went over and gave him a hug. And they cried and said, I love you. It was a 30-second moment. But it's the first time Ed has seen his son or touched him in nine years. So both told me on the record for the book that they want to have a relationship, those two.

And Aaron has never said that about a family member since The Estrangement started in 2014. So the hope is they come together in the coming months and then the rest of the family falls into place after that. What criticism have you heard in the wake of the publishing of certain excerpts and certain stories and publishing of the book? What criticisms have you heard? You probably expected a few and how would you address those? Well, I think people were looking for one singular reason for that estrangement. And frankly, so was I when I started the process. And so I've heard from people complaining about the lack of an identification of one thing. And that's because

Aaron can't really explain it as one thing. And his parents have no idea still why this estrangement goes on. And as I don't know if you know, but I come from a big Irish Catholic family. We've had our issues. A lot of families have issues. And there's a lot of he said, he said, he said, she said. Everyone has his or her own truth in these family disputes, including the Rogers family. So to get to that one singular defined issue or development is really impossible because it doesn't exist. And everyone has their own version of why it exists, this estrangement. But what's clear is that it's gone on too long. From the outside looking in, a lot of the issues seem pretty trivial to me and petty,

and I think it's a living being now, and Aaron can't kill it. He doesn't know how to kill it. So instead it lives on and lingers and festers, and that's why I hope the scene from Lake Tahoe last summer plays itself out into more contact, more expressions of love and reunification. We're speaking with author Ian O'Connor, who's written a book on Aaron Rodgers. It's called Out of the Darkness, The Mystery of Aaron Rodgers. When is the release date, Ian? Has it already happened? Well, it's on amazon.com. Now it's,

it's released officially in stores tomorrow, actually. So, okay. Hopefully, so you're doing the huge Halford and Brough show just because like it's tomorrow is the big day, right?

Like you did rich eyes and before, and I was like, he's kind of a big deal, but now you're doing the Halford Brough show in Vancouver. You're a big deal. It's an honor to be on. And I appreciate just you having the interest in having me on. I,

I just find Aaron Rogersgers really fascinating because I want to know what's going on in his head. And a lot of the times, you know, some people think like, well, it's none of your business what's going on in his head. And I'm like, well, I'm interested in him my question with him you know he seems to like have everything from the outside looking in right great athlete makes a lot of money he's famous good looking guy one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history and then the question that I have a lot is like is he a happy guy I think he is I think last year there were family members who hadn't talked to him in a long time, but obviously follow him from a distance, said he looked happier than ever. He was like the old Al before the estrangement. Now, the injury and just how heartbreaking that was last September changed things a little. I think what I see this year is more hunger than happiness. Last year was bliss. He had a love affair with New York City. So I haven't seen really from a superstar athlete coming from a different market to New York and doing this for the better part of four decades in New York. I can't remember a love affair that was just so, I mean, it was unbelievable. And so New York being a very liberal marketplace too, they were willing to overlook all the vaccine beliefs, the conspiracy theories. They didn't care.

They just wanted to see a great quarterback, a Hall of Famer come in and win football games for the Jets. And that probably was going to happen until his Achilles snapped. So I think this year Jets fans are cautious about buying in because they bought in last year and it blew up on them, just like most things with the Jets. And I think this year, Aaron is hungrier. He's, he looks, there's a little more serious. Well, he's always serious, but around the whole organization is more of a serious tone because they saw what happened last year. And that really hurt a lot of people. And Aaron wasn't sure he'd ever play again. He actually told his trainer, Aaron Alexander, in the early stages of recovery after surgery, I don't even know if the Jets want me back. So there is a very serious tone in that camp this time around, and it'll be interesting to see how it plays out in the season.

From all I've heard, his teammates love him. I wonder if sometimes his disdain for the media isn't great for his reputation because he comes across so standoffish. Do you think he's a completely different person when he's talking to his teammates as opposed to talking to the media? Well, I actually don't think, this is my opinion, but I don't think he has a disdain for the media. Because I always thought he was, even if he didn't agree with what he was saying, he gave thoughtful answers. I thought he was one of if he didn't agree with what he was saying, like he gave thoughtful answers.

I thought he was one of the best interviews in the NFL from the podium and talking to Green Bay V-Riders, like he was really good. If you had a big picture feature you were working on, you can grab him in the locker room and he would go places with you and think about answers and not give you cliches.

I think he now is at war with certain segments of the media who he feels have portrayed him unfairly. I think a lot of his wounds are self-inflicted, and he's had a lot of unforced errors. But he sat down with me and couldn't have been more engaging on some sensitive issues and talked on the record about the estrangement, which he hasn't really done. So I do think his teammates love him almost universally. That was one surprising aspect of doing my research. It was amazing.

Like it was almost to a man across his 20 year career is like, he is beloved as a leader, as a teammate. And he spends the most time with his players and that should count for something. And it doesn't seem like the players admiration for Aaron Rogers is ever brought up in the public discussion of who he is as a player and as a person I mean isn't that something that you always want to know like what do the people that spend their days with him think of him I think that's a really important question to ask of Aaron Rodgers and I don't agree with everything that Aaron Rodgers said says far from it or

believes far from it, but if he's beloved by his teammates and you look at a football team, talk about people from all walks of life, don't you think that means a lot? I do. I do. I'm just curious as to why we haven't listened more to that.

When his players talk, I mean, last summer with the Jets, I was out there during camp. They were starstruck, but they loved him. And then Jets fans thought he was a jerk. So many of them told me. We just read the media and watched the coverage of him in recent years from Green Bay, and we just thought, this guy's a jerk.

And then they watch Hard Knocks, and they're like, wow, this guy, he's a good leader. He's a great teammate. He's constantly teaching guys, even on the defensive side of the ball, tell him what he's seeing. He's taking guys under his wing. So hard knocks was actually a great thing for him. I don't think he wanted to do it. The Jets didn't want to do it as a franchise,

but that turned out to be a blessing. It really did. So, yeah, outside of Greg Jennings and Jermichael Finley, a couple of guys in Green Bay have said some negative things over the years, and those guys had a right to say it. They're distinguished NFL players. They have a right to their opinion. But they also said a lot of positive things about Aaron as well.

So that has been overlooked. The players, their opinion of him is different from the media's opinion in large part. And so, yeah, I do think that's been a lost part of the Aaron Rodgers conversation, and it shouldn't be did your personal opinion or maybe understanding of Aaron Rodgers change throughout this process at all yeah I think so and I I went back to pre-COVID Aaron Rodgers and remembered and and studied and researched his positions on things like the Colin Kaepernick protest. And I just

think so many people forgot about that and just think he's been a villain his entire career. He only became a villain after, yeah, I've been immunized in 2021. So that's only three years ago. But most of his career, he was being celebrated by the media. And I don't know, I think COVID really, the way he was, or he felt he was treated, he was really angered by that. And he dug in and he just decided he's a fearless public speaker. And on a certain level, you have to give him credit for that because most people aren't, including myself. But I think he said, okay, you're declaring war on me. I'm going to be a willing participant in this war. I'm not backing down. And maybe that wasn't the best idea in

certain cases, but he is who he is and he's fearless about it. And I think, in fact, he needs to be a little more fearless on the field in big postseason moments. He was as a younger player, and I think he lost that as an older player. And the Jets will need that to try to win the Super Bowl this year. As a Jets expert, what do you think their chances of being a playoff team and maybe even a team with an outside chance at getting to the Super Bowl is this season? I think they're on 11-16 as a chance to win the division. They never talk about winning the AFC East. It's always, okay, Super Bowl.

We haven't won one since Super Bowl III, January of 1969. They haven't won a division in a long time. Since 2002, they were 9-7. They won a tiebreaker with the Patriots. They haven't won a division outright since 98. Bill Parcells was their coach last time they outright won the ASE. So they need to focus on that. I think they can do it with this team, assuming they stay relatively healthy.

Aaron makes at least 14 starts. And, yes, could they make a run in the postseason? Without question, when you look at the talent on their roster, their defense, the playmakers around Aaron, if they can keep him upright, offensive line stays healthy, a lot of ifs there. But at some point, I think the football gods owe the Jets one, particularly after last year. And other haunted franchises in sports have broken through

in my career covering them the 2004 red sox the 1994 new york rangers the 2016 cubs so at some point the jets will win it all i just hope i'm alive to see it well this vancouver uh show is going to end this interview now that you've mentioned the 1994 rangers so uh sorry about that yeah that's okay that's okay i was there for that i'm old enough to have uh been been around new york at that point and yeah sorry about that we're used to it in vancouver uh ian thanks so much for taking the time uh very interesting topic very interesting book good luck with the sales i'm sure they're going to be really good for you hey thanks for having me on guys i appreciate it that was uh ian o'connor

who joined us on the halford and brough show um i don't know i'm i know there's a lot of people out there that are like i don't care about the personalities of the players i just want to watch sports i'm opposite because i do this for a living and I find, I find not only great athletes interesting because I want to know their backstory. I want to know how they became great. I want to know the challenges that they overcame. I want to know, and I think this is bigger and bigger these days, especially with social media, how they deal with the attention because there are some that will shut down and they'll

be like, I had a bad experience i'm going off social media i'm not saying anything interesting anymore i don't need this stuff and there's others that are like this was fun this is a challenge now yeah and they have an ego and they have a reputation and they have a desire to speak out. They're not willing to be silenced, even at the risk of being ridiculed or being hated or being criticized. And I find those people interesting, fascinating.

It doesn't mean I agree with them. Like it absolutely. I thought, I mean, I was very critical of Aaron Rogers when he came out and said, yeah, yeah, I've been immunized. You're like, so everyone was like, okay, well then he's, you said, yeah, I've been immunized.

You're like, so everyone was like, okay, well, then he's, you know. Like, I didn't, you know, if you don't, like at the time, I mean, there was so much craziness during the pandemic. I was having this chat with some friends the other day, and I'm like, we need a 20-year break, and then like an honest assessment of everything when that went down in the pandemic, because everyone got so dug in on their sides and so emotional even people that had trained themselves

not to be emotional you know like i'm a scientific logical thinker got dug in with their opinions i want to like okay i'll tell you a quick story all right um and uh this was when we were at the old station and this is how crazy it got and this was how much fear there was of multiple things halford and i were still going into the office downtown which is on robson street and um we went in there and at the time downtown was completely boarded up this is only a few years ago like it looked like like something happened here right it was totally like people like downtown was dead but halford and I were still going into the studio because we're essential workers, obviously. Right.

I've always said Halford and Brough show. Yeah. It's essential. And, um, we're walking out of the studio once, and I guess it would have been nine or 10 in the morning and we're walking to our cars and you could park anywhere there downtown at that time. They weren't ticketing and there was a news camera out there that was taking i imagine doing a news story on how dead downtown was and we walked past the camera and we were chatting like you would standing side by side

and we realized oh god like what if there's a news story and then Halford and Brough are seeing just walking, you know, we weren't holding hands or anything, but we were pretty close to each other. We weren't masked up. Right. And like that was the level of like fear there was. And it wasn't so much like that. There was just this fear of like getting in trouble.

Yeah. You know, and I think that- You're holding hands, come that. You're holding hands. Come on. You can admit it. It's okay. I mean, I have my arm around him, but sometimes he needs comforting.

But, you know, I just think looking back, we're going to say, well, we got some right and we got some wrong and that's fine, right? That's what happens in these situations. But, you know, with a guy like, bringing it back to Aaron Rodgers, you know, people had different opinions about how to deal with this stuff. And I think in some ways, while I was critical of Aaron Rodgers saying that,

because I think he kind of lied. It was misleading. And it was sneaky the way he did that. And he even admitted, I shouldn't have done that. But I think there were a lot of people that vilified him needlessly and a bit too aggressively. Let me put it that way. That's fair. On the other side, it is Halford and Brough, Rick Campbell, BC Lions head coach and co-GM will join us. We'll get into Nathan Rourke's debut and a loss for the

Lions. Four in a row now. We'll talk about all of that with Rick Campbell. It is Halford and Brough, Josh Elliott-Wolf, Jason Brough on Sportsnet 650.