Halford & Brough in the Morning - The Best Of Halford And Brough 8/9/24

Episode Date: August 9, 2024

Guest hosts Jamie Dodd & Israel Fehr look back at the previous day in sports, they talk a thrilling Team USA semi-finals basketball comeback win at the Olympics, they set up Sunday's BC Lions matchup at Edmonton with radio commentator Bob "The Moj" Marjanovich, plus the boys tell us what they learned.  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.

You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. You're listening to Halford and Brough. Out to right field, and it gets unpacked! The lead! Rayleigh is in! A Rosarena blitz run at anchor! He's on his way home! The Mariners win it!

And now Guerrero sends one on a ride out towards right field. It's back at the wall. It's over and gone. He's as good as anyone right now, really. Two words for you. Steve Nash and Chris Paul. Must see TV. That's more than two words.

Good morning. Happy Friday, everybody. Welcome to Halford and Brough. It is, of course, Jamie Dodd and Israel Fares still filling in for the fellas here. Wrapping up the week on an Ask Us Anything Friday. Izzy, what's going on, man? One more for me. You're still in the long haul.

You got next week as well. But yeah, it's been a good week. Let's close it out with a good show. My wife last night, I was like, oh man, I'm tired. I'm really looking forward to it. She's like, hey, you're almost done the morning show. I was like, I'm not actually. i'm on it next week as well thank you for reminding me i'm not even halfway done yet but all right here we are it's friday i'm excited

uh hey doug good morning good morning laddie hello hello oh you blew it again oh sorry you didn't even give a pause for me to say good morning yeah helfer doesn't usually pause so that's you're throwing me off again. As soon as I said laddie, you got in there with hello, hello. I'm ready to go. You love your catchphrase so much. I'm just fired up to go. I'm here early.

This is the midpoint of the peak of my day. Yeah, sure. So I'm just amped up. A little too amped up. I'm glad. Bring that energy for the rest of the show. Good morning, laddie. We are coming to you live from the Kintec studio.

Kintec, Canada's favorite orthotics provider, powered by thousands of five-star Google reviews. Soar feet, what are you waiting for? And, of course, health and brough is brought to you by the Dilawri family of Honda dealers. Experience the Dilawri difference today. Visit your nearest Dilawri Honda dealer today. As I mentioned, it it is of course an

ask us anything friday the concept i'm sure you're familiar with it but i'll spell it out anyways it's pretty simple you can text in you can ask us anything on your mind sports non-sports related whatever you want to run by us and we'll do our best to get to as many as we can throughout the course of the show and on top of that we're giving away a hundred dollar gift card to AJ's Pizza on East Broadway in Vancouver for the best Ask Us Anything. So get them in now. 650-650 is the Dunbar Lumber text line. The best Ask Us Anything today wins a hundred dollar gift card to AJ's Pizza.

We'll do that at 830. We will announce the winner. Before that, let's run through the guest list. Open first hour. So we've got lots of time to get into those Ask Us Anythings, to dive into them. Make sure you get them in now so we have a chance to do them in the first hour. At 7, AJ of AJ's Pizza will stop by for a quick chat.

Tell us about what's going on at the restaurant this weekend. 705 Nick Shook of NFL.com. Preseason action in full swing now in the NFL. A couple of games last night, full slate on the weekend. We'll talk to Nick about what he's looking, what he's curious to watch as exhibition

play gets underway in the NFL. 7.30, Ben Steiner from CBC Sports. We'll take a bit of a look back. Not quite done with the Olympics, but we're going into the final weekend here. So we'll do a bit of a summary of Paris from a Canadian perspective with Ben. And at 8 o'clock, of course, it is the Moj radio play-by-play voice of the BC Lions. They look to snap a two-game losing streak. They're playing Edmonton on Sunday.

Working in reverse, the Moj at 8. At 7.30, it's Ben Steiner, CBC Sports. 7.05, Nick Shook of NFL.com. And 7, it is, of course, AJ of AJ's Pizza. So lots to get into today. Lots to do. Before we do anything else, let's talk about what happened.

Hey, did you guys see the game last night? No. What happened? I missed all the action because we know how busy your life can be what happened you missed that what happened what happened brought to you by the bc construction safety alliance making safety simpler by giving construction companies the best in tools, resources, and safety training. Visit bccsa.ca and Izzy.

We will start at the Olympics, but I'm not going to start with a Canadian-centric story here because pretty clearly the biggest event or the most interesting event at the Olympics yesterday was Team USA coming back, surviving, erasing a 17-point deficit against Serbia, winning 95-91 in the men's basketball semifinals. I don't know about you, Izzy, but I was fired up. I was doing the whole pacing around the living room, clapping at the TV. I thought we were going to get a chance to see, I don't know, but an all-time upset, but a really, really big upset.

You're a TV clapper? It was not to me. I'm a TV clapper. Big TV clapper? I'm a yeller. I'm a TV clapper. Big TV clapper? I'm a yeller at the TV. Oh, okay. I'm pacing around. I'm fully... Like, not for every game that I watch, obviously.

But when the... But you get into it. The rooting juices start flowing, right? And you're like, oh, I'm into this. I'm invested in this. And there's an American League record on the line. Yeah, that's right. That's right.

Or when you have a chance to see a big upset, a big-time upset at the Olympics. But sadly, it was not to be. Yeah, it was awesome. It was an awesome game. It looked like Serbia was going to was going to pull it out. Yeah, they were hitting everything to start the game. The U.S. was drowning. They were underwater. But it turns out that LeBron James, Steph Curry, Kevin Durant and yes, even Joel Embiid are pretty good at basketball. And that fourth quarter was

dominant. I thought Serbia changed a bit when Jokic got his fourth foul. They got a little tentative. Yes, for sure. It was on both ends of the court. They just really let the Americans grab control of the game. The play he picked up his fourth foul on, too.

So I think it was surrey is up 12 yokich has a pretty much wide open three misses us takes it the other way katie hits a three there's an off ball foul by yokich which is his fourth foul so the us keeps possession after the three counts they hit another three so it's a six point possession yeah you factor in the miss three on the other end it's like a nine point swing the lead goes from 12 all the way down the old six point possession six point possession and that was like that was pretty early in the fourth and then as you said he's on four fouls everything becomes a little bit more tentative you've just given up a six point possession it kind of felt inevitable at that point like that was the pretty clear

turning point where it's like uh yeah this is probably not going to happen and you know i will say as much as i was rooting against the u.s right because they're the u.s they're the villain and they're they're leaning into the villain role a little bit more i mean they have joel and bead and he's crotch chopping the crowd at the olympics which is. Which is absolutely incredible. She's like, what is this event about? Like brotherhood and the spirit of international friendship? Nah, it's about DX Crocs chops. I was going to say like the wrestling move? Yes.

Bringing it back. That's like a signature Joel Embiid thing. I love that. Yeah, it's incredible. And he brought it to the Olympics. So it's pretty easy to root against the U.S. But I will say as a basketball fan, it was pretty special to see against uh the u.s but i will say as a basketball fan it was pretty special to see kind of the old guard and probably the three greatest players of their generation totally

lebron curry kd lead the comeback and i know mb was involved too he did play really well in the fourth quarter but it was lebron it was curry it was Kevin Durant making big plays, kind of putting the team on their back and it like ultimately as much as I wanted Serbia to pull off the upset this is kind of what this tournament is about. It's the same thing in international hockey, right? It's a chance to see guys who would never be on the same team together

in any other circumstance get put in these really intense, tight games and do something special and that's what those three did and kind of reminded everyone like yeah we're old we're not we're we're the old guard very much so in the NBA but we still might be when the game is on the line the guys you want to be taking care of business for your team absolutely and I had the exact same thought watching the game these are the three generation defining players and they stepped up to the moment and did

it in their way curry hit some massive threes durant when they needed a bucket and it's the classic basketball scenario if you've got one possession who do you want to have the ball what kind of play are you gonna run you know what's been a good play in the nba for the last 15 years when you need a bucket give the ball to kevin durant let him do whatever he wants let him cook he hit some massive shots and they're like they're not the prettiest shots in the world they're a lot of mid-range but he hits them and they are hugely impactful on the game and a triple double for lebron just another classic lebron Jokic in the post down the stretch, just like doing everything you could want.

Body blows. There was one possession in particular where Jokic went in the post, and he was banging against LeBron. And LeBron stood his ground and stood his ground. And that was like, hey, yeah, I still got this. 39 years old. I mean, they were talking on the broadcast, this guy's almost 40. And again, a triple-double, as you said, 39 years old. 39. I mean, they were talking on the broadcast. This guy's almost 40. Yeah.

And again, a triple-double, as you said, I think it was only the second triple-double for a U.S. player at the Olympics. And he has the other one on the men's side. Right. So just kind of reminding everyone. Also, 40-minute game. Triple-double in a 40-minute game. In a 40-minute game is pretty wild. So, like, again, as I said, I was full-on rooting for the upset.

It would have been really, really special to see. It would have been a cool moment for Serbia, but it was also really, really special watching the talent, the incredible all-time type talent take over. It did get me thinking also, this is the last Olympics for all three of these guys, I would assume. LeBron has said that he won't be at the next ones. Yeah, he's going to be 43. Yeah. KD, I guess. Curry had never played in them before which is kind of

a weird statistical anomaly but i guess in 2016 he was coming off back-to-back finals runs they had lost right they lost to cleveland in 2016 after having the best regular season ever and probably a little bit of a disappointment and then then the last Olympics were not quite as hyped as the previous ones. And he really hit his stride in that 2014-2015 range. So I guess he wasn't, you know, like an automatic lock until now. Yeah. So I don't know. Maybe he'll want to be the old guard.

The U.S., these dream teams have always done a pretty good job of having a couple of old heads to use. I mean, speaking of old heads, the number one fan, I think the guy having Mello. Mello, he was reacting like you were on the sidelines. A lot of clapping. Mello's definitely a big clapper. I did love people also being like, oh, Carmelo was orchestrating that possession where KD hit that big shot.

It's like, you mean he told Katie to isolate and hit a jumper? Like, yeah, wow. He really got basketball genius. Basketball genius right there. Cooking that play up. Hey, give the ball to Katie and clear out guys. Wow. What a play from Carmelo Anthony.

I did also love, I have to say, Kevin Durant. Great quote after the game. Someone just asked him about like, you know, being patriotic and loving the country. And he said a lot of BS. He didn't say BS, but he says a lot of BS happens in our country, but a lot of great things happen too, which I thought is just a great motto to really sum up the USA. Well put, Kevin Durant.

It is extremely, extremely apt. They advance win 95-91 over Serbia to the gold medal game where they will take on the host country, France, who took care of Germany in the other semifinal. Does that make you feel worse or better about Canada losing to France? Right. It's kind of the thing, the same thing Canucks fans went through with the Oilers, right?

Where it's like, oh, we were so close. But then they are going to the game seven of Stanley Cup final. And you think, oh, man, if we had just got past them, what we could have done. But it also makes you losing to them look better for me, especially, man, if Serbia had knocked off the US, I would have been furious that Canada had lost, like absolutely furious with the US still advancing to the gold medal game. I think you can kind of look at it and say, look, France playing at home might just have been this kind of team of destiny that Canada ran in. I don't want to make excuses, but I think it makes me feel slightly better about Canada losing to France that they're going to the gold medal game.

I feel worse because it's not like the way it, if it had been Wemby just dominating Canada, I would have been able to get behind that. But when it's role players and guys that have pedigree and were considered decent NBA prospects and have had really good careers in Europe, I'm not denigrating their accomplishments, but when you're the Canadian team that's supposed to be the one that was going to challenge the U.S.

It's not like France then went out, and Germany's a good team, defending World Cup champs, and they clearly play a really strong team game, but it's not like France blew the doors off Germany. It does feel like a huge missed opportunity. You are right. I was thinking the same thing. It looked like Serbia was going to waltz to the final.

That would have been a tough one to take. That would have been devastating. Because then you would have thought for as good as Jokic is... You'd have a chance at gold. A gold medal opportunity was on the line. Yeah. They could have had the reputation that the Manu Ginobili Argentina team did.

Yeah, exactly. When the U.S. The previous time the U.S. choked. All right. So the final will be France versus the USA for men's basketball gold in Paris. From a Canadian perspective yesterday, Majoran wins silver. This was happening kind of just as we were going off the air yesterday. Mod Sharon wins silver.

This was happening kind of just as we were going off the air yesterday, wins silver and weightlifting. Of course she was the defending gold medalist, but she had to lose weight, shed weight to get into the new weight class in this year's Olympics. Also dealt with injuries. So going from gold to silver, but still a really,

really impressive, incredible performance for Mod Sharon just to do that and to make it back on the podium. Also, our women's beach volleyball team playing for gold today. The Humana Parity's Wilkerson duo, they beat Switzerland in the semifinal. They were facing a match point at one point and they stayed alive and they came back to win the match. So impressive performance. They're going for gold today. Also want to mention Skylar Park winning bronze in Taekwondo for Canada yesterday. And this morning we picked up gold in canoe sprint, I believe. Yeah, women's canoe double 500 meters. Sloan McKenzie and Katie Vincent.

So there you go. We continue to rack up the medals at Paris. Some people are saying, and we'll talk to Ben Steiner about this at 7.30, you can make the case that this might be the most successful Summer Olympics that Canada has had. We'll see where the final medal count and everything ends up, and there are some high-profile disappointments mixed in there as well. But overall, I think you have to look at it and say,

it's been a really impressive performance. I also want to mention Sarah Minton in shot put has a chance to be on the podium or even challenge for gold. That's happening today as well, as well as the men's four by 100 relay. One other note from the Olympics yesterday. This is a wild story for me. Noah Lyles wins bronze. The American sprinter wins bronze in the 200 meter. After the race, he's in a lot of distress.

I think he ends up leaving in a wheelchair, right? And people are kind of like, what's going on? What's happening here? And it comes out shortly after the race. He has COVID. He was racing with COVID. And obviously it caught up to him at the end of that 200 meters. And then initially there was a lot of confusion.

People being like, what the heck's going on? Why was he racing with COVID? And it turns out they're just treating it like any other respiratory illness, like the flu or a cold at these games where it's your choice. Hey, we'll take precautions to kind of keep you isolated in the village on the way to the event and all of those. But if you want to compete, go ahead. So that's the choice that Noah Lyles made.

I'm honestly just wildly impressed that he was able to win bronze in the 200 meter sprint while having COVID. If you've ever had COVID, you know what it can do to your lung capacity, right? And sometimes even light exercise has your lungs burning. So for Noah Lyles to take home the bronze with COVID is like one of those sneaky, wildly impressive Olympic feats for me. I thought he was just a big fan of Paul Pierce. He was just throwing back to Paul Pierce coming off on the wheelchair. A Paul Pierce tribute? Yeah, that was a crazy story.

No one is that big a fan of Paul Pierce. No one had it on their radar, right? No, it came out of nowhere. It was kept quiet for two days so that these opponents would't know that he was he was running uh he was running a little behind and it was kind of funny too because of course noah lyle's not shy about pumping himself up about boosting himself and you know before the games he'd kind of said oh what a freaking boost that's right before the games he said you know i'm gonna win four golds right i'm gonna i'm coming for all these different events he won the gold in 100 meters loses this one or finishes uh third it

gets the bronze and the initial reaction was kind of oh he was talking such a big game he couldn't even win two of them you know he's to finish his bronze in this one it's like well he did have covid so i feel like there's a bit of an asterisk on that it would have been interesting to see what he could have done if he didn't have covid he did end up withdrawing from the rest of the olympics after that race. That's the Olympic picture from yesterday. Again, we'll keep you updated on everything happening while we're on the air.

We'll dive more into the Olympics with Ben Steiner from CBC Sports at 7.30. To the Diamond last night, massive, massive result for the Seattle Mariners and Robin Suri, who loves to stick it to the blue jays has already texted in ask us anything for jamie how does the crow taste this morning

after that walk-off three-run rbi double for mitch hanegar that moved the mariners back into a tie for first place last night that's from rob in surrey oh they scored that a double hey he didn't touch the ball so what what are you going to do? Yeah, if you weren't watching, and you texted me, actually, I think in like the sixth or seventh inning, it was, what, 3-1 for the Tigers. The Mariners had two hits, and you kind of said like, oh, Mariners fans are doing great right now.

And it looked like it was going to be just another classic, incredibly frustrating, punchless offensive performance for the Mariners. A bullpen game for Detroit. I texted back to you like, hey, two-run deficit, insurmountable for this team. The night before was hard scooble. This was a bullpen game for the Detroit Tigers.

Guys who had, like, I looked it up, the first two pitchers in the bullpen game had a combined, like, ten innings pitched in MLB, in the bigs, before that last night like these were inexperienced bullpen guys that the tigers were throwing out and they were two hitting the mariners through like seven or eight innings and it was a three one game and again it looked like this was going to be their fourth loss in a row you know falling further behind the astros who were idle last night it felt like it could been I don't necessarily want to say a tipping point game, but the kind of thing that really throws fans into a frenzy, right?

And instead... Oh, the vibes were bad on social media, Jamie. Very, very bad. And then what happens is they load the bases in the ninth inning. Mitch Hanegar steps up, line drive to right field, and as Laddie alluded to, I would say misplayed by the Tigers outfielder. It gets behind him, gets all the way to the wall,

and it's a base-clearing three-RBI double for Mitch Hanegar. Walk-off 4-3 win. Now, I will say, for the Tigers outfielder, it was two outs, right? So the runners are running on contact. So if you don't catch that ball, it's probably a tie game anyways. So I understand he's trying to win the game. He's saying, you know what? I don't want it to be tied.

But still, you probably have to keep it in front of you in those circumstances. However you score it, however you assign credit or blame or whatever, it's a massive, massive hit, a desperately needed hit for the Mariners. And it feels now like it could be a bit of a catalyst type win for them, right? Like maybe that's what they needed. They just needed something to go right like that to get a little bit of the mojo back. They're now tied with the Astros. And one of the subplots in this whole division race is the Astros aren't that great either.

So the Mariners don't have to be exceptional to keep pace and edge out the Astros in the AL West. They just have to be good. They haven't been good at the plate in a long time, but that's the type of win that maybe could jumpstart their season and push them into a playoff spot at the end. Yeah, they've got the Mets coming in this weekend, and they've got a very rare Sunday night baseball game on Sunday. The Mariners rarely, rarely get an opportunity to play

in the marquee weekly game, and I'm assuming there's going to be some juice at the park. The Mets rarely come to Seattle as well. And that'll be – also, they play Detroit again next week in Detroit. And they've got a bit of an easier schedule to finish out August. So they do have the opportunity to put themselves in position to be in first place to start september and then go from there and and try to stave off the astros because we know we've been saying it all week their pitching staff is about as

good as it gets in the league right now whatever julio rodriguez and jp crawford can give them when they come back will probably be better even though they've both had some down years relative to the year before they'll probably give them a little bit more than what they're getting although victor robles has been been quite good filling in in center field and he'll probably just move to playing some right field and getting some some positional or some situational at bats that's that's the bar and you're right jamie the bar is not they don't have to be an elite team. They just have to do enough. And I mean, we could be having a completely different conversation

if Cal Raleigh's line drive to center field the night before is like five feet higher. And then they end up winning that game. But it is the margins that they're playing with, right? We're talking about a home run robbery late in the game the night before and then the game last night uh a guy you know an outfielder trying to do a little bit of a hero play and the ball basically you know landing in the middle of right field and going yeah hey you take you take what you can get right and as you said it's not as if they had been super

lucky the night before so they pick up the win they're now in basically a dead heat for the astros with the astros for top spot in the al west uh meanwhile jay's win seven six vladdy finishes a single shy of the cycle this was against the orioles by the way he is on an absolute tear right now like even for you know you go back to his 2021 season which was off the charts. And this feel it feels like we're getting this version. Another loss. Again, another loss. That's what it is. Right. He's on a 20 game hit streak. He's hitting over 500 in that span. And it's not just singles. He's hitting for power, racking up extra base hits in a big way. He had a big opposite field home run last night. But as you say, Lattie, it's just like, well,

this amounts to nothing it's fun to watch it's a nice little consolation prize for jay's fans it's fun to see a hitter with his type of talent put it all together for a stretch but as i was saying to izzy before the show i just feel like the jays are going to come back with an improved team and next year and vladdy's going to go back to like 2022 vladdy and it's going to be all for naught and we're going to be wondering like hey where was this guy where's this guy when we actually need it? When the team is competitive, you hope from the start of the season. Well, does this give you any sort of thoughts that he might have a little bit of trouble

when he has pressure on him, perhaps? Because every time he has a good team around him, he seems to falter a little bit. And then now when he's the guy, games don't really matter. All of a sudden, he's back to that 2021 Vlad again. You're saying he's the Elias Patterson. Well, I'm not saying he's that close of a comparison. Maybe Bruff would make that comparison

a little bit more than I would. But yeah, it feels like when the pressure is on, he's not the same guy. Just wait until he gets the big contract. He'll disappear for months at a time. Well, the pressure will be off at that point. He'll have the contract,

so maybe he'll be fine. But he won't be playing for a big contract. He won't be playing for a big contract. He'll disappear for months. The pressure will be off at that point. He'll have the contract. So maybe he'll be fine, but he's not, he won't be playing for a big contract. I will say, I think that at least he's demonstrated enough this year that you can buy. Okay. He's it's reasonable to expect him to be, you know,

one of the best hitters in the American league, which is all of a sudden what he has been this year. And then you can feel good about giving him the type of payday. Now, as you said, look, are you going to have questions? He's not established himself in that upper, upper echelon of players where you're kind of locked into elite performances year after year. But I think he's at least done enough, answered enough questions that you can say, okay, we feel comfortable paying this guy.

We could feel comfortable investing in his future. And I think the Jays need that. So it is frustrating to see him turn it on now and it doesn't mean anything. I don't know. I'm not ready to go there with the, oh, he can't do it under pressure thing. Like, I think we need more evidence.

I think it's just for whatever reason, he's been very, very inconsistent. Maybe it happens to track with whether the team has been good or not, but I'm willing to to write that off as a coincidence and hope there are better days ahead uh if and when the jays put a more competitive team around them you're listening to the best of halford and brough you're listening to the best of halford and brough

it's the mooch i did not eat four burgers. I don't want to go to Winnipeg. Nobody wants to go to Winnipeg. Yes, I love food. I went online and kind of did a little surfing. Yes, it's the mooch. Halpert's fine, but, you know, Brumf is just grumpy all the time. Moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, moat, Moj, it's the Moj. Really got to let that one run.

A long tail on that one. Got to let it breathe. Worth every second. Welcome back to Halpern and Brough, your Sportsnet 650. Jamie Dodd, Israel Fair. Halpern and Brough brought to you by the Dilawri family of Honda dealers. Experience the Dilawri difference today. Visit your nearest Dilawri Honda dealer today. This hour of Halper of half and rough is brought

to you by campbell and pound real estate appraisers trust the expertise of campbell and pound visit campbell-pound.com today and as a reminder you still have time to get your ask us anything friday submission in a hashtag a u a and include the pizza emoji, 650-650 to the Dunbar-Lumber text line. Include the pizza emoji for your chance to win a $100 gift card to AJ's Pizza on East Broadway in Vancouver. We'll do that at 8.30, but right now, joining us, as you heard, he is the play-by-play voice of the BC Lions. He is Bob the Moj Marjanovic. Moj, what's going on, man? Good morning, Counselor.

Good morning, Izzy. Good morning. How you doing, man? It morning, counselor. Good morning, Izzy. Morning. How you doing, man? It's a Friday, isn't it? So it's a good day. Exactly. Exactly. So, all right. Lots to get into with the BC Lions. Before we do that, I'm glad we have you on today, Moj. Earlier in the show, somebody texted in a question about

ordering pizza for a group. And my take was, keep it simple. I'm not saying it all has to be pepperoni, but don't overthink things. Pepperoni is the best pizza. We don't need to go trying to add all these fancy toppings. Just keep it simple. Everyone likes pepperoni.

That should be the bulk of your order. I got a surprising amount of blowback, people criticizing my devotion to pepperoni pizza. So I got to put it to you, Moj, where do you stand on pepperoni pizza? That's a tough one. It's funny because we were on the road in Winnipeg,

and I usually get some sandwiches and stuff prior for game day and for the flight home and all that. And I kind of like, you know, I could have done the subway road. I mean, here's the thing. You can go like the super safe thing. If you're picking a sandwich, you go with Subway, Quiznos, whatever. If you're going with pizza, you can go with pepperoni, ham and mushroom, whatever. You can keep it simple.

But if you have confidence in your clientele, the people that you're with, and you have confidence in what you believe to be a great pizza or good sandwich, you kind of venture out. And I'll give you an example. We were in Winnipeg. I read about this place there that had some amazing Vietnamese subs. And I'm thinking to myself, if I ask Julio Caravaggio if he wants a Vietnamese sub, he's going to say no, right?

Like he's Mr. Ham and Potatoes, give me some pasta, whatever. And I ordered the subs anyways, and both him and Timur absolutely love these subs. They're unbelievable, right? So it's a real risk, but you have to be pretty sure in the pizza that you're ordering that if you do order it, people are going to love it. I mean, you can go safe, but see, here's the thing. I don't like safe.

I like to venture out and try different things, and I even want my friends to get out of their comfort zone and try different things and nine times out of ten it works out pretty good because people actually do like what you pick but see for me pepperoni it's not that it's safe it's just a well-done pepperoni pizza is better to me than the than the more adventurous and i'm not saying i never go for other things of course you know I mix it up here and there but I just think the pinnacle of pizza is a really well done pepperoni pizza yeah you know sometimes basic is really good the only rule I have with pizza is I don't put pineapple on pizza like I mean if you're gonna put pineapple or you put bananas and oranges and all this other stuff pineapple does not belong on a pizza that is absolutely criminal criminal. Anybody who puts pineapple on pizza,

like don't even ask them for any sort of food opinion. Moj, who's putting bananas and oranges on a pizza? Same people who put pineapple on it. All right. Moj, I knew you'd have a good, a strong take on pizza. So thank you for doing that. But let's get into the BC Lions here. They're looking to snap a two-game losing streak in edmonton this weekend you know that's

coming off a five-game win streak for them what's gone wrong over the last couple of games for the lions well first off the game against calgary just not making a big play when they needed it right i mean they had ample opportunities in that game at three or four late in the game where if they make a play, they could possibly win the football game. I mean, Seante Evans falls on a football that squirts out and Calgary retains possession. There was like a second in, I don't know, 15 where they let Calgary at the hook. They make a play there.

They get the ball back a couple of passes and boom, they're in field goal range and win the game. So that one you look at and you say they just didn't make a play. Winnipeg, I don't know what happened in Winnipeg. I mean, they made the Bombers' defense look like the 85 Bears. I mean, Winnipeg's got a good defense, don't kid yourself, but BC's got a pretty good offense as well. And they just completely misfired in that game.

And, yeah, it was a no-show. And as Rick Campbell says, you're going to have those games, those bad days at the office. I mean, even Rick Talkett will talk about it with the Canucks. There's maybe four or five games a year where you just got to wipe the slate clean and go back to the drawing board and kind of go back to what made you successful. So hopefully this weekend against the Edmonton Elks at Commonwealth Stadium, the Lions will get back to the recipe of success.

Adding to the disappointment in Winnipeg, obviously, the Vernon Adams injury and the news this week is that it's not long-term, long-term, but it is week-to-week, but it does appear, at least from the Lions' side, to be positive based on the way that he left the field against Winnipeg, does it not? Yeah, I mean, obviously, it's not a season-ending injury. And we're going to see what joke Jake Doligala joke don't we got Jake Doligala sorry Jake Jake Doligala has in store he's a

big quarterback he's got an unbelievable arm I was out of practice yesterday made a couple of throws that you just kind of went wow um great arm strength of course he doesn't have the mobility that Vernon Adams Jr. does and that might put a little bit more pressure on the offensive line. But it's going to be interesting to see what he does. I mean, he played last year for Saskatchewan, guys. And I looked at his stats. It wasn't like he, you know, played poorly. Like, he did the job for a backup quarterback.

So it's going to be interesting to see what he does. But the big key, and Rick Campbell talked about this this week, is they've got to be much better on first downs. You know, against Winnipeg, I don't think they ran the ball the first four times they had it. So that's something they've got to get back to, is run the ball a little bit more with William Stanbeck. Get in a second and short situations where either you can run the ball

or run these hit screens that everybody seems to be running now where it's just an extended running play and you get the ball in the receiver's hands, you know, and allow him to pick up 5, 6, 10, 15 yards, whatever the case may be. Yeah, and you mentioned Jake Doligala, the backup, who's going to get the start. 6'7", as you said, big fella, big arm. And, you know, I know sometimes there's a tendency when you have the backup quarterback coming in, and as you said, they want to establish the run more anyways.

Maybe you play it a little bit safe, right? Do more of those short-screen-type passes, get the ball in space to your guys. But when you have a guy with that kind of arm and that kind of size, you got to probably want to take some shots downfield at some point too, right, Moj? Oh, without a doubt, without a doubt. I mean, you want to play to his strengths, right? So it's going to be interesting. Plus you have to, you know, when you look at what you run on offense, a lot of times you have to take what the defense is giving you right so if they want to come up and take away those hit screens and and force the lions to throw the ball they will take some shots conversely if they want to play deep and you know take away you know the deep ball then you know then you hit the hit screen so it's basically like every

defense no matter what defense it is there is a a weakness in it, right? You just have to find the weakness in that defense and exploit it. The cliche football answer is that it's a week-to-week thing and the team's not going to be looking past any opponent. But if Vernon Adams misses, let's say, three or four games, what's a realistic expectation for how the Lions can perform while he's out? Well, I mean, if you ask anybody on the team, they want to win each and every game. But, you know, if, say, Vernon Adams is out four games,

and if you can go 3-1 or 2-2, I think you're in pretty good shape just because of the fact that you do have a backup quarterback in. So, I mean, the last thing you want to go is 1-3 or 0-4 if he's out, per se, four games. My biggest thing that really kind of concerns me about Vernon Adams being out, you know, the Lions have a little bit of space to play with in terms of the standings. But the thing that concerns me is they got Winnipeg again. Winnipeg had a bye week, and then they'll play Winnipeg at home next week.

And if Winnipeg wins that game, Winnipeg has the season series on the Lions, right? So to me, that's the biggest concern. You know, you always talk about trying to get a team at the right time of year. Well, the Bombers are getting the Lions at the right time of year by knocking them off in Winnipeg, knocking Adams out of the game, and of course now going up against the Lions here next week and not having Adams in the lineup.

You know, and Moj, as you said, still the standings in the West Division, very tight, right? Saskatchewan's played the extra game, so they're ahead of the Lions right now, but that can change with a win for the Lions over the weekend. But then Calgary's at 4-4, Winnipeg 3-6, but as you said, maybe they're catching the Lions at the right time here. And of course, I think in the back of our minds for a lot of us with this Lions season is the fact that they're hosting the Grey Cup

and it would be absolutely amazing to see them make a run to that game at this point of the season I mean how would you kind of just evaluate the Lions as a whole and their chances of of being in the mix for the Grey Cup at the end of the year well I think they got a really good chance I mean you know you're gonna look at you're gonna have some recency bites and look at the last two weeks and go oh this team's in trouble but but let's not forget. They did have five wins prior to that. Right. I mean, it's crazy. I mean, pro sports is it's crazy. Five, you know, a couple of weeks ago they're in cruise control on a five game win streak.

You lose two and all of a sudden people are reaching for the panic button. So I think they got as good a chance as anyone in the Western division to reach the gray cup in Vancouver. And you're right. I mean, that was there in 94, believe it or not, and I was there in 2011. When your team is in the Grey Cup and, you know, you're hosting the Grey Cup and your team's in it, it's just an amazing experience and it's even more amazing when they win. So I look at the big picture and, again, I think they have just as good a chance as anybody to win in that division. Edmonton is one and seven but as you point out in your latest column six of those

losses have been by one score so they've been playing some tight games obviously big news there just a few weeks ago with Chris Jones getting let go what is the challenge that Edmonton even with that that poor record could could pose to the Lions? Well, they've been competitive in every game. I mean, of course, we talked about that in the piece. And then, you know, you look at the Edmonton Oaks, they're coming off a win. So they're going to be playing with some confidence. They have a reference point.

And they have Trey Ford, a quarterback, who's given them a tremendous boost both on the field and, I guess, psychologically. So it's going to be a challenge. I mean, you know, the one thing about the Canadian Football League this year, man, I can't remember a season where there's been so much parity, where so many games have come down in the last three minutes. And even with the command center trying to screw everything up last night, I mean, it was still an entertaining football game, right? So it's interesting because, and Rick Campbell talked about this as well,

you can't look at the records, right? I mean, these are good football teams. Despite the fact that Edmonton has only won one game, they've been in pretty much every game. They could have four or five wins by now if things have gone the other way, but they didn't, so here they are with one win. But, man, I'm looking at this game in Edmonton, and I'm looking at it by no means am I saying this is you know guaranteed

win night for the BC Lions because they're going up against a one-win game yeah and on the flip side of that right with the the Elks losing by uh by a lot of one-score games I mean some of the Lions wins early in the year were one-score close games right so I think it's a great point about the parity in the league right now and you know you mentioned earlier right that they really need to do a better job on first down, and a big part of that is getting the running game going more consistently. What needs to improve in that area for the Lions, not just against Edmonton this weekend,

but for the rest of the season as well, Moj? Well, I mean, if you want to run the football, it starts with your offensive line and gaining control of the line of scrimmage and winning your one-on-one battle. I mean, that's what it boils down to, right? And, you know, utilizing the proper technique to do so. And conversely on defense, I mean, I was watching that game against the Saskatchewan-Edmonton game, just watching, you know,

what Edmonton did in that game. And, man, I looked at what Saskatchewan was doing on defense, and I'm like, guys, what are you doing? Like, I'm just – there were some plays, like, you know, guys – I mean, I'm going to get a little technical on you here, but are you doing? There were some plays like, you know, I mean, I'm going to get a little technical on you here, but, you know, when you're playing gap-controlled defense, you can't allow your shoulders to get turned.

I saw players getting their shoulders getting turned. I saw linebackers sitting at five yards, and instead of moving up and canceling a gap, they basically waited for an offensive lineman to basically block them. I saw Micah Johnson one time who had an outside shade on the guard and crossed his face and tried to get into the other gap and then just got washed, which I'm like,

this is stuff you don't see in high school, right? So basically on defense it boils down to gap integrity, right? Just maintaining your gap and doing a great job. They're going to have to do that this week against Trey Ford and Javon Le because if they don't, you know, Edmonton will have an opportunity to exploit some plays.

But for me, like with the run, it starts on both sides of the line of scrimmage, whether it's offense or defense. Moj, as you know, it's an Ask Us Anything Friday here on the show. I know you're a big, big fan of this segment. We had Colin Intuosin texted in specifically for you and Ask Us Anything for the Moj. Which Olympic event

would you have been the best at? I don't know if you're a big Olympics guy, Moj, but there's the question from Colin. Which Olympic event would the Moj have thrived at? Oh, wow. That's a great question. Colin from White Rock, I think you actually silenced me on this one. That's hard to

do. Yeah. Which Olympic event would I love to have done? I'll tell you a crazy story. When I was a little kid, like when I was like six or seven, I actually wanted to be a tennis player. All right. Okay. So, like, you know, I was like, you know, I went out and bought a racket once

and then, you know, bang the ball around at Queens Park at the tennis courts for like who knows how long. And then I kind of decided I was going to become a pilot or something i can't remember there was a part of me at one point that you know dreamed of playing in wimbledon right so um maybe a tennis player it certainly certainly wouldn't be diving right sure what what would i have been capable of man i i was just i wasn't a good enough athlete to be even close to anything right but yeah maybe like a tennis player if i had to go that route right what about hammer throw we're a hammer throw powerhouse now moj yeah um hammer throw no i'd probably kill somebody in the stand

but they do have those nets right like you have those nets that'd be all right if they didn't have those nets they'd be like hammer could be going who knows where, and that'd be dangerous. I don't know how those people do it either. They're unbelievable. That's wild. Think about this. Can you imagine Dodge spinning around four times? He'd fall down, right? Forget about throwing anything.

Just the spinning would be bad enough. Exactly. You'd spin four times, and you'd be like one of those little kids at a birthday party. You'd be down on all fours in like one of those little kids at a birthday party. You'd be down on all fours in like six seconds. Can't even do the pinata. Exactly. Well, the next game's mojo. We've got flag football.

2028 sounds like a lot of the top NFL stars want to participate. You're obviously a huge football guy. Do you have any interest in the flag football at the Olympics? You know, I'll tell you something about the Olympics. I was thinking of doing a column on this, and I still might. I don't know what it is, but, like, when I was younger, I was totally into the Olympics. I'm still into the Winter Olympics.

And I'm into the Winter Olympics, too. I think it's because it's smaller, it seems more quaint, whatever. The Summer Olympics, to me, it's just got monstrous. And I think the other thing, too, that kind of turns me off is, you know, the participation of all these professionals, like whether it's golf, whether it's basketball. I mean, they've got surfing in French Polynesia and Tahiti, right? I mean, is that really part of the Olympic Games?

Yeah, it is. Three-on-three basketball. You know, whatever. I mean, breakdancing. I mean, all of these events, it just got so big. And I don't know. I've had a real disconnect with the Olympics. And that's not to say that I don't appreciate what some of these great athletes are doing.

But to me, it's just gotten so big that I just can't connect with it anymore, right? And that's why I think I really love the Winter Olympics because it's smaller. And you can connect with the athletes. And here I am talking about professionalism, yet when it's smaller and you can connect with the athletes. Here I am talking about professionalism, yet when it's Olympic hockey, of course, I'm watching. There's kind of a double standard there. No, I get it. I mean, look, we're Canadian, right?

The Winter Olympics is always going to have that extra pull for us. I understand that. Moj, really appreciate it, man. Fun times, as always. Have a great weekend. All right, Counselor Izzy. Have yourself a great weekend. Thanks, Moj. That is Bob the Moj Marjanovic weighing in on the Lions and the Olympics.

I like that I have a nickname for my Moj now. Explain Counselor to me. Because I used to be a lawyer. Right. Okay. Sustained. That's right. I'll allow it, Counselor.

That's a special moment for me, getting the Moj nickname. I expected Moj to go to wrestling or something or or you know as i said hammer throw lacrosse is a big lacrosse guy that's in the next games yeah that's coming up so i guess it's not a traditional olympic sport but uh tennis i wouldn't have picked uh moge for a tennis aficionado but no that was that was a bit of a swerve i I do generally agree. This is a problem in a lot of pro sports and sports in general, is if you're not growing, you're not getting more money and things like that. But I am an Olympics traditionalist. A purist.

I like the core events, if you will. I'm not anti, you know, the breaking is going on now and people are excited about Snoop Dogg's there. He's very excited about that. But I always was more of an Olympic purist. Yeah, the real sort of tentpole events. The core sports are the key, right? You're swimming, you're track, you're athletics.

Those are the key events. I don't have a huge issue with them trying out these different things and adding breaking and, you know, three on three basketball. It doesn't detract from the rest of the games, right? As you said,

kind of the traditional ones that people really get engaged with. For me, I can kind of separate them. I get why they do it. They're looking for, you know, they're looking for these, these new revenue streams and to grow the interest and all of that.

It is kind of funny that they end up putting in these different versions of sports, like three-on-three basketball. And look, I watched a couple of the three-on-three games. Really entertaining. Great athletes. But even, you know, I said the lacrosse version. I was wondering. I was like, okay, it's probably not box, so it's got to be field lacrosse. But it's actually a relatively newly developed version called sixes.

So six aside, that's kind of a smaller I guess like a Rugby Sevens equivalent. Yeah, Rugby Sevens, right? So it is like that throws me off a little bit. I get why they do it. You're trying to, you know, it's a short tournament. It would be hard to stage a whole rugby tournament in the amount of time that they have of traditional

rugby, right? Yeah, because like the Rugby World Cup takes places over like 19 weeks because you can't play every day. Because you can't play that many games whereas in rugby sevens you play multiple times a day right so you can get it done really quickly but that's the one thing like i would love for it just to be you know field lacrosse or something right rather than the new version that's kind of only been recently developed having said that still stoked still stoked for uh for lacrosse to be there and for softball uh and baseball to be there in 2028. Robin Suri texted in a very appropriate what we learned.

What I've learned is that you know it's summer when the main topics of conversation are pizza and obscure sports that we would never otherwise dream of discussing. It's the Olympics, man. That's one of the best parts of the Olympics is you get to weigh in on all these sports that are otherwise never, ever on your radar. You get to learn new rules and all these things that you'd never thought of before. I mean, you were fixing the Olympics yesterday. The speed climb was too fast for Jamie Dodd. This event should be more than five seconds. It should.

Old man Dodd and his cow, slow down. You're moving too fast. Crazy kids. Can't keep track of all this movement. Well, we came in this morning and there was like the more traditional. The more like technical where it's like, see how far you can go, but it's difficult. And Jamie was like, this is more my speed, guys. It was way better.

It was way more compelling. They were like, this is a whole minute and a half. None of this five second nonsense. You can really see the technique. One of the guys fell off before he was uh before he got to where the leader had gotten to like this yeah he needed he needed like one more one more hand up to to get to the gold medal spot and he he fell didn't you say you were listening to the people show yesterday and they had a guest on who made the same point like the ioc has got a they've

got to make this last longer it's not it's it's no good under five seconds i'm standing by that's a good take by me that's a strong strong but had you ever cared about uh that event prior to yesterday of course not but that's what that's the whole point of the olympics you don't need to be invested i had this conversation with brough he's like oh so all of a sudden you care about swimming it's like well the olympics i do why not it's the olympics that's the fun of it is getting invested rough is very in these sports olympics yeah i know he's on record i know there's a lot of canadians like that i don't know why if like they feel threatened because we're not one of the best countries at it unlike the winter ones i mean i get it i'm far more invested in the winter games than i am in the summer games it's always been that way but

that doesn't mean i don't enjoy the summer games they're still super fun too there's some great great events and incredible athleticism that you'll never see anywhere else. So thank you. Well said. Why not? Well said. The spirit of sport lives in it. People are so mad about about pepperoni. I don't get it. I don't get the blowback. Jay and Red Deer pepperoni pizza is so overrated. Hawaiian is king. Somebody else says,

come on, adult pizza is not pepperoni. Why not? I don't know what that was. I mean, the one from Terry. Imagine living a hundred years and only eating pepperoni Sounds incredible What is it? Sounds amazing Explain adult pizza to me

What does he mean by that? Well I get people say Like cheese pizza Is kind of for kids Right? If it's not like margarita It's just like cheese From a chain restaurant

We should have a honey drizzle And some kind of Special crumbly cheese on top That's what they're talking about Maybe they're looking Like the gourmet pizza stuff Yeah But like I'm a blue collar stick to the classic people pepperoni people think like

adding toppings is increasing like your maturity level yeah it's more complex and it's more complicated so that means i'm more of an adult for eating and that's what i'm saying broader palette yeah exactly exactly it's like no sometimes you just want to go with what works what's what what's proven to work and be delicious and that's pepperoni pizza don't fool yours this is what i'm saying don't fool yourself into thinking it's inherently better to pile on the obscure fancy toppings and think that matt that makes a pizza better sometimes simplicity is where it's at things simple roshan and bernaby pepperoni is the grefsky or jordan of pizza yeah you can have your favorite players or maybe make an argument for another player topping,

but at the end of the day, we all know who the goat is. Thank you. Thank you, Roshan and Burnaby. That's a great way of putting it. I'm not saying you can't enjoy other pizzas, but why are we talking around what the best one is, what the ultimate, if you could only have one pizza, we all know, it's pepperoni. I've just accepted. I'm shocked at the blowback that we're getting here it's because you're five years old jamie that's that's been an

accusation that's been made multiple times here i did have a blizzard for breakfast yesterday so you might be on to something you're listening to the best of halford and brough