Halford & Brough in the Morning - Welcome Back Brough, And So Long Podkolzin

Episode Date: August 19, 2024

In hour one, Jason Brough and guest host Josh Elliott-Wolfe look back at an eventful weekend in sports (3:00), they talk the Canucks trading Vasily Podkolzin to the Oilers (6:00), a clunker of a game for Nathan Rourke (18:00), plus they go around the NFL with Too Deep Zone's Mike Tanier (26:13). 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.

Da-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na- Kelsey's got it for the first down. I'm sorry to the fans. I know there's a lot of excitement going in this game, and I didn't deliver. I think he'll fare well, and if he goes out there and lights it up, it wouldn't surprise me. I don't think he's going to go out there and have a clunker. Vasily Pogslova. Good morning, Vancouver.

6 a.m. on a Monday. Happy Monday. It is Halford and Brough. No Halford once again. Last week before he's back from his three-month vacation. It's Josh Elliott-Wolfe. Jason Brough is back, though. Welcome back.

Good morning. Good morning. And I apologize in advance if I have a clunker today Because I might be a little rusty like Nathan Rourke I was catching up on, well, everything that happened in sports in the last two weeks Just last night, so I might have missed a few things So just bear with me Fair enough Luckily, a lot of things happened last night

But before we get to that, good morning, A-Dog Good morning Good morning, Laddie, you're back hello hello welcome back alfred nubruff is brought to you by the delari family of honda dealers experience the delari difference today visit your nearest delari honda dealer today you can text in as well 650 650 the dumb bar lumber text line the bridge street dumb bar lumber in latin has moved to progress wayne tilbury's industrial park more room more product more awesome details at dunbar lumber.com i haven't done this for a while yeah welcome back but i think i can do it we are coming to you live from the kintec studio kintec canada's favorite orthotics provider powered by thousands of

five-star google reviews sorfy what are you? Kintec, that's what you're waiting for. So today on the show, a lot to get into. 6.30, Mike Tenier, NFL writer for 2 Deep Zone. It was preseason week two in the NFL. A lot of storylines there, including rookie quarterbacks doing their thing again. Caleb Williams getting a lot of hype, getting a lot of comparisons. I've been reading a lot of Bo Nix articles.

This guy is... He's getting hyped up too. getting a lot of hype, getting a lot of comparisons. I've been reading a lot of Bo Nix articles. This guy is... He's getting hyped up too. He might be the starter for Denver week one. Yeah. Denver can finally feel better about their quarterback situation. Potentially. I don't know if the Steelers are going to feel good about their quarterback situation.

I played golf with a Steelers fan yesterday, and he was like, I watched the game. It was not good. Yeah, they're hoping one of them breaks out and neither russell wilson nor justin fields are grabbing it by the horns at seven o'clock justin bourne sportsnet's nhl analyst we're going to talk to him about facility putt colson getting traded the leafs they have a new captain but also more importantly the oilers and what they're doing with potentially matching offer sheets.

They made another trade as well yesterday, too. So a lot to get into. Do you think Tavares is going to get traded? That'd be fun. Probably not. You don't think so? I don't think so. I saw some sports books that said he was likely to be traded.

I don't think so. He was at the press conference. To the Islanders. He was shaking Matthew's hand saying, here's the C, my friend. To the Islanders. Yeah. Because he's like, yeah here's the sea, my friend. To the Islanders. Yeah. Because he's like, yeah, I'm out of here. Here's the sea.

Take care of it. Actually, I don't care what happens to it because I'm out of here. Fair enough. It'd be fun, but I don't think so. 730. Ian Conner, author of Out of the Darkness, The Mystery of Aaron Rodgers. We're going to talk to him about that book and the mystery of Aaron Rogers, who to me has always been a hated figure. Initially, it was because I'm a Vikings fan and he destroyed my

hopes all the time. Yeah, it was pure football. Yes. And now it's kind of off the field reasons too. So we'll talk to him about how... A hated figure by some, a very much admired figure by a lot of people as well. A divisive figure. A divisive figure. And my question for Ian O'Connor, and he's been doing all the bigger shows. Like I saw him on the Rich Eisen show and I'm like, and now you're going to do the Halford and Brough show. No Halford.

My biggest question is like, when did this all happen when did aaron rogers turn into this divisive figure because there were a few people that maybe didn't love his personality and they had some questions about like doesn't he have like kind of like a weird relationship with his family like what's going on here but when did he turn into like a national talking figure whenever he said something you know it kicked off the culture wars on social media. When did that happen? The Ivermectin thing, I think, is what kind of started it all. The trajectory went, what's radio?

You can't see me. Yeah, he's doing it up and down. After that, people were like, what is this guy talking about? But then he, and then he really seemed to lean into that almost as a reaction to the reaction to his stance during COVID. Yes. It feels like, be surprised.

He loves attention. And we'll see. The man enjoys a good conspiracy theory. Who would have thought? 8 o'clock. Rick Campbell, head coach and co-GM of the BC Lions is going to join us. Nathan Rourke, he made his return last night.

Was not incredible, but also... Hey, I'm just happy the Lions scored some points against those Bombers. Didn't look good. Didn't look good after the first half. It was like, oh God, they're going to get shut out again. And then they almost didn't get a touchdown in the game, but they got one late. But not from Nathan Rourke. Not from Nathan Rourke.

It was a bit of a rough start for him, but also, I don't know, I went into it with low expectations just to not be disappointed. Okay, so we got all sorts of sports talk today. We got some Canucks talk, and we'll lead off with the pod calls and stuff. We will have lots of Lions talk later in the show. We've got some NFL talk. Now I'm going to tell Laddie I'm going to do the thing.

You're going to do the thing? Do you want me to do the thing? You can do the thing if you want. Oh, okay, okay. So I got to work in reverse first. So 8 o'clock, Rick Campbell, head coach and co-GM of the BC Lions. 7.30, Ian O'Connor,

author of Out of the Darkness, The Mystery of Aaron Rodgers. 7 o'clock, Justin Bourne, Sportsnet. And 6.30, Mike Tenier, NFL writer for 2 Deep Zone. That's what's happening. Laddie, let's tell everybody what happened. Hey, did you guys see the game last night?

No. No. What happened? I missed all the action because I was... We know how busy your life can be. What happened? You missed that? You missed that?

What happened? What happened is 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. Leading off, the Vancouver Canucks making a trade minutes before 4 p.m. yesterday. I was getting ready for the BC Alliance game. I was getting pumped. Nathan Rourke's coming back.

And then the Canucks were like, hey, look at us. Silly Pod Coleson traded to the Oilers for a 2025 fourth round pick that belonged to the Senators. So when I first saw this news, I was like, good, we have something to talk about. And then I went to social media for the reaction and I have to admit, I was a little bit surprised by how many people were quite upset about this. And, you know, I wasn't. I wasn't upset really in the least. I think in the end, the Canucks couldn't trust

that Pod Colson would crack the NHL lineup this season. And since they don't want to lose him for nothing on waivers, it's that time in his career now. They got what they could for him now. And I imagine that the Oilers' offer sheet situation might have allowed an opportunity for the Canucks to actually get more than they might have gotten for Pod Colson. If he were to come into camp and play some preseason games

and then they're going, oh, I don't know if he's going to make the team. We're going to put him on waivers. I don't know what they could have gotten from there. I'm not personally worried that Pod Colson is going to break out with the Oilers. I don't think, this is not one of these cases where we're kicking them on the way out, by the way. Like I've said all this stuff.

I don't think I was ever super excited about the guy when I watched him. I'm talking about super excited. Uh, he had some potential. Sure. And he showed some potential at times. He was the 10th overall pick. Of course he had potential. He was a big guy.

He was a hard worker. He was a likable guy. He had a decent shot. He scored some nice goals, but not enough of them. He was like a movie you wanted to like because, oh, there's some good actors in it. Oh, he's directing it? Oh, this should be good. And then you're watching the movie and you're like, this movie's kind of boring.

Like, when is something exciting going to happen in this movie? When is this? He long-legged me. Oh, yeah, you didn't. boring like when is something exciting gonna happen in this movie when is this he long legs oh yeah you didn't yeah yeah you you heard all the things about long legs and then you saw it right yeah yeah i i don't i don't know i i want to hear from the listeners text into the dunbar lumber text line 650 650 um i know there was a lot of people that maybe they live in Abbotsford, they go to Abbotsford Canucks games that saw him last year and they were excited about him. And they thought he was playing really well,

but his point production wasn't anything to write home about from Abbotsford. He wasn't, you know, and so my question with Pod Coles, and this was often the question that I would have with players that ultimately didn't make it in Vancouver, is like, what are you? What are you as a player? What do you do? What would you say you do here? And what do you do well?

What did Pod Kolzin do well? He's not a top six scorer. He's physical, but I don't think anyone's like, wow, that guy really hits hard right like he didn't you know it wasn't even killing penalties no and he was in the bottom six so what what do you what are you doing here other than being hey he was a top 10 pick and that that was kind of it so you look at it he had 26 points in his rookie season and that's where it was like hey maybe this guy can grow into a role in vancouver since then nine points in 58 nhl games which is not good enough if you're a guy that's looking to grow into an

nhl role and i i guess my thing is whenever i watched him it felt like i was like okay i want more i expect more i can i can believe that there is more but at a certain point you're not getting more so this is just what you are and i think that's kind of what the canucks looked at and it's it's also felt like he's been a player that has relied so heavily on confidence but also just never really had confidence and you could see it in spurts where he where he did have a bit of confidence and things going his way but there were too many in spurts where he where he did have a bit of confidence and things going his way but there were too many times out there where he was on the ice and it looked like he was just trying to survive the shift yes he was kind of treading water out there and you're

kind of like he's making nice plays along the wall or but but there was never any like it never really got to anything you know he, he was out there, he was surviving. He wasn't dreadful. No. But I think what Rick Taukin wanted to hear, to see from him, and we'd heard this before from him, is like, hey man, like just like loosen up a little bit and go out there and play some hockey. And, you know, you mentioned the confidence thing

and maybe you just didn't have the confidence to do that. And, you know, you mentioned the confidence thing, and maybe he just didn't have the confidence to do that. And, you know, just so people might have forgotten because it's still August, the Canucks picked up a lot of wingers and they kept quite a few wingers. And if you're looking at, you know, their lineup for next season, I don't see how Pod Colson could crack, well, their top 12 forwards, right? He might be a 13th forward,

but would you put Pod Colson ahead of any of these guys? I'm going to rate them all 12 out. JT Miller? No. Brock Besser? No. Nils Hoeglund? Elias Pettersson?

Daniel Sprong? Maybe you can make a case for Pod Colson in front of him, but I don't think so because Sprong is our new and shiny toy. Yeah, I would also do that. Jake DeBrusque, Dakota Joshua, Teddy Bluger, Connor Garland, Danton Heinen, Pew Suter, Kiefer Sherwood. That's 12 players. I don't have Pod Colson in front of any of those guys.

And the coaching staff probably had another guy maybe in front of Pod Colson in front of any of those guys and the coaching staff probably had another guy maybe in front of Paul Colson and they looked at the situation and they went here's an opportunity with Edmonton they're going to be interested in Paul Colson let's make the deal at a certain point like you look at Neal Zoma too and he at least has played on the penalty didn't mention him yeah like he's a 13th forward that they probably trust a little bit more than Vasily Podkolzin at this point. The thing that I guess I do wonder is, if you were a neutral team and you were looking at these two options, would you rather bet on Podkolzin maybe potentially being a bottom six guy that makes a million dollars for the next two years it's cap controlled and is he's fine defensively he's never been like horrible defensively so you know he's always going

to be semi-responsible or would you rather have the fourth round pick and for me i think most neutral teams look at it and would probably take pod calls like that feels like maybe a better bet but also then i come back to looking at the lineup and i i can't convince myself that that is the better option or better bet for the canucks specifically i was told yesterday and this is an answer to phoenix the yellow tonka truck driver oh yeah by the way while you were gone we we asked listeners because people were getting mad about mike the urologist and his text always getting right okay so we were like just put your profession on things and we're more likely to read it and he this guy phoenix yeah drives a yellow tonka truck who doesn't okay uh he said

i wonder if there uh was ever a deal that uh pod colson could have been included in at this past deadline i was told that the canucks tried to move Pod Colson at the deadline. There was no interest. They were trying to put him in there in deals. They were like, 10th overall. He's a hard worker. He's a good guy. And they're like, yeah.

Why are point totals so low? And the Canucks, I don't know, lied or something. They're like, oh, he's hit the most a lot. That's a typo. I don't know. That's a typo. I don't know. That's a typo. Yeah, there wasn't interest, guys. We see any tape?

No, no, you cannot see tape. Yeah, yeah. Well, the tape of Pod Colson, you know, if you saw it on a shift-to-shift basis, you'd be like, yeah, he's okay. And he's only, what, he's only, what, 23 or 24? I'm not super worried that he's going to break out, but I could see him hanging around in the NHL.

Yeah. Could they have gotten more than a fourth for him? I think that's some people's concern. That was the only thing that was sort of a weird thing for me. I was like, I get why they traded him. He just wasn't going to crack the last third. You're not going to get a second for a former first-round pick that has not broken out.

Maybe even a third at that point. Yeah, but you would have been. But then you're going like, oh, a third? Doesn't really matter, maybe. Who cares, right? Like, I mean. After the second round, it's sort of a crapshoot anyways, right? Yeah, I'm not all that concerned about the return.

And then if you're talking about a hockey trade, well, one of the reasons he's being traded is bodies. And also, Drance has made this point a few times on social media saying like the Canucks have a lot of contracts and I think they have 48 of the 50 contracts allowable right now. And you typically want to be around, I don't know, 46 or 47 just to maintain that flexibility to make deals later.

There might be another guy out the door at some point, a younger guy that hasn't panned out at some point this this summer at least that's what drance was saying um i i don't know i i don't know how much people want to talk about pod colson today i well i'm not seeing any um uh anger from the textbooks text box right now but i i was i guess a little bit surprised what i saw on social media maybe it was that people just liked the guy like someone texted and said i had a paul coals in jersey yeah sorry okay well why did you do that sorry but i don't know uh we can move on and uh talk about this from the oilers' perspective, if you like, because the Oilers made not one, but two trades yesterday. Yes, so they trade the fourth for Pod Colson,

and then later in the night, they trade Cody Ceci and a third rounder to San Jose for defenseman Ty Emberson. And the important part of this trade for the Oilers, obviously, they still have these pending offer sheets for Philip Broberg and Dylan Holloway. And what this does, according to Pockpedia, trading Cody Ceci, Edmonton can now match both offer sheets. If they match both and Evander Kane returns with everybody else healthy, they then have to make another trade but realistically they're starting the year with vanderkeen on ltir so theoretically right now they can match both of

these offer sheets if they wanted to but there are some people that are connecting the pod calls and going they're going to match broberg and say no on holloway which which i think would be a risk for them yes to me i I thought the the easy match was Dylan Holloway just based on he kind of fits in in cap wise a little bit better though I get it from Edmonton's point of view because you look at their forward group and there's not really many holes in it whereas on defense especially if you're trading Cody Cece out you need someone to to play a role on that back end. And Broberg, he showed flashes in the playoffs.

I still have a lot of questions about what he's going to be long-term in the NHL, especially at this cap hit. I think it is an inefficient contract unless he really, really hits. There's a lot of pressure on him now. Yeah, definitely. There's so much pressure on him because if he doesn't – what's the cap hit on broberg uh it is 4.58 so now imagine if he comes into next season and he doesn't play all that well and now oilers fans are like wait a minute first of all you're not playing well and second of all like you kind

of did this to us like you went to another team to get this contract and people can say well that's the right within the cba and and it would be the fans right as fans to be like hey you put you kind of like went against the planning of the team to do this yeah this was not something that was good for the team that you did so it'll be interesting to see what happens if they do indeed match broberg. Brandon in Vancouver texts in. He said, I was half expecting Jason to say he'd put Pod Colson in over Petey. It is good to be back on the show talking Canucks. No, I wouldn't. I'd say it was like a coin toss.

You're not there yet, but you're almost there. The way Petey played down the stretch and in the playoffs, I was kind of like, yeah, Pod Colson doing nothing. Two assists. Petey doing nothing, you know in the playoffs. I was kind of like, yeah, Pat Colson doing nothing. Two assists. Petey doing nothing, you know, nothing versus nothing. Who knows? Let's talk a little bit about Nathan Rourke's return yesterday. I was pretty excited for the game.

I know a lot of people were excited for the game. It started out well. Yeah. They got a touchdown. Not a touchdown. They got a first down yes um and then that was pretty much the highlight of the night for nathan rourke his first pass um the fans at bc play stadium were hoping to see the nathan rourke of old and they were probably in the back of their minds they were like this guy hasn't really played meaningful

football for a while and he's starting right away. He hasn't had a lot of practice time. Yeah, but he's Nathan Rourke. Yeah, he wasn't very good. No. And the Lions did not look good against the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. I guess their defense at times played okay. But then you look at the numbers that the Blue Bombers put up in BC Place, you're kind

of like, well, they didn't play that well. This team has now lost four straight. They're five and five. They've still got a chance to win the division. I think the Riders are in first at five, four, and one. So, you know, the West is not the power division

that it used to be. The good teams seem to be in the East now. And although the Bombers are kind of like, are these guys good or not? But in order for us to be talking about winning the division or hosting a playoff game, hosting the West final, which we'd all set our eyes on because the Lions are also hosting the

Grey Cup this year, you know, it'll look good when they're a five and one. Look good or look really promising. But the last month or so, you know, it'll look good when they're a five and one. Look good or look really promising. But the last month or so, you know, before we even talk about that stuff, they've got so much to clean up. And it's not just the fact that their quarterback play has not been good. There are a lot of things, a lot of issues with this team. And we'll get into that with Rick Campbell, the head coach,

later in the show, who's probably waking up this morning and going, oh God, I gotta do a radio hit about this now. Let's play the Nathan Rourke audio though, because if you didn't watch the game, congratulations. But Nathan Rourke's press conference started off yesterday with him going, whoa, whoa, whoa, before anyone asks any questions, I have something to say. Here's what happened after the Lions game. If you don't mind, if I'd like to say something, then hopefully that answers all your questions. I want to take this moment to publicly apologize.

That was not my best football right there. You know, as a quarterback here, it's never a one-person job, but it is the position where everything, you have the ball in the hand, your hands every single play, and I didn't make enough plays. Obviously, I'm not going to sit here and make excuses in terms of it being a short week and getting into the offense again, and it's definitely a tough, tall task when you play a team like the Bombers who have been so successful. But I'm not going to make those excuses. I know that I'm better than this. I'm sorry to the team who stuck their necks out for me for getting me here and allowing me to play. The rest of my teammates, you know, effort is never going to be an issue with this locker room.

They fought right until the end, got, you know, battled and got into the end zone on that last possession. You know, teams that have less character, you know, they're not fighting at that time in the game. So I'm really proud of them. I'm sorry to the fans. I know there was a lot of excitement going in this game and I didn't deliver. I'm going to be making sure that this is, you know, if this is a starting point, then we only got up to go from here. The good news is that we got a short week, quick turnaround. Good news is that we're still early in the season and it's anybody's ballgame in the West.

So that's really how I feel about that. So next up for the Lions, they travel to Ottawa to play the Red Blacks on Saturday, then host them again August 31st. That's in Victoria in the touchdown Pacific game. Rourke returned to the Lions after spending, what, a year and a half down south chasing his NFL dream, which he couldn't catch. His last CFL game was a loss to the Bombers

in the 2022 West Final. Should we have expected anything better from Rourke given the lack of meaningful football he's played the last two years? So I do think there were expectations from people that he could have done more yesterday to me. Like, look, I'll be honest. I expected a little bit more, but I went into it being like, this feels really quick. And when he got signed last week, I was like, oh, he probably won't play on Sunday, but he'll get some practice time in, be good to go against Ottawa.

Showed you how concerned they were about the quarterback position, though, and the direction of the team that they did give him the start. And it just felt very clunky yesterday. And that was expected, but now we need to see what he can do with a full week of practice. He's gotten back into game action against Ottawa this week on Saturday is that game. His two interceptions did not look good. No.

Those were bad throws, and the media loves a quarterback controversy and I just wonder how long do we give him to shake the rust off? Let's say he doesn't look great over the next little while and then all of a sudden the news comes out, oh, Vernon Adams is healthy again. And he's just considered week to week. We don't really know when Vernon Adams is going to be healthy. That'd be a juicy situation.

Would be. Because they didn't trade Vernon Adams, and they very much came out and said this Nathan Rourke signing, it's happening, and it was in the release. It was in the release that the line sent out the information. They were like, Vernon Adams is not getting traded. Yeah, we'll see how that develops. I think you got to keep betting on Rourke, but we'll see how it goes. We'll talk to Rick Campbell

at 8 o'clock, but on the other side, Mike Tenier, NFL writer for 2 Deep Zone, joins us. It is Halpern and Brough no Halford it's Josh Elliott-Wolfe Jason Brough here with you

coming to you live from the Kintec studio you can text in 650-650 the Dumbar Lumber text line Halford and Brough is brought to you by the Dilawri family

of Honda dealers experience the Dilawri family of Honda dealers. Experience the Dilawri difference today. Visit your nearest Dilawri Honda dealer today. We now welcome in our next guest. It is Mike Tenier, NFL writer for 2DeepZone to talk about preseason week two in the NFL. Appreciate you taking the time, Mike. And it feels like the kind of headlines

coming out of this week, once again, were all about rookie quarterbacks. Caleb Williams getting some hype, but Bo Nix as well, also getting a lot of hype. Is Daniel Jones a rookie? Because I saw some headlines about him. Yeah, he's getting really hot dot.

What did you think about the quarterback performances over the weekend, Mike? You know, there's not much else to talk about coming out of preseason games, but the rookie quarterbacks and the Daniel Joneses who play like rookie quarterbacks, even though it's their sixth NFL season, because not a lot else happens. But, you know, it was an encouraging performance from Bo Nix last night. I think he's going to be named the starter.

Sean Payton's being coy right now, but he's going to name him the starter. I'm going to be blunt. It was actually an up-and-down performance from Caleb Williams, but the ups were, oh, my God, ups. That demonstrated just how much raw talent and ability to make plays is at his disposal. So that was very good. So, you know, a lot of really encouraging rookie quarterback news

around the league, except in Minnesota where their kid got hurt last week. But you can't have everything. The other guys are doing pretty well. And in terms of, like, I saw the flashes of Caleb Williams and what he can be, and it got me thinking about, not to make a comparison at all, but the development of Patrick Mahomes and how that worked. It was kind of like a perfect situation for him,

and I think with Andy Reid there, too. And I was kind of thinking about how important coaching is for these young quarterbacks. Do you think that that kind of ideal situation is in place for Williams in Chicago? I don't call it ideal because ideal is hard to measure, but they did everything they can. I like Shane Waldron as a developer, as a person who's going to put together a quarterback-friendly scheme.

I like the fact that they went out and got a Dunzey who caught that big play. They went out and got Keenan Allen. They've really been investing in their offensive line over the last couple years. So you create all the structure around Williams that he's got to be in position to succeed. If he throws a short pass, it's going to be yak afterwards. The guy's going to pick up first downs for him. The running game with DeAndre Swift should be pretty good. Again, Waldron is not one of these weird dictatorial guys

or one of these guys who work with Peyton Manning, and that's going to make him a good coach when he was basically holding the golf clubs for Peyton Manning. Waldron's been around, he's, you know, pushed guys like Geno Smith to achieve their potential. So it's a strong situation. Again, it's like what I have to pump the brakes on is, you know, you mentioned Mahomes.

You don't want to make a comparison to Mahomes. People are making comparisons to Mahomes right now. And that's where you have to pump the brakes and say, let's see some real games. Let's see him have a strong rookie season where he's not making that many mistakes and making some of these big plays. The one that kind of surprised me was Bo Nix. And he looked good. And you mentioned like, it feels like he could be the starter in Denver. Do you think that's the right call? What have you thought of his play in preseason so far? Yeah, well, I mean, his competition is Jared Stidham and Zach Wilson.

So it seems like from the beginning it was like, come take this job from these guys. You know, come be adequate and take the job from them. And, you know, he looks like he belongs. You don't get these wows of plays that you're getting from Caleb Williams. But if you watch the drives, the drives are him in the pocket. The pocket is in good shape. He delivers a short pass.

Guys get yacked for him. Third and medium, he's completing the passes. He's getting the ball downfield. Now, he's been doing it against backups. So you have to watch. He's been doing it against backups. And Sean Payton has been grooving in these pretty easy plays and some screen passes and everything to make him look good. But you talk again about good situations. Payton does this. Payton builds his entire system around short passes. If you're a smart quarterback who can deliver the ball quickly, you can have success. They kept some of their veteran offensive

linemen there. They've got guys like Garrett Bowles and Quinn Minars there. That gives them some protection. It should be a situation, if you don't set your expectations too high, it should be a situation where Bonas can start and play okay and develop this year. What do you think of

that division because i look at uh the afc west and there's there's the chiefs obviously who we we know will make the playoffs and they they shouldn't have any issues getting there but then i look at all the other teams and there's so many question marks like the broncos obviously it's the the quarterback situation uh the raiders are in a similar spot at gardner minchu going to be starting for them and then the chargers with with harbaugh coming at Gardner Minshew going to be starting for them. And then the Chargers with Harbaugh coming in and how he's going to work with Herbert, it feels like it could be exciting. But what do you think of that kind of division as a whole? It's a division besides the Chiefs that is so bad that it like skews the playoff odds and

probabilities because the likelihood that the Chiefs get first seed in the playoffs is impacted by the fact that they could go 6-0 in this division very easily. You can't say that about the Bills. They can't go 6-0 in that division very easily, et cetera. The Ravens or the Bengals or the Browns can't do that. They're going to beat each other up. But that's what you're looking at. When you look at the Chargers, not only do you have Harbaugh coming in,

but you've had Herbert missing most of training camp right now. So he's going to have to come into the system. The Chargers have shown nothing in his absence. You can't get anything from their preseason games because they're going through the motions. You mentioned Minshew, and, you know, he's another guy who will give you two or three highlights, and then you watch the rest of the game.

You're like, oh, my goodness, what am I watching here? This is chaos. This is absolute madness. And they're kind of buckling up for that. That's a team that's going to be pretty good on defense but probably very inconsistent on offense and the broncos are going to be rebuilding around nick so it's it's it's hard to look at that and say anything except well pencil chiefs in probably not going to get a wild card and then you're asking if these young

coaches and these young quarterbacks can develop and turn these teams into rebuilding teams how do most teams approach the preseason now in terms of their starters? It's really 50-50. You look at the Chiefs, Mahomes has played twice. You know, he's played in two games. The Bills were going to play Josh Allen again, but it was rainy and they couldn't warm up, so they decided at the last second to put Trubisky out there.

But they put the rest of their starters out there. You look at the Raiders, you know, Max Crosby has been playing in the preseason a lot. Travis Kelsey, who is, you know, what, 54 years old? He's playing in the preseason a lot. So you get these teams that are like, well, this is all about really getting ready and getting the timing of the starters.

And then you're seeing teams that are just avoiding it completely, absolutely not putting anyone out there. And there's a bunch of those teams right now. The Ravens, for example, are not putting anyone out there. So there's a bunch of those teams right now. The Ravens, for example, are not putting anyone out there. So it's very hit or miss. My gut tells me that the right thing to do is to get the starters about a quarter or so. You know, get them a quarter, get them like four or five series, and then get them out of there.

And then, like, really, like, work on your backups and bubble guys. But I'm stunned how many teams now are just putting really the third and fourth string, nothing but bubble guys out there for huge swatches of these games and say, okay, go try to make the team. Hard to watch. Hard to watch when you're trying to analyze like out-of-town games. But these coaches, I think these coaches come away with it saying, we did joint practices.

We saw the starters in a more controlled setting, and we're comfortable just keeping everyone healthy. Yeah, I guess I was a little surprised because the Seahawks are one of those teams that haven't played their starters and they've played two games. They only got one left. They got a completely new coaching staff. And I'm just a little bit surprised. Were you surprised? Are you saying you sound like you are surprised that the Seahawks haven't played any of their starters yet?

Right. None of their starters with a new staff. So you can't really come out there and say, well, they're a bunch of veterans. Indeed, they are, but they're learning a new system. Not even a series or two from them. And a really odd one is the Carolina Panthers, who have a second-year quarterback, Bryce Young, who didn't play well last year. They've got a whole new staff. They've got a whole new front office. They brought in about 100 different guys, you know, in terms of free agency,

and they're starting absolutely no one. And in their case, it looks like they've got something to hide. It looks like a team that's really so bad that they don't want to go out there and show people and have people be discouraged. I don't know what the Seahawks are thinking in this, because this is a team that could be a wild card, could push for playoff spots, et cetera, et cetera. I feel like, yeah, yeah, four or five series with Gino and DK and the starters would do a world of good. Hey, Mike, later in the show, we're going to talk to Ian O'Connor, who's written the book about Aaron Rodgers.

What would be a question that you would have for Ian O'Connor about his book? I'm not asking you to do my prep for me. I actually do have some questions, but what's, what's, what's kind of like, if you have the opportunity to talk to Ian and he's spoken for, he spoke for a few hours with Aaron Rogers for the book, what is something that you would ask? Are you okay? Are you okay? I'm actually, I'm guessing Ian is fine because like the advanced sales on that are amazing. I would want to dig into the conversations. Cause he only had a couple of conversations with Aaron Rodgers. You know, what was the vibe talking to him? Because this is something that Aaron Rodgers has done a very, as he always does, an elaborate dance with.

This is unofficial. This is unauthorized. I didn't authorize this, but I did talk to him. And, you know, and like this weird, like he's not going to endorse it, not endorse it. He's not going to say it's a pack of lies, et cetera. I'd want to know what the vibe was in the room. I'd also like to know, and he wouldn't say this on the air, like how much real access did you have? Was there a handler there?

Was there like an agent there, a publicist? Did you get a list of don't ask, whatever you don't ask this question, don't ask that question. Don't bring up red M&Ms. Don't make eye contact, whatever it was, to see what he was really getting from aaron rogers in those uh in those sessions got to admit i have not been able to crack the spine on that thing yet a lot going on around here some of the stuff that's leaked out of it is absolutely fascinating yeah if you talk to him then it kind of is authorized right he's just like i'm writing a book about you do you want to talk for a couple of hours yes but and like so how do you brand it as unauthorized then it's very it's a very

delicate dance i imagine i don't understand it either because once i say i agree to talk to you i'm sort of giving a blessing to it to some degree but it's aaron rogers and you're operating in this another space you know he's not a politician it doesn't have to follow these exact rules in terms of you you know, I might be giving away a government secret or something like that. But it's very vintage Rogers because if something comes out he doesn't like or he gets asked about it, he can just say that's unauthorized. So, you know, fake news, whatever he might say. But then he can at the same time say, look, I cooperated

and I provided some information. And, oh, that part about my great-grandpa, that was accurate. And I'm glad that he went and found out that stuff about my grandparents and great parents because that saved me from having to actually have a conversation with my parents about my family um what do you how do you think is going to go for Aaron Rodgers this year let's say he stays healthy let's say he stays healthy I think it's a decline season. Everything about quarterbacks his age, of which there are very few examples, and quarterbacks at his phase in his career,

of which there are very few examples, suggest you're going to get the 2022 season minus 10%, minus 15%. That's still a pretty good quarterback. That's still a top-half quarterback in the NFL, somebody who's going to make some plays for you, probably avoid mistakes because he's not going to do anything stupid out there.

Then you have to turn around and say, well, where does that leave the Jets? Jets have a phenomenal defense, good supporting cast. Offensive line has improved, but we don't know. And if all this turns out to be a situation where, hey, Rodgers has sort of like an almost Pro Bowl season, Pro Bowl alternate season, and they win 11 games, and then you look at him at 42, and you look at him with his injuries, and you look at him with a salary and say, then what?

If it's an 11 win, lose to the Bills in the playoff season for the Jets, how do they qualify that as a success? Do the Jets have the team around him, especially on offense, to make him successful? You know, there's question marks there because Mike Williams is sitting there at the top of the wide receiver depth chart with Garrett Wilson.

Williams is coming off an injury. Williams had lots of on and off seasons with the Chargers. So you can talk about his talent, but then you say, well, the guy's never healthy and he's not always more than a one-dimensional bomb guy when he's out there. I've been hearing all this stuff

about how good Alan Lazard has been in training camp. Well, Alan Lazard is Aaron Rodgers' buddy. Of course he's getting the ball all the time out there. What happens if he's got to get open against real top-quality cornerbacks? I'm sure he's getting open against Sauce Gardner. I don't know if Sauce Gardner is going 100%. Offensive line is full of guys that they're kind of rotating.

They're not sure about Joe Tippman. Byron Smith is another guy who's out five, six games a year. There's a lot of questions in there, and if everything is steering in the right direction, yeah, this could be a deep playoff run. But if you start saying the old and injured guys are going to be old and injured, that's a problem. I don't see a disastrous offense.

There's no way this could be disastrous. The running backs are good. There's some veterans all over the place. But to make it a great offense, we almost have to say, oh, everybody's going to play like they played in, I don't know, 2019. And that's a tall order. Hey, Mike, before we let you go, I do want to ask about the Steelers. And it feels like they're in a situation where it's like,

please, one of Russell Wilson or Justin Fields, just grab this quarterback job and make it yours. And neither of them have. Do you think one of them will and what do you kind of expect from pittsburgh this year tomlin's going to trust russell wilson to go out there and do veteran stuff and wilson wilson's not a great veteran stuff kind of guy anymore you guys saw what it was like late in seattle he wants to do his own thing i think he's tamped that down a little bit if you saw him uh the other night you saw how far

the skills have deteriorated. Steelers have a real problem right now in that one of their centers got injured. Their left tackle, Broderick Jones, looks terrible. They're counting on Troy Fotano, a right tackle, as a rookie to take over. One of their running backs got hurt. They don't look like they have a lot of speed besides George Pickens on the perimeter. This is a team that whoever's a quarterback, that quarterback's going to struggle. And this is probably the year where the Steelers stop doing that thing where they squeak in as a playoff team

because their defense can't be expected to do everything. Hey, Mike, really appreciate you taking the time, and we'll talk as the season goes on here. Absolutely. Take care and enjoy the rest of your week. Thank you. There is Mike Tenier, NFL writer for 2DeepZone. Hello, Ruff. I want to, could you just, what would your first question be for Regan O'Connor?

And then he was like, I've seen you pretty good. What would your second question be? Actually, you know what, Mike? What would your third and fourth question be? Actually, can you text me all these questions? Could we patch you into this interview, please? We're gonna, we'll let you take over, man. That's all you. Alright, so we've hit some nfl we

talked a little bit about the cfl and we will talk to lions head coach rick campbell later in the show who is no doubt thrilled to be talking about that game last night with us um we did start the show off with the facility pot coals and trade to the edmonton oilers the oilers uh send to vancouver the a fourth round pick it wasn't the Oilers. It was formerly Ottawa's. But it was the Oilers because they got it from Edmonton, and then they sent it on to the Canucks. Bill from Buffalo texts in and says,

Can we now officially call this another, in the fairly long, first-round flop of the Benning era? I feel like we were there for a little bit. So definitely. And now we're kind of getting like the... I mean, Jake, sixth overall. Yeah. Ulevi, fifth overall.

And Pod Colson, tenth overall. And then you traded the... Traded a bunch of them. Traded a bunch of them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, JT Miller, that one ultimately worked out, right? So that's good. But when you look at the drafting record of Jim Benning,

who was specifically hired because he was this super scout and because the Canucks had struggled with their drafting and they weren't producing enough, and that was like the one big criticism of the Gillis era. Their drafting was terrible. And that finally caught up to them when some of the guys became too expensive to pay or they got too old. The Canucks had nothing in the pipelines and the cupboards were empty and they traded away a lot of draft picks because they're in their Stanley Cup window. And's fair enough so they brought in a guy who was supposed to be this super drafter and it didn't work out that way no you know um Elias Pettersson was a good pick um of course you have all that you know

nonsense talk about well you didn't want to pick Elias Pettersson but you give credit for Elias Pettersson because he was the general manager he He could have overridden, and he didn't. And the Canucks ended up with Elias Pettersson. Quinn Hughes, I won't credit anyone with the Canucks for that pick because Quinn Hughes fell to the Canucks. That was obvious. Everyone in Vancouver would have been like, everyone would have, right? So you don't get a lot of credit for that. And then really what you want from

a drafting ace, if you're talking about a guy like, oh, this guy knows every player in the world is so good at drafting. He's got an eye. You can just see these guys. It's not the first round picks anyway. It's not the first round picks. It's the guys later in the draft. And

how many, you know, diamonds of the rough did the Jim Benning era unveil like any like two maybe you got Thatcher Demko and that was a second round pick and then you have Gustav Forsling in the fifth round but they traded him away right away and they traded him away right away and so you can say well maybe the drafting was good but the development wasn't good i mean that doesn't exactly help the resume um yeah i i don't want to spend too much time going over i think everyone knows that the jim benning era did not go particularly well although it left the canucks with some good core players to build around um it is easy though and tempting though to wonder how it all could have turned out. Maybe not for Tanning because that was so long ago.

Even Ulevi, you know, the Canucks did get Quinn Hughes. But, man, if Pod Colson turned into a player, it just would have been, you know, I don't know, it just would have been really nice if he would have turned into a player. I would have enjoyed it. If they had a power forward, you know, right now you're looking at the Canucks lines for next season and there's going to be some really interesting training camp battles.

You know, the only thing you can tell really about the top six or even the whole team right now is like, I'm pretty confident JT Miller and Brock Besser are going to start together. And then after that, what are you totally sure about? You're hoping that Jake DeBrusque has some chemistry with Elias Pettersson and he's going to be given every opportunity to have chemistry with Elias Pettersson. But you don't know who's going to be the other winger with Miller and Besser? You don't know who's going to be the other winger if DeBrusque and Pedersen have chemistry together. Could be Nils Hoeglander up with Miller and Besser.

Could be Daniel Sprong with Pedersen and DeBrusque. Who knows? Now, a lot of people will say, well, I know one thing for sure. I know Dakota Joshua and Connor Garland will be on the line together. Are you sure about that? That's not a guarantee.

What happens if Hoeglander doesn't look good? What if Daniel Sprong's not a fit or Danton Heinen or, you know, like these guys you might have to bring up a Connor Garland into the top six or bring up a Dakota Joshua into the top six. And that makes it interesting. Let's be honest, but it would just it wouldn't be you got a top 10 pick man yeah and the top 10 pick and i i don't think the canucks did anything badly to develop him maybe coming from the khl he didn't get the biggest development there right but that's not i mean that's the canucks fault for drafting a guy that they knew they were going to be in the khl and that's always the risk when

you're drafting russians is you know they might end up on a team like pod colson did where he's the young guy that's getting scratched or not getting a lot of ice time and he's not developing in the best situation for him um but that's the risk you take with Russian players when you draft them, especially the top 10 guys. But I don't see anything. There's nothing that the Canucks did with Pod Kolzin while he was in Vancouver or Abbotsford that I'm like, yeah, they really screwed that up. It was Pod Kolzin.

Pod Kolzin didn't pan out. The other part I will say like we can look back at it and be like man if they had just taken matt boldy who went two picks later cole caulfield who went five picks later but i do remember going into that draft and pod colson especially throughout the draft year being someone that was like hey maybe he goes in the top five and then there was the russian factor and so we kind of kept. And so I remember after the pick being like, hey, maybe this is a guy who's diamond in the rough, fell because of the Russian factor.

And then maybe he'll come over and be something more. Obviously he wasn't. And so I just look at this pick and I can't really like fault them, I guess, for it. But also, when you're talking about Benning and you're being marketed as the scouting master, you should be able to identify that, hey, maybe he isn't going to work out,

and maybe you do have to be one of the team that keeps him dropping down the order, and you've got to find someone else who's maybe a better bet. Ian in Coquitlam, Texas, and how much of a shot does Lekker Mackey have to make the Canucks? If I was making odds on it, I would say he's probably

not going to make the Canucks, but Canucks management has been talking about giving him a chance. He's got a better... If he shows up and, you know, maybe he has some chemistry with some

of the guys in the top six. I don't see him in the bottom six. Like, I don't see any need for that six. Like I don't see any, any need for that. Um, his strength is scoring and the concerns you have about him right now is whether or not he's going to be able to adjust to the North American style of play. He didn't play much at all when he came over for that short stint in

Abbotsford. I think he's most likely to go down there, but remember, um, the playoffs, the Canucks had issues scoring. Yes. And their shooting luck kind of ran out a little bit. And I don't even mean their conversion.

I mean, getting shots on goal was a problem. I'm personally not all that, like I'm not counting on Lekker or Mackey to have much of a shot of making the Canucks and I'm totally fine with that. He'll make it. A-Dog will rush him into the NHL. This is the A-Dog. Like A-Dog gets super excited about this type of player. He's gonna do it.

The guy's got a great shot. Let him rip. Let him rip. It'd be so fun. Yeah. A-Dog was the guy who was like I want to see all these guys on the team right away. Put up with Petey. He's the answer. So, I don't know. I just think training camp is going to be

I think it's going to be really fun and interesting because Rick Tockett is going to have to come up with a bunch of new things to get the guys motivated. And he's talked about that. He said, I can't just go into next year talking about the same old stuff that I've been talking about. And hopefully that stuff doesn't really need to be discussed.

Right? Like, play the right way, system, structure. And Tuckett himself has said, you know, this training camp might be, and the preseason might be a little bit more about creativity and how we can create more offense, how we can create more offense off the rush. Canucks have got a bunch of new players. Always excited about new players, line combinations, who's going to work with who. And then, of course, there is, for me, what's PD going to look like? Yeah, so there's a lot of storylines going into this training camp,

and we'll obviously get into a bunch of those over the next month. On the other side, Justin Bourne, NHL analyst for Sportsnet is going to join us. We'll get his thoughts on everything going on around the league. It is Halford & Brough on Sportsnet 650.