Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Damien Cox: Toronto Mike'd #945

Episode Date: November 8, 2021

Mike chats with Damien Cox about his Twitter persona, why he bothers, his blocking strategy, sports media in 2021, Angelo Mosca, and his new book A League Of Our Own.

Toronto Mic is brought to you by the Yes, We Are Open podcast, a Moneris podcast production, telling the stories of Canadian small businesses and their perseverance in the face of overwhelming adversity. Subscribe to this podcast at yesweareopenpodcast.com. Welcome to episode 945 of Toronto Mic'd. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery. A fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA.

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who's ripping up the GTA real estate scene. Learn more at realestatelove.ca. I'm Mike from torontomike.com. And joining me this week is Damien Cox. Damien, nice to see you, nice to see you mike i'm here in your uh in your backyard with your beautiful assortment of trees and uh it's good to see that uh your operation is still alive and kicking it see i feel like since the first time when was the first time you and i spoke um i should have that date handy i actually only have the episode number here.

So pause that thought and I'll just tell people if they want to like revisit Damien Cox's Toronto Mike debut, it's episode 110. That goes way back because this is 945. So I'm going to guess, I'm going to guess 20, I'm going to just randomly guess 2015 maybe, 2015 or 14. Yeah, two thoughts on that. One, hasn't the podcast world exploded since then? We are surrounded by podcasts. And the other thing is I now, I feel like I'm one of those you know did you ever watch Hollywood Squares? Yeah of course

and you know they always had guests on there but you didn't really know what they did right like Soupy Sales what did Soupy Sales do? Right and I feel like I'm now that on your show I'm like

you know occasionally I come into a guest host when Mike's on a fabulous vacation. But what does he actually do? No one knows. What's he famous for? I think in my audience, it's very Generation X.

I think they think you're that guy from the Passion Returns video. I love that. I know people who, it's like to some people, seriously, it's like the Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Oh, they watch it over and over again? It's a cult. It's a cult thing. So I think of myself now as like, I'm like Riff Raff in Rocky Horror. That's right. That's right. But if you, and I have revisited it recently because someone heard you were coming on and they reminded me to Damien's in that. And you're in there and there's like you and you got the mullet, like the full mullet. And then Doug Gilmore is the next screen

and he's rocking like the similar style. Like that was just how you rolled back in the early 90s. That's right. Somebody sent me a grade 13 picture of it and I showed it to my kids and they just burst out laughing. So those were, yeah, that was how it went back then. And yes, the mullet was in style.

Well, a question I was asking, or I think he brought it up voluntarily, but Dan Schulman was over here. Yes. And he was talking about how he likes being bald. He says bald is beautiful. No argument there. But he despised balding, like the process of balding on television. Like you have that thick head of hair and now you just, are you shaving it?

Like what's the deal now? Oh, I've been shaving it for, well, I can tell you almost exactly what it goes back to. First of all, I beat my buddy Dan to it by a fair bit. And so I got to watch him go through the experience. Right. But mine was, I'm pretty sure it was the 1996 World Cup. Okay. And we were out in Alberta.

I think they were pre-tournament games. And I was sort of fighting it, right? And I'm fighting it. And I'm like, am I going to do it? And then I think I, it might have been a couple years after. But anyways, and who do I run into in a bar? But Mark Messier. Okay, yeah.

Who at that point is totally. Right. And I remember saying to him, you know, do you ever regret going to the full shaved head? And he goes, not for a second. And I think shortly after that I did and I've never regretted it. But I'm very blessed and I thank my mother and father for this, for having a head that kind of works with.

I'm not sure everybody's head works that way. And there's only one way to find out, right? Right. You go, oh, I made a huge mistake, like Job in Arrested Development. Right, right. I mean, you know, not everyone is as lucky as you, Michael. I was going to say, how do you know these aren't transplants or plugs? Humble Howard, who's a client of mine, he got plugs.

He's not ashamed to admit it, but they actually glue hair on your head or something. How does it look? No comment. In my mischievous moments, I think, Oh my goodness, how good would it be to show up with a toupee? Just like a full on. Like George Costanza. Yeah.

So, okay. My problem with that episode is I think George looks great in the toupee. He actually does. Right. But Elaine, like is so like awful, like how horrible and shames him into,

I guess throws it out the window. I think. At a certain point, but that's also the one where he gets it from his buddy who lied about having cancer. And then George can't keep a secret, remember? They're all horrible people on that show. That's why we love it, I think.

That's right. Okay, and before I read the description for that episode 110 for people who want to go back, how are you doing? I think the listenership wants to know how fotm damien cox is feeling these days i saw a picture of your dog this morning like so how's life how's life for damo life is great life life is is really great uh i'm sort of in a semi-retirement mode and absolutely comfortable in it now.

I mean, it takes a little while to get there. Right. To sort of feel good about what you are and say goodbye to what you used to do and embrace what you're going to do now. But between, yeah, those dogs and my incredible family and the little bit of work I still do and big plans for the future and more reading than I can. Can you share any of these big plans? Like, uh, what is, what is, what are you going to do?

What is the, I mean, I will say, so we're going to talk about this later in the program, but there's a new book by Damien Cox and, uh, remind me, how do you say Andrew's last name? Podnix. I should know that he's written a million great hockey books. But this is called A League of Our Own, the story of the NHL's first all-Canadian division. So we're going to talk about that. So you're still writing, and you still pop in the Toronto Star. You'll still find a Damien Cox article now. How often do you get published in the Star?

Well, twice a week. If you can believe it, and I know this will shock you, I am in my fifth decade of writing for the Toronto Star. 80s, 90s, early 10s. It does shock me because I thought it was at least the seventh decade. I swear I get people come in, oh, I read you all the time growing up. Right.

Well, that's honestly because I'm 47, and I feel like I read you growing up, but then when I do the math, I realize, because the star was what got delivered to my family home. But what's the year you first write in the star? So 1983 is when my first. Okay, so maybe I did read you forever now. It's possible, but I didn't,

and then I got to sports by about 1989. Okay, so that's when, it's the Leaf stuff, and that's when I kind of, yeah. And then, of course, the Passion Returns, that was the big playoff run in 93. 93. Of course, games. And then that's a whole other book.

But I'm going to read the description for episode 110. Mike chats with longtime Toronto Star journalist and Rogers broadcaster. So remember, this was written back then, okay? Damien Cox about his years at the Star, on the Fan 590, and on TSN and Rogers Hockey. We also talk about his Twitter behavior,

the perception he's condescending and arrogant. I think I copied and pasted this from my Mike Wilner episode. And I played this glorious audio. Okay, I know what I played. I'll just touch on it real quick here and get it out of the way. Because the Christmas season is almost here. You're going to be hearing a lot of Christmas carols.

I'm sure CHFI is going all Christmas, like, I don't know, the day after Remembrance Day. We'll find out. But real quick, I'm just going to play a bit just to... Because... I don't think... Well, let me play a little bit and then we'll move on from this. Okay, good. Hold on.

It's too glorious for me to talk over it. Hold on. It's only a minute. No finals since 67 So-called greatest fans So-called greatest fans So-called greatest fans So-called greatest fans Draft schmatz Draft schmatz Selling condos Poggi instead of Rask

So-called center of the hockey universe 44 to 46 to 5 How do you lose guys? Who knows that occurs? No finals since 67 No finals since 67 Plan the parade Plan the parade. Plan the parade. Tie dormant lovers.

You're joined by Howard Berger here. Oh, that's right. He's like the... Right. Doesn't matter to the stupid fans. No final sin. 67. No final sin. 67. So-called greatest fans.

It's a little repetitive. Yeah, but it's winding down here. Okay, so... So who... Do you know... It gets a little repetitive. Yeah, but it's winding down here. Okay, so. So who, do you know who the author of this fine piece of work was? So there was a glorious time in the blogosphere. So pre-podcast, before there were podcasts, there were blogs. And in the mid-2000s, let's say like 2004 or 5, TorontoMic.com was just a blog, believe it or not.

I started as a humble blogger. No way. Really. It's unbelievable. But there was another great blogger we called Down Goes Brown. Yep. And then there was another great blogger we called, I don't know how he pronounced it, but it was like Bloge Salmin.

Okay. So it was like Bloggy Salmin or something. And they used to collaborate on these great videos. Like they were fantastic. And that's one of them. That's the Christmas, I don't know what they called it i remember that uh carol of the bells or whatever and that's that was damien cox i mean obviously they were doing an impersonation but that was damien cox and howard berger doing carol of the bells and i played it for you on your first visit and i wasn't sure

if you were familiar with it but i'm glad you are now because it's a classic and i like to bring it out every christmas song I know Down Goes Brown. Yeah, I think he wrote the lyrics maybe. And then I think the video production was mainly this gentleman named Bloosh. And what happened to him? I don't know what he's up to these days, but there was a moment in time. We used to blog about the Leafs and we called it the Barilco Sphere. That's what we called it.

And John Sinden was hired by MLSE to help them with some social media stuff and PR stuff or whatever. And John Sinden took us all out to Wendell Clark's at Highway 407. So a bunch of us Barocco Sphere bloggers got together. The guy from MLSE, Pension Plan Puppets was there. Oh, I remember those. They were nasty, though. They were a little nasty. They were a little nasty. They were a little nasty.

They were kind of mean. Yeah, well, I don't think they're big Damien Cox fans. Oh, no. Believe it or not. It's hard to believe. But anyway, we all got together, and believe it or not, even Ottawa's own Damien Cox was there. We all kind of had this summit of things we might do,

and then nothing actually materialized, but we got a free meal out of it. And, you know, we got to talk about Damien Cox in private for a little bit. So it was good. But, yeah, that's a great piece of audio. And those two guys put that together. I love it. Hey, before we get into some of these listener questions and we talk about the book, you're a Hamilton guy.

I'm just letting you know you're a Hamilton guy. But I want to know if you have any words to share about the passing of Angelo Mosca. Jeez, that's like newsy. You know, I always laugh privately. To yourself. To myself. On your walk to the dog. When I write something about the CFL and then somebody will say, you just hate the CFL.

You love the NFL. You about the CFL and then somebody will say, you just hate the CFL. You love the, you hate the CFL. And it makes me laugh because, um, to have grown up in Hamilton in the late sixties, early seventies. I mean, the Hamilton Tiger cats was all there was.

Well, and, and the Hamilton Red Wings, um, and once or twice a week on television, the Toronto Maple Leafs. And that was my world of sports. And so somebody sent me a picture of the 72 Tidecats that won the Grey Cup. And I started looking at it.

And I seriously could name the players on the team. And what's really sad is I couldn't name many players on the current team. Angelo Mosca was at that point still playing and was already a legend. He'd come from Notre Dame. I think the 72 Great Cup was his last game, wasn't it? I believe. And they had some other guys like Garney Henley was. believe um and they had some other guys like garnie henley was i mean he there was a book about garnie henley because he came from some school in south dakota um he was fantastic

quarterback chuck ely came in um you know they had bob kraus the running back dave fleming who lived around the corner from me joe zuger had just left but angelo Mosca was a bit of a larger-than-life character. And then when he went on to wrestling, that sort of was accentuated. And then I ran into his son playing high school sports in Hamilton. And his son was an outstanding athlete. So, you know, very sad to hear of Ang's passing. He was in ill health for quite a number of years. I would run into him in the press box at Iverwind Stadium

when there was still an Iverwind Stadium. Always friendly, always nice. I always will remember, you know, he was walking with a cane and the Grey Cup was in Vancouver and he got into a dust-up with somebody. I mean, he was feisty to the end. Well, there's that famous video I was looking at. Jim Capp, who was the... Oh, Joe Capp.

Joe Capp, that's who it was. Exactly right. And this video, he's got a cane, and they're fighting on the stage. Yeah, yeah. So I'm not sure. I mean, you tell me if there's somebody equivalent for you, but I'm not sure that there is somebody like that locally that a Toronto sports fan would grow up and say, that's my Angelo Mos't think we appreciate how big a figure angelo mosca was like we so it's almost like we almost we need to we need you to kind of educate us like you know we kind of hear oh he was king kong mosca and then we hear i just was reading that they tried him out

as like a wwf commenter and it didn't quite work out and it was jesse the body ventura who sort of ended up with that gig like so the the role because i go back to the 80s of the wwf if you think of what jesse the body ventura was to 80s wwf that's what angelo mosca could have been like he could have been that kind of a figure but a larger than life i don't i don't know what the equivalent would be i honestly don't know no and uh it was also a different time like i say i mean he was at a time he came up to canada from notre dame as i mentioned and players would come from the united states to canada get this because they could make more money that's amazing isn't that incredible and he came up and came up to stay um and of course he was seen as a and that's why it works

so beautifully with wrestling because he was sort of seen outside hamilton seen as a and that's why it works so beautifully with wrestling because he was sort of seen, outside Hamilton anyways, as a dirty player and there was the famous incident during one of the great cops where he who was the player from BC the running back, anyways

it'll come to me probably at 2 o'clock in the morning tomorrow call me up when you need me so yeah, he was a villain you know me probably at 2 o'clock in the morning tomorrow. Call me up when you... Yeah, I will. So yeah, he was a villain. You know, he was a bad guy to most CFL 50s. And he only ever

played for the Hamilton Tiger Cats. Not like today, right? Guys bounce around and by the time they're done with the CFL, if they play as many years as they did, they played for half the teams or more. He only played for the Hamilton Tigers. I think we're running out of guys who can tell us what we need to know about these aging vets from the old CFL glory days. Like, honestly, because, you know, I think.

It's true. It's like, I have faint memories of 83. Like, I have faint memories of 83. 83, that's like yesterday. I know. Well, because that was the year the Argos won the Grey Cup, great cup right 83 so i have faint memories of the parade and the excitement around 83 but uh you know i hadn't i was still like i was nine years old so uh but man to hear about these these larger than life figures and who's the uh argos coach who passed away last okay right

there's another guy like you know it's like okay what does that name mean to a guy in his mid-40s like we need to yeah on these guys well and and and again you know it's everybody has their reference point um and you know leo cahill was was similar to mosca was kind of larger than life right he was the guy who said after the first game of a two they used to play a two game total points playoffs series back then, um, uh, in the Eastern semifinal, I guess is what it was.

And after the Argos won the first game by a lopsided score, uh, Cahill's famous line was only an act of God could stop us now. And of course the Ticats came back. that's amazing. Um, but, uh,

yeah, Cahill was, was a guy, I mean, these were, and, and oddly enough, one of uh, yeah, Cahill was, was a guy, I mean, these were, and, and oddly enough, one of maybe my first show on radio I did with Leo Cahill. Wow.

And, uh. This is on 590? This was on 590. Sunday mornings, we started doing a football radio show and the trick of the show is and i as a veteran of this now you'll know how this works right the the trick to doing that show was to try to do it despite the fact that leo hated my guts right he didn't he didn't think that anybody else should have any thoughts or opinions on football because he was leo cale. Right. And it got so bad, eventually I had to, and there's a little bit of history here. You'll like this.

Yeah, I'm listening. I had to bring in my good friend, Gord Stelic, to make it listenable. And then that morphed into Gordon Damien, which I still have high hopes that we're going to get a call one of these days and say, we want you back. Well, what a timely segue, because I have a bunch of questions, and I'm going to start with some kinder questions. Like this gentleman named Paul. Here, I'm going to warm you up a bit, but Paul Palermo, his

question very simply is this. Ask him if he will return to radio, TV, media again. Sports fans miss him. Paul. Paul's the guy. Thanks, Paul. I miss you too. Like, if you got an offer, and there's a bunch of questions around this. Some of them are repetitive.

But if you were, I don't know, if a phone rang and, I don't know, 1050 wanted you to do something, would you consider it? Probably not. Interesting. Are you saying that because you don't think that calls come up? First of all, I haven't got a call and no one's called me. Maybe they can't find your number. I think they know how to find me.

You know what? I was on with Jeff Merrick two weeks ago and I really enjoyed that. Hey. And I mean, Jeff, he's one of the great guys and one of the outstanding broadcasters out there now so I like doing that if someone wanted to have me on once a week to chat about this that and the other or like you

to visit once every couple years I do that but you know I think I loved what I was doing for many years and I love not doing it now. And it's taken me a couple of years to sort of, uh, wean myself off it. So, uh, yeah, I think the answer is probably not. Um, and I think the business has changed so dramatically that I don't think I'm a fit.

And, uh, I think there's lots of younger people, men and women out there who should be doing it. Not me. The way the model has changed. I think you'd have to bring the brand with you. Like Cox brings the brand with him. Who's going to pay for the damn show. And suddenly you're on the radio. Yeah. And I think that's, I think that's part of it. I mean, I look at people out there now do a lot of things they're doing and, and there's, there's a, like, like you've done, I mean, they build of it. I mean, I look at people out there now, a lot of things they're doing, and there's a, like you've done. I mean, they build their brand. There's a hustle to it.

You've got to try to, and by a hustle, I mean you've got to bust your butt to get your idea out there and get someone to buy it. And I like, you know. That's a lot of work. Yeah, and I like sitting back and listening to different voices.

I've heard my voice for long enough, believe me. And I mean, you're in the Toronto Star twice a week, so you have that outlet. It's not like you need a creative outlet or whatever. Well, yeah, I have that outlet. And you're writing books. I mean, A League of Our Own is available for your holiday wish lists. I can tell you've not read it.

Oh, no. I haven't read it yet. It's actually pretty darn good. I was pretty happy with it because I wasn't sure how it was going to turn out. And in my mind's eye, because of the way... I mean, in my mind's eye, I thought, well, if the Leafs were to make it to the semifinals,

at least, that would be a really good story. And obviously, that didn't happen. But it ended up being... I think it'll be a book that people are going to go back to in a number of years and go, oh yeah, the pandemic, what did the NHL do in that? And this is about the NHL's pandemic year. But it also touches on stuff like racism in hockey. It touches on, you know, some really important issues

along the way. So, yeah. No, no, no. You're right. I have not actually read it yet, but I do have it, and I will read it. I mean, there's chapters like... I think you'd enjoy it. Yeah, I will read it.

And the other thing I think you would find interesting because of what you do... Because I'm a curious cat. This is a book done without a publisher. Hey! This is done in a direct deal with Indigo. So you can only get it at Indigo. And basically, Andrew and I, we do a contract with Indigo. And they say, we want this many books.

And we print it. We develop the cover. And we do all the, get the pictures. And obviously do all the editorial and then just deliver it to Indigo and then they put it on their shelf. Cut out the middleman. Well, it's a different model to, yeah, different model to doing books. The middle person.

I'll change that expression. The middle individual. A lot of expressions. Do you ever watch that Apple TV show, The Morning Show? Yes. Okay, so the weatherman got in trouble for saying my spirit animal. His spirit animal, yeah. Right.

And I was thinking, because I do use that expression myself, and then I know this is a fictional show, this didn't really happen, but then I thought, like, maybe you shouldn't say that. Like, I have no idea. Can you say my spirit animal? I don't know. You know, that's a good question. It's a great question.

That's why it's thought-provoking moments on provoking moments on well there's a couple of things first of all with uh my i have a 16 year old daughter and her world gender fluidity in her world yeah yeah is so such a big deal yep and she has educated me and we talk all the times about things you can say and things you can't say and um you know one of the one of the areas where i actually am doing some work in is um uh well um understanding the indigenous component to canada and and get it becoming a little more knowledgeable i'm embarrassed how ignorant i am, particularly growing up in Hamilton, not far from Six Nations. And I'm sad that if there had been a relationship between Hamilton and Six Nations,

it would have been a richer experience for everybody. It wasn't. So now I feel like I'm playing catch-up and learning a lot more about that. Yeah, and without a doubt, there's a free course from the University of Alberta. I took it. Yeah, my wife took it too it's i have a long list of things i got to catch up on a league of our own that course but uh i just want to tell them just find out whatever happened to bloge salming i will i think his name was jeff but uh i gotta find out how he's gonna

find out let me know how he's doing but if you want and we'll talk more about the book later but uh because i gotta get some questions for you damo but for more information you can go to a league of our own dash book.com because you couldn't get that domain name so i know what you had to do there but a league of our own dash book.com you can get more information on uh the new book from damian cox and here's a good question related to what we were talking about with Gord Stelic is Doug Floyd. And Doug Floyd says, ask about Sunday morning show with Stelic in the 1430 days.

That was a hilarious show. Or was it Saturday morning? And he's got like five question marks. So for the record, this was a Sunday morning show. Yeah. So after a relatively short period of time, Leo phased out and, and, and Gord and I phased in.

And so I would back up to your, you asked me before, would I do something? And I said, probably not or not. I would do something with Gord again, even if it was only a short-term period, because it was such a cool period in our lives i mean uh gourd is one of my dearest oldest friends i don't see him hardly at all but and we don't see people as much during the pandemic um and uh and people like that show you know and? And so I would do that. So you get the word.

You be my agent. Well, let me ask you this. This is my next question. This actually just came up. So a good FOTM is Rod Black. And of course, no longer with TSN. I was going to ask you about that later, actually. But Leo Roudens was over like two weeks ago.

How good a guy is he? Yeah. So basically, Leo and Rod and rod you know are good buds as you know and uh they've agreed to come on together on toronto mike so rod black leo are going to be my guests wow what about because he's a good fotm too gordon stelic's been over a bunch of times he knows i can't get enough of those ballard stories uh would you come on with gordon stelic on toronto? Absolutely not. Oh, okay. No, of course I would.

I'll let it out. Of course I would. I would. And you know what? I would, why don't we call him? He'll come over right now. Yeah, no, I would do that. Sure.

Okay. That's what I'm here for. I'm here to, because I don't work for Bell or Rogers. I can do the things. I have this nimble ability of being a fiercely independent guy where I can put together people who can't be put together in the mainstream media. You know, there aren't many fiercely independent people left out there.

I know. You know, they come at me with their Brinks truck and they park it in the driveway and I say, get the hell out of here. Get out of here. And then they leave with the Brinks truck and they don't leave anything else. Okay, where do I begin here?

I like this start because... Actually, here, I'm going to share a little story real quick here. So, you know Kevin Gluh. Kevin Gluh is a fun follow on Twitter. He posts a lot of nostalgic Blue Jays tweets. I think he works at the Canadian Baseball Hall. I know Kevin Gluh. Do you?

No. Okay. Well, he's big with the Canadian baseball hall of fame, I think. And he's a good follow on Twitter, but Kevin, uh, likes to post these nostalgic blue Jays tweets,

which I quite like. It'll be something like he did this the other day. He posted happy birthday to, uh, blue Jays, ace Ricky Romero. He turned 37 years old. Okay.

And he tags Ricky on Twitter and it's a nice little tweet, and it's just harmless, right? But the reply comes in from somebody. The reply was basically, the gist of the reply was, there is absolutely no way, shape, or form you can refer to Ricky Romero as an ace on any staff. Oh, that's not true.

Right, so let's put aside whether it's true or not, because I don't think it's true either i think but what what would possess somebody to to reply to this very harmless sweet little happy birthday ricky romero you former blue jays ace with that remember this is also tagging ricky he's a human being right last i checked he's a living breathing human being he probably will see mentions in his twitter because what what's the point of being on twitter if you don't ever glance at that although maybe you don't we'll get into that but uh i was thinking like is that's basically so that's where we're at like what's the point of that reply it's just uh to me it's just like a a mean hurtful reply that doesn't add anything to anything anywhere like i i was just thinking that was like example. Excuse me, I'm all choked up over here.

An example of how the Twitter dialogue has deteriorated. I personally think that's just an asshole reply that's completely unnecessary and adds nothing. I'm not even sure it's deteriorated. I think it's been like that for a long time.

Maybe it depends. Maybe because you're a famous guy, you get a lot of people chiming in. Because this will now segue. So Brad Wheeler covers music for the Globe and Mail. Brad's question, very simply, and there are a lot of questions like this, but I'm going to take Brad's

because he's a famous guy in this market. What led Damien Cox to decide to play the heel? So Brad thinks you've decided on Twitter to play the heel. So Brad thinks you've decided on Twitter to play the heel. Now, there's a lot. I mean, I'll just do a quick, real quick, but another person chimed in to ask, why is he so grumpy? Well, let me ask. Yeah, yeah.

Let's just start. Let's talk about your Twitter. Let me ask you this. You know me a little bit. Sure. This is your fifth. I'll let you know and the listeners know that I did talk about your Twitter. You know me a little bit. Sure. This is your fifth. I'll let you know and the listeners know that I did talk about your first appearance. And in a moment, I'll read a question about your second, which was to kick out the jams.

But you've been here now five times. So you know me some. Sure. Do you think I'm grumpy? I think you assume a grumpier persona on Twitter than you are in the real world. See, I don't assume any persona. I think I just do what I do and people read into it what they want to read into it.

Like I was reading on, with something on, when you announced that I was going to come on your fine program, and someone said, oh, the kick out the, it humanized him. Oh, I have that here, yeah.

I mean, what a crazy thing to say about someone you don't know. You know, and because someone says, boy, the Chicago Blackhawks have a bad defense or in this case, what would we say? They have a racist logo on their front. Oh, he's grumpy. Right.

What grumpy I think is someone saying is he doesn't agree with all the things I agree with, or he doesn't think the things that I think are great are great. Well, I don't think you can read into someone's persona or personality. Personality is a better word. Um, just by what they may or may not comment on this or that.

It's funny, but that comment that you're talking about regarding your jam-kicking episode, which was your second appearance, and I actually have the description here. It's episode 270, Mike and Damien Cox play and discuss his 10 favorite songs. That was a great show. I enjoyed that. You were great.

I almost queued up a Coldplay song for you actually here but it was fantastic and people should listen to Damien Cox kick out the jams but I stan bull leafs I think is how you say this twitter handle says I remember the kicking out the jams episode it humanized him there seems to be an old man

stick he's playing at what point does a pundit simply become opinionated but not insightful? I don't know if Twitter hot takes are a healthy way to live. I hear what you're saying. I want you to explain to me

what a hot take is. In your opinion. I co-host a show with Hebsey every Friday morning and I feel like he's good at these hot takes. I think it's just a term for a contrarian belief that you present to the world, sort of like if you were going to say something like,

I've heard this hot take might be, the John Cordick for Russ Cortnall trade was an excellent trade by Gord Stelic and a good trade for the Leafs. That might be a hot take. That's just stupid. I've heard, well, down goes Brown actually has that hot take. So I would agree that I'm a contrarian.

Right. But as far as hot takes, I mean, basically, something pops in my head, I might put it on Twitter. I might not. I might. I mean, is that something pops in my head, I might put it on Twitter. I might not. I might. I mean, is that a hot take? I don't know.

I don't sit here and live by hot takes. Also, hot takes suggests you're taking that stand for shits and giggles to shock as opposed to having these legitimate opinions. Your opinions are valid. I don't shock anybody. I mean, I'm not out there to shock anybody. And I'm,

I, I, I see references to just trying to get clicks. What would, what would be, what would be the possible benefit for me to get clicks? I have, there's no money in that.

Well, I mean, I have the followers I have. I, they're deeply disturbed, but committed following. And, but,

you know, like I'm not out there looking for more followers and I'm not out there looking for people to, it's just sort of out there. You can read it, don't read it, ignore it, whatever. The term humanized though suggests in some fashion that you weren't human before. I thought that's a bit rough.

You're a monster of some sort. But the funny thing is that exact line, when Wilner kicked out, that's why I rough. You're a monster of some sort. But the funny thing is that exact line, when Wilner kicked out, that's why I joked about him earlier, because when Wilner came on, I had very similar questions about suggestions that he was arrogant and condescending, like those two words.

And I got the same with you. And then I also, when he kicked out the jams, I had legitimate same quote that it humanized him. And then I'm seeing it again with you as if like suddenly talking, you, Oh, this, this beast likes music and tells a story about,

you know, driving a Hamilton and some very heartfelt stories you shared about why you love this song. Did I cry on that one? I can't. It was honestly, I will say that one jam in particular got emotional when you talk, cause I'm a divorced,

I'm a divorced dad too. I'm on my second marriage and I have two kids. My teenagers are from a previous marriage and i totally like uh relate to that story you share oh i can there's lots of music i can get emotional about look i i think um i mean people if if i challenge that person to the face that well they i bet you what they would say is well i don't mean humanized it mean i think what they he liked you more after that episode or he got to know you a bit more and and maybe that's the lesson in all of this is the the image one presents to the public via a column or on television or on twitter is two-dimensional at best probably probably one-dimensional. Best not to think you actually know that person at all,

simply by what they say. And, you know, like what they say, don't like what they say, agree, disagree, but I think saying you know that person or that this humanizes them, I find that a little disconcerting. Right. Right. I do think that, yeah, really what this gentleman I think is saying is that,

yeah, they got to know you, like the personal side of you, like the more human side. Yeah, I'm okay with that. As opposed to just your opinions on some of these matters we're grappling with that uh that go beyond sports now and i think when you we and i think we've talked about this before the whole idea of arrogance or whatever i mean i'm i think you'll agree i'm blunt sure i don't i don't I don't. There are people in this business who, when they ask a question or answer a question, will give a menu of possible answers and questions.

And along, well, it could be this or it could be that. Or when I hear broadcasters on television after someone's made a terrible play saying that was a little bit of a mistake. Everybody's hedging all the time. And so if you're a person who doesn't hedge, but say, this is what I think. It can be cutting, right? It can sound a little harsh, maybe a little cutting.

And then people will think you're grumpy. And this guy here, Paul Gullo, I hope I said that right, G-U-L-L-O. Paul Gullo goes, why is he so angry all the time? Like for the record, definitively, here on Toronto Mic'd, are you angry all the time? No, I'm not. You know, I mean, definitively, here on Toronto Mic'd, are you angry all the time? No, I'm not. You know, I mean, you know, and how would this anger manifest itself?

Do they think I go punching walls all the time? Right. You know, I mean, you know, I would say I'm a pretty passionate guy. I'm a pretty emotional guy, but I'm not angry. And I like, I will say, and I'm on the record of saying this, I like people who have the passion and are characters. I'm kind of, I don't want a milquetoast kind of like safe, sanitized person who doesn't want to offend anyone either way.

Like I'm looking for these voices, and they're all disappearing by the way. Like there's a, one by one, they're're all disappearing anybody who's got a little sandpaper to them gone right exactly right and you know uh that was uh and this is a whole other subject that was uh when i went to hockey night in canada and was on hockey night in canada and those tumultuous two years. And I remember Scott Moore talking to me and saying, well, you know, you're a little too much sandpaper for some people's liking.

And I'm thinking, what did you think? You think I was going to change, Scott? I mean, that's what we, that's what, you know. But sometimes that's not what people want. And think of other people that maybe you could describe as a sandpaper character love him or hate him because there's a lot of problems with him but Don Cherry is a guy like that you've got

Bob McCowan was a guy like that these are the voices that were kind of here for a long time and have said goodbye to mainstream media they got podcasts where they can be their own boss and they don't have like a program director across the table or whatever.

But even Glenn Healy, for example, is a guy I always liked. I thought he was, I liked him because he said something. And that was exactly why people didn't like him because he would, you know, if you say something, you might, half the people might be pissed at your take or your opinion. So people on Twitter were very harsh and angry at Glenn Healy a lot.

And I was always like, like, do you really want Glenn Healy off the airwaves to be replaced with somebody, uh, boring? Like, I don't know why. And you know what the answer is? Yes. I think the answer is yes. People want, for example, people on, when they, when they listen to an, uh, Leaf broadcast, they don't want someone who tells them what they don't want to hear.

Right. Until they've decided that Rasmus Sandin shouldn't be in the NHL or Mike Babcock was a terrible person. When they make that decision, then it's okay to say it. But generally, people do not want, it seems to me, no, let me back up. There are some who do not wish to be challenged or do not wish to hear a differing opinion,

and they tend to say so. The people who do like to hear a different opinion and do like to be challenged tend to not speak out. And people are more likely to tell you who they hate as opposed to who they love. Exactly. Which is why I have had you on five times. Because honestly, I appreciate that you have knowledgeable opinions on this subject matter. And I like hearing it.

I'm not looking for an echo chamber or somebody to just tell me all... I thought you were. You told me, I want you to come on here and be an echo chamber. Just repeat after me. Look, you're earning your gifts, I'm going to give you in a minute here, but I've got to get back to Twitter just for a moment because there's a lot of questions in this vein. Patrick Mulholland says,

why is he still on Twitter when he's basically blocked everyone? So Patrick, I think, and I got a lot of this, a lot of basically, he blocked me. Craig M wrote in to say, I'd like to ask him why he blocked me. Way too quick on the trigger finger.

Should be able to discuss like adults and not be so sensitive to a difference of opinion. So maybe I will summarize all these by asking you, do you, what, what is your Twitter blocking, uh, strategy? So that's all bullshit. Okay. That is complete bullshit. Um, that, uh, do I block people? Absolutely. But you've got to, I think, in my opinion, people have lost the ability to offer a challenging point of view in a respectful tone. you're a scumbag, I can't believe how stupid you are because you think Austin Matthews is ever going to be a good player for the Leafs. Well, I might ignore it, I might mute them, but if people go beyond, I mean, I would block them.

And what's interesting, Mike, is people will text, email me, or somehow communicate with me and say, people will text, email me or, or, or somehow communicate with me and say, you, you blocked me and, um, uh, either, I don't know why, or, um, would you, would you unblock me? And I say, and I always say, sure. Can you just tell me what you said? And they never want to tell you what they said because they know they were being an asshole. Or they were being vicious. And so, I don't, I'm not, the Twitter, my Twitter feed is for me. Right. I don't owe anybody anything.

That is true. You know, there's, let's see. Let's see how many followers we have. And you reserve the right to block whoever you want. You know, you can block whoever you want. If seeing their replies is making you feel less than happy, then life is too short. And to say I block, why am I still on?

Because I block everybody. Well, there's 60,000 followers. Okay, so you haven't blocked everybody. But if you can, I have blocked a lot of people. Do you know how to figure out how many people you've blocked? I don't know if I've ever looked into it, but I don't know offhand. Okay, because I would tell you. If you had to guess, though, we talk in like 100 people, 1,000 people?

Oh, probably a couple thousand. I don't take shit. I mean, why should I, right? Like, why would I? Yeah, you're not paid to tweet. No. Yeah, I hear you. I love the ones where I want you to stop talking about this.

Stop talking about this. And it's like you seem to be under the impression that you are going to dictate what I talk about. It's not going to happen. No, I will say sometimes people will get caught up in a net. Like if there's a bunch of people in a thread, somebody might call you some bald headed asshole or something. And then you might,

you might do a flail sweep. Is that the word term? Flail swoop. Anyway, you might do a broad stroke where I think I've made, I think I have made that mistake. Cause I can tell you, I'm now opening up to you,

Damien. I feel safe with you to tell you that I've been blocked by Hamiltonian, Jeff Blair. Okay. You ever heard of this guy? I, and I actually was curious because I don't get blocked

because I don't actually do the call people names on Twitter and do things to get blocked. So I was curious and I actually did some searching on Twitter and realized that I was just tagged on something or someone else. Yep.

And then he blocked everybody. Yeah. But I actually didn't say, I didn't say negative boo to Mr. Blair there, but I got blocked. And now, you know, people subtweet jeff blair said something about this blue j player and i don't see the damn tweet and it's mildly annoying but uh i did not deserve it's too bad because i wonder if if there was like i probably blocked a couple people on the weekend and i if i could i would read you the tweet and say this is why this is what i get and what would you do well screen

cap that and just say uh these are the types of if you're wondering why you were blocked this is what I get, and what would you do? Well, screen cap that and just say, these are the types of, if you're wondering why you were blocked, this is the type of, I do block too. I don't have to block as many as you because less people passionately hate me on Twitter, but I totally will block somebody for being a rude dick or whatever, for sure. You reserve the right, and you should do so.

But people are very curious about your Twitter behavior, and here's an interesting... Phil here says... I wish they'd ask about my writing for my broadcast. It's coming, it's coming. I'm saving those, they're coming. Phil says, why has he become a bigger hater of Toronto sports teams

than Marty York? Has he been hanging with Marty to learn from him and develop his negativity? So this is interesting interesting because I will... Marty York's also an FOTM, but before I ask your opinion on Mr. York, a very controversial figure, Hebsey just told a story on Hebsey on Sports about Marty York.

It's quite the story. But I will say you can clearly see in the tweets of Marty York that he has an immense bias against anything Rogers has touched. So, um, yeah, the Blue Jays could probably go undefeated and he would tweet something like, uh, overrated, uh, overrated team. Uh, they really suck despite being 162 and 0. Like that might be a Marty York tweet. And it's really more like a parody to me. Like like it's a it's comedy and I don't take them seriously uh being compared to him though you're you're an actual legit you know uh journalist here

what would you say to Phil who thinks you hate all Toronto sports teams uh and have been taking notes from our New York well I don't know based on what like I you know I mean I've written books on the Toronto Maple Leafs I've written books on the Toronto Maple Leafs. I've written books on the Toronto Raptors. I've covered these teams for years. The only one of those teams I really have any kind of a feeling for would be the Toronto Argonauts because I grew up as a Hamilton Tirecats fan. But I think, like, I don't care if the Leafs win or lose. I don't care if the Raptors win or lose. I don't care if the Jays win or lose.

I know people. I've met people on all those teams who I've enjoyed talking to i've met people on those teams who i haven't enjoyed talking people talking to so i don't you know i i don't i don't hate them i don't like them they don't you know i mean but you're not a cheerleader for these teams like that's well i think that's the difference i think what he's really asking there is why don't you cheer for toronto teams and i and the answer to that is that's not my job man you're not a you're not a cheerleader but you know why these people i think have been kind of groomed to expect a bit of that is because this whole like uh the for example let's take uh roger sports net okay they uh not only do they have a an ownership

stake in the maple leafs but they have this massive, I don't know if you've heard about this. You should talk to David Schultz about this. He, they, they got a massive deal for 12 year deal for how many billion? I can't remember now, four or five. I don't know, but they are partners of the NHL. No. Yeah, true. And, uh, in there, therein lies, uh, an inherent, uh, even if it's an unwritten, unspoken potential bias, simply because you are partners of the league. I think that's right. And I don't think it's a coincidence that it's Rick Westhead's reporting

that has uncovered a great deal of this Chicago Blackhawks scandal, the sex abuse scandal. It's because Rick Westhead doesn't work for Rogers. I feel like that's not a coincidence. Well, I think that's the flip question.

And I don't mean this as any, I mean, Rick's done great work. So please don't take this as any kind of a negative take on his work. But would TSN be as keen on publishing that work if they were the rights holder for the National Hockey League. Yeah, and I think you can safely speculate, potentially, allegedly, that no, I don't think so. And I think that's one of all the changes that have happened in sports media over the last, what, 30 years or whatever. I mean, when I put together our group for the Lou Marsh vote every year, I'm, I'm stunned now how many people are working for either Sportsnet or for TSN. Um, and that was not the case three decades ago.

And I would agree with you that I think if you, that to some degree, um, you are conflicted if you work for a rights holder. you are conflicted if you work for a rights holder. I mean, I remember when I was working for or trying to negotiate a deal with TSN back in 2010, and basically it was made clear to me by Mark Millier, who was running the network at the time, you can be critical about anything, but not about the Canadian football league. You're not allowed to say anything

about the Canadian football league. Interesting. And that was spoken, because we always refer to these as unspoken shots across the board. And I believe, and I have no proof for this whatsoever, so this is just that of the number of reasons why I was unsuccessful at establishing myself long-term on Hockey Night in Canada is I was not willing to drink the Kool-Aid and to say how great it was and talk about how fantastic it is to sell the game and have expansion and how fighting was great.

And those things do not endear you to the National Hockey League and they don't endear you to people who are rights holders. Now, just before I go, I know you want to jump in. No, no, I'm listening to you. I'm not going to say that's why I wasn't successful on Hockey Night in Canada long term. I think there are a few reasons and probably there are people out there saying, yeah,

you sucked. But, um, I, I, I believe that was a reason why I wasn't part of the reason why I was not successful. You're as,

and again, I've never worked for Rogers or Bell or any, any mainstream media outlet, of course, who would hire me. I, uh, just,

I'm a consumer of this content and I distinctly read, I know for a fact, Ron course, who would hire me. I just am a consumer of this content, and I distinctly know for a fact Ron McClain would ask Gary Bettman some uncomfortable questions, and that when this big deal was signed, Gary Bettman didn't want Ron McClain to be the host. And then, I mean, I've had Scott Moore on, I've had Ron McClain on, I've had James Duthie on,

so I can tell you, and I'm not speculating here, that Rodgers tried to get James Duthie on. So I can tell you, and I'm not speculating here, that Rodgers tried to get James Duthie for the role. Duthie's very loyal to TSN. He's still there. He's a good boy too. Good FOTM. And this is where the Strombo experiment comes into play. George Strombolopoulos comes over to take those

to the reins. And now you can look not too far back. You can look to Ron McClain speaking of Gary Bettman in the playoffs last year, was it? And not asking about the Chicago Blackhawks. The Blackhawks sex abuse scandal, which was sort of just periculating at that time,

was not asked of Gary Bettman by Ron McLean. Ron McLean made a decision as a hockey journalist not to ask that question. He's not a journalist. Okay, well, but he made this decision as a hockey journalist and not to ask that question. He's not a journalist. Okay. Well, okay. So I, yeah.

Okay. But, but, but he made this decision on his own to pull that question to pull his punch, so to speak. And I don't know about you, but I think it's safe to say that's protecting your career,

right? That that's merely done to protect your job with Rogers sports. So I've known Ron McLean for many years. We're not friends, but we are acquaintances. I am, I am, he may or may not like my work.

I don't like his work very much. And I thought that was embarrassing. And I thought that was, you know, it was really sad about it. I thought that was Gary, Gary Bettman being able to sit there um and go i own you man yeah you'll ask what i let you ask right and i thought that was really unfortunate you know i

i couldn't work under those um circumstances ron can good for ron he's making great money he's a famous canadian he has had a remarkably uh long and successful career and he doesn't need my opinion or he doesn't need my support but i saw that and i went oh wow that was humiliating but on any level like as a you know somebody who works still works in the mainstream media rights for the Toronto star, like on any level, do you sort of understand, you know, why he's making that decision to protect his livelihood? Like,

oh, I understand why he's doing it. Can you, but I just couldn't do it myself. Cause you said he's not a journalist. So which, which I don't even, I mean,

that's an interesting conversation itself. Like, so he's a host, he's a presenter. Yeah. Yeah. But he's, he's also now on live television interviewing Gary Bettman. And I think he's a poor choice to do that.

I think, you know, I think Elliot Friedman would probably be a better choice. But the NHL's... I mean, Gary Bettman is not... First of all, Gary Bettman, I can tell you after decades of doing it, you can't lay a glove on that guy. So it's an impartial, but you can ask the question and you don't self-censor.

Right. You don't say, I will not ask the question. I mean, you know, I think, could you imagine Dave Hodge not asking the question? No, and I know you're buzzed with Dave. Dave's coming over here i'm going to just promote this really quickly but he's going to uh share his 100 favorite songs of 20 100 holy i know so later this month and uh too bad it's not i mean he wants to do in the backyard for for safety reasons and i'm hoping it's you've given me even half this temperature

because just to let people know we are are outside now. It is November. It's spectacular. November 8th. I'm in a light sweater here, and I'm feeling great. I don't even have the heat out. I'm in a t-shirt. Yeah, unbelievable, right?

Unbelievable. I'm so glad I moved this in the last minute I moved it in the backyard. But back to Ron McLean and Dave Hodge. Back to Dave Hodge. Dave Hodge, who's been over many times, he's chock full of integrity. And Dave, there's a pen flip.

Actually, there's a special episode of Toronto Mike coming very soon all about this pen flip. Everyone's like, seriously, it's in the works, working with the VP of sales on it. It's coming very, very soon. And by the way, they are good friends, Dave and Ron. Okay, because I was at the live reporters event. This was at the Paradise Theatre just before COVID. And I was there because I was at the live reporters event. This was at the Paradise Theatre just before COVID.

And I was there because I was actually recording this for an episode of Toronto Mike. You can find it in the feed right now. And this is during sort of the Remembrance Day scandal with Don Cherry was kind of just passed or something. And I... That's in the book, by the way. Yeah, I'm going to read this down.

That's just fucking good. But Dave Hodge pointed out that basically, if he was Don Cherry's sidekick, that Don would never have been able to become this caricature, this character. Because the first time Don Cherry said, Patty Roy, Dave would have stepped up and said, no, it's Patrick Roy.

Dave would have stepped up and said, no, it's Patrick Waugh. And where Ron sort of enabled Don to become this caricature. Yeah, I mean, like I say, Ron. You're saying they're buds. Oh, yeah. Well, they both. I mean, Ron's a big music fan. Yes, that's true. He does a lot of stuff.

Look, Ron's got more fans than I'll ever have in my life. Right. But I can't imagine going on national television and let someone tell you to shut up. Shut up. I'm talking. You shut up or bully you or belittle you. I just can't imagine it.

I just, now we all do things for our own reason. Maybe it doesn't, maybe it never bothered Ron. I suspect that Ron's points of view on many topics were very similar to that of Don. And I'm still amazed that Ron was able to survive after the Don Cherry business because he was the one on that show that night nodding his head and giving a big thumbs up.

I try to see this, even though I've had a positive experience of Ron McClain when he came on the show and he was fantastic and we had a great private chat and I quite like the guy, to be quite honest. I think he's a very personable, very friendly man.

But when I watched that tape a hundred times and he's got the, somebody's talking in his ear, but throw into that clip in the remembrance day clip. And I, I feel like I, I want to give him a pass because I kind of know what it's like when you have,

you're running the board and you're doing this. And then you said something, I might kind of miss it. Cause I'm playing a queuing up a clip. I'm going to play or whatever. Like there's a lot of stuff going on. He's not just focused on the words coming out of don cherry's mouth so i i feel i'm maybe i'm being very kind to the man

and that's okay but i mean if if if there wasn't a whole lot of history to that then i would never have thought that was the case but there was just too much history of of a of of of either passively nodding you know or agreeing or whatever. Right. You know... As if he's condoning the words. But, yeah. And I haven't... Think about that. Is it aired live somewhere,

but then it was repeated in a couple of markets? Like, apparently, that wasn't... So, somebody at the helm there... Like, nobody... I don't think anyone caught, really, the severity of these words because it was aired.

Not immediately, yeah. Right, it was aired again. So it's recorded. I remember watching it. Whoever gets to it first, right? Whichever market gets to the first intermission first gets it live. I remember watching going, what?

Yeah. And you know, I think it's really sad in the way in which Grapes' career ended. I knew Don for many years. He was always nice to me. He would always give me the gears. If I ran into him in airport, what's a good Irish guy like you? Why don't you like fighting?

And we did not share points of view on many things. But he was always nice to me. If people came in the studio, they wanted to meet Don Cherry, he would meet them. He did a lot of charitable things, and I think that was an unfortunate end to his career. But guess what? Not many people in broadcasting get to end on their terms.

What about Jim Hewson? Jim, he just suddenly retired. I suspect he was done with it all. I think you're right. He didn't travel during the pandemic, right? So he didn't want to do that. And there had been a bit of a shift with Chris Cuthbert coming over.

So maybe there was, you know, there could have been contractual things. Well, he was going to have to share. I think they were going to take turns. And maybe he just had enough. You know, I think Jim's a guy with a bigger world than just watching hockey and broadcasting, and I think he might have just decided enough's enough. But I don't know.

I haven't talked to Jim. You said the words, of course, because you said Lou Marsh, and my co-host on Friday mornings of Hebsey on Spores is Mark Hebsey, who's been adamant that he's shared quotes from Lou Marsh and he's got some evidence of Lou Marsh being anti-Semitic and using some anti-Indigenous language in his writings. And I'm just curious if there's any conversations

about changing the name of that award. So what I can tell you is there's an ongoing discussion and there's a process of trying to, I think this pull down the statue, take this name off here, sometimes. Oh, like with Ryerson and Dundas? Yeah, sometimes it's done very quickly. I think that this is something that's come up

on occasion over the years, not just from Mark. And I think it's something that what we decided to do and what we're going to try to do is try to study. Go back and let's find out what this guy actually said. Let's just cherry pick a few things. Let's find out what he said said let's try to put it within the context of his times and if it's appropriate to move on to a new name and retire his name then maybe that's something we'll look at but i can tell you this um you know i've invested a lot of time in the lou marsh process it is the most prestigious award to any athlete in Canada. And I'm not going to do

something just, and I'm not going to advocate doing something just quickly because someone can peel off a quote. Now, we've really worked hard in the past few years of trying to diversify our voting committee. This year, I'm proud to say we'll have our first Indigenous voter. We will have our first Paralympic voter. We have people from across the country, and we're still working on getting people. So it's an ongoing process to make sure this process is representative of Canada. And I think part of that is making sure that we have the right name on the trophy and we're going to, we're going to make sure we, we do.

And if, and if it's decided down the road that it's time to move on, then we'll move on. It's tough to, well, once you find out, uh, you know,

Lou Marsh was a Nancy sympathizer. It's, uh, tough to forget it. Well, I don't know. See, see,

then that's a great question. I've not heard that. It's tough to forget it. Well, I don't know. See, that's a great question. I've not heard that. I have heard a lot about his relationship with Tom Longboat. Yeah, those quotes I've seen. About there is words that he's used that would indicate or people might read that to say he's a racist. I've never heard anything about him being a Nazi sympathizer. So I'd urge you or Mark,

if he has something he wants to send to me, send it over. I will. But more than that, I think we're going to try to get to the bottom of it. Right. So no knee-jerk reaction. Let's find out exactly

what was said and what context do you think that's a reasonable approach i think that's absolutely i'm glad to hear that there's at least this conversation is happening uh like let's let like that you're having this discussion back in the 1920s there was there was a yeah there was a completely different relationship between sport and media. The NHL was not a big, successful, money-making league. Neither was the NFL. Neither were professional sports in general. Amateur sports were bigger.

The relationship between media and these sports was very different. of the predominantly white sports media reflected to some degree the attitudes of the public, but not completely. You know, the Toronto Star at the time, which published Lou Marsh's columns, was very, you know, the Joseph Atkinson principles and a very progressive newspaper. I would hate for someone to go back into my columns from 25 years ago and say, he said this, he said that he was wrong. What an idiot.

On the other hand, I'm accountable for things that I've written and things that I've said. And we, what we've got to try to do is go back and take a historical figure and try to see and hold them accountable. And if it's, and, and, you know, I mean, Mark Sauer obviously made his decision based on the evidence he's been presented with. Um, we're going to try to go a little deeper. No, uh, glad to hear it. Glad to to hear it and because i got a bunch more questions for you and i want to give you a few gifts now before we get you know too deep here uh i want to

give you something that it's a brand new gift so you haven't received this your first four times here but you see that like uh the light brown box between the beer and the yeah okay there you go that my friend damien cox that is uh a wireless speaker for you so you can play your cold play on that um and your your bruce springsteen so why did i give you a wireless speaker that is uh branded uh from manaris i'm giving it to you because the yes we are open podcast hosted by fotm al grego who's actually going to be here later this week to kick out some jams, is what you're going to listen to on that wireless speaker.

So Al travels the country interviewing small Canadian businesses, and then he tells the story of their origins, struggles, and future outlook. If you're a small business owner or an entrepreneur like myself, you'll find the podcast both helpful and motivational. So you can listen to Yes, We Are Open wherever you get your podcasts.

Go to yesweareopenpodcast.com for the subscription links. And enjoy your Moneris-branded Bluetooth speaker there, buddy. I will. Thank you very much. That's a really nice gift. Yeah, and there's more. You ready? You want more?

You want more? Okay, this is awesome, too. You didn't get this last time you were here. Chef Drop. So if you go to chefdrop.ca, you can pick these fantastic meals from chefs you know and fantastic restaurants in the cities. These prepared meal kits that get shipped right to your door if you live in southern Ontario, which you do. So what am I giving you, buddy?

I'm giving you $75 to spend at ChefDrop.ca. No, you're not. I'm giving it to you. No strings attached so i'm going to send you an email and you can redeem your 75 digital gift card chef drop.ca but for the listeners this is actually a kick kick-ass deal too you get uh fifty dollars off your first order if you spend a hundred dollars or more if you use the promo code FOTM50 FOTM50 go to chefdrop.ca make that happen. Let them know that it

makes sense to fuel the real talk on Toronto Mike. In my freezer, buddy, I got a large meat lasagna for you from Palma Pasta. Oh, the one you gave me last time was unbelievable. Peter Gross says he's never had a better lasagna. He's always at my door.

He's at my door every couple of weeks for a new one. My wife said, when are you going back? Well, that's why you're here, I think. Every couple of years. And it's in my freezer right now. Don't leave without it. Thank you, Palma Pasta. And it is the best lasagna you can buy in a store.

That's for sure. There's a six pack of fresh craft beer from Great Lakes Brewery there. One day I'm going to get you to a TMLX event on the patio of Great Lakes Beer. It's practically in your backyard. Come on. Yeah, well, it just never seems to work. Have you finished your thing?

Because I want to tell you a quick story. All right, one last thing I'll give you. You don't have to give me anything. Well, there's a Toronto Mike sticker. I'm hoping you'll slap it on the back of your car. That comes from stickeru.com. I don't know if I'll put it on my car. I'll figure somewhere.

What if I put it on my golf bag and then people will ask me about it? Then you can tweet a picture of that. It would be an honor to be on your golf bag. Okay, let me work on that. I was just going to tell you that in the early 90s, when you would do radio shows, often for other NHL teams, you would get gifts. And the one I always remember is going and doing the radio show in Boston.

And Johnny Busick, the great Johnny Busick, was at that time the color analyst for their radio broadcast and their traveling secretary. Boston was one cheap organization. And what you would get from Johnny was, when you came on, you would get shirts, dress shirts. And they would go in, they'd measure you, and they'd send you dress shirts.

And I got cowboy boots from one show I did in Dallas. And then it all ended abruptly. And now you go on almost any radio show, you get jack shit. But not here. Special shout out to Hamiltonian Tom Wilson. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because Tom, he came over.

He got the lasagna. He wrote me. He goes, Mike. He goes, Mike, I do these CBC shows. No, no. He said, Mike. Yeah, I can't do it. I can't do it.

Maybe you can do it. He goes really low. Mike. I do these CBC. By the way, listen to his episode for the story about Bruce Springsteen's tits. That's the name of his story at Massey Hall. Check it out. Shout out to the Massey Hall episode we did last week too.

So where am I going with this? So he has this lasagna and his wife, and they love this palm of pasta lasagna. He can't believe he got this large. That feeds a lot of people. Large lasagna from palm of pasta just for coming on my show. He goes, and I can't do his voice, but like,

I do these CBC shows. I do these CBC shows. He goes, I don't get anything. In this Canadian media landscape, he says, no one gives you anything. He says,

he couldn't believe he had this large lasagna for doing this podcast. So there you go. I would say that what Tom says, well, Tom speaks the truth. Tom's the best. But it's true and it's unfortunate,

but it's also ungrateful. And you're very nice to do these things. You don't need to. I would come over here for nothing. Wow. Just to let you read me questions of people crapping all over me. Yeah, some of them are positive. Here's one questions of people crapping all over. Yeah, some of them are positive.

Here's one that's not crapping on you. Cam says, what was his relationship like with the late Don Dawson at McMaster? I saw Damien do a guest lecture in my economics professional sports class in the late 90s. Topic was the future of the NHL in Canada post-Quebec City and Winnipeg leaving. From what I recall, Damien and Don seemed like pals. Yeah, I mean, we knew each other, and we knew each other through that, and I think Don played a little hockey.

I think I met Don, if I recall, through Stephen Brunt. Hey! Shout out to Hamiltonian Stephen Brunt. And I was a Mac grad, and so I ended up going in and speaking to the class, and Don was a great guy, a fine gentleman. So, yeah, it was sad for him. I still like doing those things every once in a while.

Right. In fact, I'm a little annoyed with myself because John Shannon teaches down at the Toronto Sports Media School. Yeah, the one that, yeah, I know it. And he said to me, we're having dinner. You would love this. This is what you should record. Tell me.

Every once in a while, I have dinner with Dave Hodge, John Shannon, Steven Brun. And we go to the same restaurant in Oakville. And you can imagine the conversation. Yeah, it'd be fantastic. And it really is. And John said to me, and I i said how's that going he goes you want to come down and talk to a class and i said no that's when i am grumpy right and then i

thought why are you being such a jerk of course i would and in fact i'm doing something with some ryerson students later today i think soon to be renamed when you say you know or you we were talking a little bit what are you doing what do you want to do? Yeah. I'm going to do some academic work, not related to sport. But I would have liked to have got maybe involved in teaching at one of the colleges or one of the schools, but it hasn't been in the cards. So you mentioned John Shannon. So I also previously mentioned that Dave Hodge had this event,

The Reporters. So The also previously mentioned that Dave Hodge had this event, The Reporters. So The Reporters Live at Paradise Theatre. So John's at this event because, of course, he's friends with Dave Hodge, as you just mentioned. So I go up to introduce him. He's sitting with Dave Perkins. Who's there? Scott Morrison and Dave Perkins are there. And they both were kind of chatting me up because they had these great experiences on Toronto Mic.

Because most people have a pretty damn good experience on Toronto Mike and John's there and I think Dave says something like John you should do Toronto Mike and I said yeah John I'd be happy I'd love to have you on Toronto Mike first I need to talk to him about the pen flip like I need to finish my my story there anyway John says something like to the effect of I'm going to paraphrase but something like I don't do podcasts so fast forward like I don't know six months So fast forward, like, I don't know, six months. He's doing a podcast. Maybe he's saying he doesn't do things for free. I don't know.

You'd love to have, John would have such great stories. Yeah, but he said no. And you know what it's like when someone says no, you know, you sort of stop asking them. Yeah. You don't want to be that guy. Like, you can't take a hint. Well, I mean, you know, it's an interesting question

as to exactly what this is you do. I'm listening. I am. Well, let me. I'm a fan. I'm a fan of the format. I'm a fan of sort of, I have no idea how long this conversation is going to go or what we're going to talk about.

Right. But it is a conversation as opposed to you pounding me with questions. We have a conversation. And I don't know how many people do this. I don't know if anybody does this. So for me to come over here and sit in the backyard and chat with you about sports media or life or being divorced parents or music or all those sorts of stuff i mean you and i aren't pals but i you know i enjoy

i enjoy chatting with you and so i i i'm not i don't i don't know why john wouldn't want to do this because john is among the most sociable friendly people i know and keep in mind he's with dave perkins and Scott Morrison who are both saying, we did it and we loved it. I'm amazed you got Perky in here. That's impressive. He came in,

I actually had, so you know how I said, I'm going to put you back together with Gord Stelic on Toronto Mike, then I'm going to get Leo and Rod back together and I have these ideas. I had this idea once, I had Bob Elliott on

and he told these great stories with that voice he's got. What a voice. And Perkins had great stories. Yep. And I'm on a bike ride. This is where all my ideas come from. I'm on a bike ride.

I'm like, hey, I could put them on together. This was the idea. I'm like, why can't I? So I reach out to one and he's like, yeah, we're buds. Bottom line is I put it together. They come at the same time. They sit at the table with me, these two guys. I just try to shut up for 90 minutes or two hours

while they tell these fantastic stories. You know what that's called? Being a good host. It was really selfish. I just wanted to hear Perkins and Elliot talk about baseball. I'm serious. Let them talk. Oh, yeah.

No one wants to hear me if you got... Well, and those guys have great stories. I worked very... Well, Dave was my boss for a while. Right. And I never worked that closely with Bob Elliot my boss for a while, and I never worked that closely with Bob Elliott, but what a gentleman. Holy smokes. And he brought

this, so the first time he came over, he was solo venture, and Bob Elliott's got a couple of Diet Cokes in his hand at the door, okay? So my brain thinks, what a nice guy. He brought me a Diet Coke, right? So we go down to the whatever, and they're both for him! So he downs these two Diet Cokes during the episode, which is fine.

But it's just my thought was, oh, what a nice guy. He brought me a Diet Coke. Here's one for him, one for me. But no, it was two for Bob Elliott. But yeah, so okay, so how did we get there? Oh, yeah, so Perkins was telling. So Shannon, if you're listening, and I did reach out once, and once I realized he didn't want to try to mic.

So I don't want to bug him and ask him again. But I'm putting together this Pen Flip anthology. Basically, it's a Pen Flip episode with various people talking about the Pen Flip, from Ron McLean to Ken Daniels to Paul Romanuk. I have a bunch of people who have an interesting perspective on where they were when that happened. And Dave Hodge, of course, as well, who was also there, you might have heard. So Pen Flip is happening. I realized John Shannon was there.

What a great idea for sure. Yeah. And I realized I need, he's the missing link. Like I need the John Shannon and I actually write him a note and say, look, you don't have to come on and clearly he doesn't want to do the Toronto Mike thing like you're doing right now

where you sit and we talk for like 90 minutes or whatever. So I'm like, what if we did a Zoom where all I asked you about was the pen flip, just the pen flip. No thanks. No thanks. He's fucked up my pen flip thing. And it's like, what the hell?

So anyway, I got to, obviously I have a... I don't know why. I'll ask him if you want. But the next thing, because... I want to know if you're going to do the pen flip episode. When are you going to do the passion returns episode it's maybe it's gonna happen yeah it might it might end up happening you'd be that you'd be on

that one for sure you need mark I did a Harold Ballard similar thing a hero I call the micumentaries although I haven't even really you know interesting so I did the Harold Ballard one unbelievable because it's deluxe yeah you're on there all these great stories about the Ballard.

You know who came over just since you were last here? Hunter and Ormsby. Oh, yeah. Two of the greats. Yeah, and we got some great Ballard stories there too. But okay, I digress. So that's coming soon, the pen flip thing. And obviously I'm pissed off that Shannon won't talk to me

about the freaking pen flip. But I got to talk to somebody about that. Okay, so Mike Rogotsky. Could you ask Damien what he thinks of the new fan 590 lineup since he was such a big part of it for so long? Can it ever get back to the power and reach that it had? Are you even aware of what's going on right now on 590? I'm generally aware,

but I don't listen to sports radio much anymore. And I think the answer is no. And I think that has to do with radio and what's happened to radio. And I know they're trying some different things. I know they've got some good people there. But it was, you know, think ray sports radio was at its height when people were in their cars first of all definitely but also when i mean i remember thinking i gotta flip on the radio i gotta get in the car so what's happened today and you don't need that anymore so then it relies totally on the

entertainment value of the broadcasters and in my opinion, and McCown was probably the last one of the really entertaining guys. Don't hate me, Stephen Brunt, because I know you're still on. And I think Jeff Blair is a pretty entertaining guy. But a lot of it is just boring. Well, the milquetoast safeness we referred to earlier. Right, and so why would I tune in? And if I do want to tune in to something, I'm going to tune in

probably to a podcast. I listen to yours, I listen to Revisionist History a lot, I listen to... What's the one that Jason Bateman does? I've listened to that. My problem with that one, which is extremely popular and he's making a lot more money than i am okay smartless it's called smartless very safe too they're doing a show at massey hall i believe it and i believe they'll

do very well for themselves but very safe if you i i prefer the gilbert godfrey podcast it's far more interesting to me i will listen to so i heard i saw like what dropped there i think it's a seinfeld so i will pop in and see like how seinfeld is on smart list but i also know we're not going to get any real talk on this show this is a very they avoid anything that's sort of anything political yeah it's it's about it's about their relationship really between those safe stuff and so i find it i mean the guests are massive. Jason Bateman does make me laugh. So Bateman and the Canadian, of course. Will. Will Arnett. And then the other guy, I don't know who the other guy is.

He's from Will and Grace. Oh, see, I didn't ever watch that show. Sean Hayes. I didn't watch it either, but he's from Will and Grace. But yeah, Smart List is a big success story. But okay, so. So I don't think sports radio is coming back. Is it Bluetooth's fault?

Like, you got the Bluetooth speaker now. I feel like you're right. AM radio particularly, but radio, uh, traffic jam was the best friend radio ever had, you know? And,

and, and prior to the, I would say Bluetooth becoming like omnipresent, like even people like, you know how to use her Bluetooth in their car. No offense, but I feel like now that people realize, Oh,

I can press a button on my phone and listen to SmartList with Jerry Seinfeld instead of this long commercial break on 590 or whatever, I feel like that's really the biggest thing is that there's so much great content to stream once you're able to easily stream in the car. Well, that is true. And I think there's just been such a huge,

I remember, you know, going back to Angelo Mosca, I remember sitting in the backyard of friends' houses listening to Tiger Cat games on the radio with Purse Allen. And because that was the world. Right. You know, you couldn't just turn on the television. You couldn't just turn. Now you can turn on your phone and watch the world. Right. You know, you couldn't just turn on the television. You couldn't just turn, now you can turn on your phone

and watch the game. Right. Or, so I just think for sports radio, unless they come up with a different formula, I know the guys at TSN

and their drive show, I think they're having some success, but the numbers aren't anywhere close, I don't think, to what they were doing, you know,

with primetime sports during its big day. Oh, no, no, no. And it's a subset of a shrinking pie. So if you're talking share of a shrinking pie. Exactly right. And that's why the way I look at it now, when I look at the new Fan 590 model, I think this is probably the right way to go in 2021, is that it's really just a bunch of podcasts that record live on the radio.

Yeah, and that's what they seem to be trying to reinvent it as and try to get you to understand it as. And maybe that'll help, but in terms of, like there was an immediacy about it, right? Something would happen, it would break, we'd all turn to Macallan or whatever, or when Shulman was in the afternoon or that. And now, I mean, what would you do?

You tell me. If I said to you right now, Connor McDavid just got traded to Pittsburgh. Yeah, I'd be on Twitter. Where would you go? Twitter. Or you'd turn on your television. Right, sure, of course, yes.

Would you turn on the radio? Would you turn on the radio? No, no, no. And let me ask you this. Maybe you know this. Go ahead. Who would be on the radio on 10.50 or 14.30 right now? Or no, 14.30.

5.90. Dating yourself, Mr. Cox. Hopefully Brunt, to be honest. No, but is he on at this time of day? No, you're right. He's not on at this time of day. So who would be on? It would probably be a Raptors show with William Liu or something like that.

Yeah, right, right. So I think we're kind of demonstrating the point here as to why it's lost its place. Let's go back to primetime sports because Brian Hutton's question is basically asking you, and this has been covered on previous episodes of Toronto Mike, so you don't have to go too deep, but he wants to know what your memories are working on primetime sports and I will say I do remember that being stuck in being in a car because I used to commute to work

this is going way back now because it's been a long time but I would commute to work and I'd be in my car and the big sports story of the day I would look forward to hearing what you know what Damien Cox and Bob McCowan say about this on primetime sports like I definitely would tune in to 590 and listen to you guys talk about the big sports story of the day.

It's almost like a quaint story of bygone era or something, but what would you say to Brian who's wondering what your memories are of working on Primetime Sports with Bob McCowan? I'm mostly good. Some love, hate. The way it worked was I did the show with Gord, and then something happened. I can't remember how it worked. And then I was doing a weekly show of a group of people,

which was like a weekly roundtable. This is a bit of esoteric trivia for you. Okay, I'm ready. And the name of the show was? Once a week for about a it was called the cutting edge okay the cutting edge which is and bob used to refer to the cutting edge as primetime sports without the listeners so we were doing a round table every week and then, like the 1979 NHL merger,

it got folded into primetime sports. But I was the co-host of primetime sports on three different occasions. Okay. And so we'd work together for a couple of years. It would get nasty and ugly. And then we'd stop. And then I'd end up coming back.

So it was always a love-hate thing. It's hard to work that close with people. um it's hard to work that close with some with people and it's hard to work with that close with bob um i think if i was to be honest i think bob gets bored of people i think he or or he gets a new shiny something that uh person who he thinks oh that's who i've got to have like at one point it was Butch Carter. At one point it was, what's the name of the guy who just got, he was working there for a while, the American guy. Oh, Richard Deitch. Richard Deitch.

So he was the apple of Bob's eye for a while. And so you'd be there and then you'd end up sort of getting rinsed out and then you'd end up coming back. Well, you know, I think you're the general, are you the guy who recommended to me in the first place I should talk to this guy named gear joyce is that you i don't know but gear's a pal of mine it might have been you uh because gear flies under the radar but i reached out and we've been he's been a great fotm but you got to hear his story about

bob mccowan uh you got to just get here but there's a long list of guys like gear joyce and i'm thinking david schultz is another one. Basically, they would refer to it as they go into a book of some sorts, like a banned book. I'm not sure. But there were always definitely people that Bob wouldn't want on. Well, Wilner was never on, and that was a noticeable...

I don't think Bob admired his work. Jerry Howarth is another one. If you notice, even on his farewell tour, which was all over the Rogers landscape, it even made its way to my

basement. Noticable absence was that, you know, Jerry never did primetime sports during that

farewell tour. Yeah, and why Bob decides he likes you or doesn't like you or whatever is,

I can't tell you. You know, I mean, people still say, how's Bob? And my answer is i have no idea i mean the last time i talked to bob was on his his podcast his podcast and that was probably you know so i think people make the mistake sometime of thinking if you work with someone

in broadcasting your pals forever it doesn't work that way and it's funny that we're talking about this and we've been you know your buddy your buddy, uh, Steven Brunt, cause Brunt came on this show to say that, uh, you know, he's, he, you know, he was,

he, cause he was, uh, no longer the primetime sports co-host sort of like yourself there. And he announced that, you know, he's done with Bob, like it's never going to happen.

And then I think I pulled the clip because of course a press release eventually comes out that, uh, the new co-host of Primetime Sports is Stephen Brunt again. Well, Stephen and I a lot of our paths kind of crisscrossed along the

way. I will say on a few occasions like I've talked to you about how much I enjoyed doing radio with Gord Stelic. On a few occasions that we did roundtables and it was me and Bob and Stephen Brunt and it might have been one, maybe a Shannon,

maybe somebody else, whoever it was, I always thought that was excellent radio. And one of my regrets is that I probably didn't get a chance to work with Stephen as much as I would have liked. And I, you know, to me, you know, well, here's a little story for you. When TSN was starting up sports radio, that was when I was in, did I tell you the story about how I ended up leaving TSN to go to Sportsnet and all that sort of stuff?

Anyways, at that time, part of the deal was I was going to be the host of the Drive show on the new sports radio, 1050. This is where Jim Van... No, yeah, right. This is 1050. You're right. This is not the team. Although there is an episode, but speaking of the Mikeumentaries, there's a great one on the team, 1050.

You should check out. That came out a couple months ago. Please, yeah. And so I was going to do that and it obviously didn't end up happening i went to sports net and blah blah blah right um but i really think there was an opportunity at one point i can't remember when that steven and i i thought it would have been a great opportunity for me to host and for him to co-host i think we could have done a great show and it never happened yeah you it would be very interesting for sure uh i'm trying to this

question's a bit heavy but uh you can answer it as you wish i don't think you'll be shy or afraid of the question but uh the question comes from caring for others that's the handle caring for others and it's just how many rumors of sexual assault and hockey did he help cover up to protect his access now i think this is a bigger question about i mean did i cover yeah this is the specific question yeah so i think this though speaks to the fact that um like people must have known about the sexual assault with the black hawks um video i can't remember his title but the videographer whatever and uh people again we didn't hear about it till recently like i guess can you speak to will people who and again again

a quick tangent is that we talked earlier about betman and why did ron mclean not ask betman about the question that you know and and we know because rick westhead wasn't called upon in that press conference that betman held on this topic until until somebody called him out on not calling on Westhead. And I was starting hearing from other journalists who were saying, this is the Bettman move. He'll freeze you out. Yeah, he did that to me once. So you will be hesitant to be critical because then you lose your access. So have you ever buried a story to preserve your access?

Boy, have I ever buried a story? I can't think of one, but I think sometimes it became more of a question of emphasis, but not over something like sexual assault yeah nothing that's serious right no i mean nothing nothing like that i would say to your questioner i'm mildly hearing for others mildly insulted by the question but that's okay um right first of all as it applies to the to the to the chicago blackhawks thing, I would actually be surprised if any of the guys covering the team knew anything because access to the team and players

has been so strangled and suffocated in the past 15 years. You're not anywhere near where it was. Like when I first started covering the Leafs, I would stand in the stick room with Ally Afraidy as he lit his cigarettes with a blowtorch

and did his sticks. I'd be in the room. Right. Right. That's not the way it works anymore. Is that a COVID thing or is that?

No, that started, that's a Batman thing and that's a control the message and it's also a new buildings thing because new buildings,

all the new arenas came with more walls and more rooms right better security um so um i mean i was around my early early years covering the leaves was probably in the last years of the garden sex scandal. Right. And I can tell you, I knew there were some of those guys. I didn't know Stuckless, but I knew the usher. What's his name? Robe? Robey. John Paul Robey.

I knew him. And they were odd, odd fellows. There were lots of odd people working around the gardens. But I didn't know anything about anything. No one did. No one I've ever known said, oh yeah, we knew something was going on and nothing was being done.

So I think your questioner overestimates the access that people have to these athletes. Right. And, right. Okay, let me turn the channel a bit. Barrage Dave wants to know, which team is most likely to win the next big championship in Toronto?

Does the CFL, does the Grey Cup still count as a big championship? Let's say it does not count, just for the purposes of this question. You're talking World Series, NBA Championship, or Stanley Cup? Right. Stanley Cup. I agree with you. Oh, actually, you know what? I'm not sure I agree with you.

I think the next one would be more likely to be the Blue Jays. That's how I feel. I feel like we— It's tough playing in the American League, Eastman. I know. But if you can get in... They can't even get in the playoffs. Well, I know, but you're...

Yeah, I know. I know. And you could write... Your next book could be about how the Leafs haven't won a playoff round since 2004 when my oldest, who loves hockey, was too young to remember. He was two years old when that happened.

And I find that difficult to believe that my almost 20-year-old has zero memory of a round. Forget winning a Stanley Cup, which I have, of course, no memory of. No memory of winning a Stanley, a round, not even a play-in, like a best of five against Columbus. Like there's no playoff success to speak of since 2004. I know, it's quite incredible.

Quite incredible. Okay. We're winding down here. You've been amazing. I could do this for hours. Easy to talk to you. But I just want to say you mentioned The Edge. What was the name of that?

The Cutting Edge. That was the name. The Cutting Edge. I should have gotten t-shirts printed. So there's a podcast called this. Primetime sports without the listeners. There's a podcast called The CEO Edge. It's from McKay CEO Forums.

And I post the latest episode on torontomic.com every week. And I would like to urge people to subscribe and listen to The CEO Edge podcast. You are an empire. I'm an empire. A burgeoning empire. An burgeoning empire. Ridley Funeral Home have been fantastic supporters of this show. They helped to fuel the real talk

and they're actually in this hood here 14th and Lakeshore so I just want to thank Brad and the gang from Ridley Funeral Home for their awesome support and last but not least Mike Majeski of Remax Specialist Majeski Group you can reach out to Mike

if you're looking to buy and or sell in the next six months. Go to realestatelove.ca. Let him know Toronto Mike sent you. He's the guy who showed up at the last Toronto Mike listener experience at Great Lakes Brewery and bought 40 beers for the crowd.

He made a lot of friends that day. Reach out to Mike. He's a good egg. He's a good egg. Winding down here, because otherwise you might as well just move in here. I'm going to ask you another question. Mike Lynch says, of all the different roles you've had in sports media, he says print, radio, TV.

Some of these questions are pretty good, by the way. Yeah. I did delete 95% of the, why is Damo such an ass on Twitter? Because that was a lot of, too many of those. You know what you should say to those people? What would you, you can say it yourself right now. What would you say to those people?

Why don't you meet me and then decide if I'm an asshole? Yeah. I'll let people know. We'll have a little event here. Meet Damian event. Well, I'll try to make it to your next. Toronto Mike listener experience? Yeah, I'll try.

You'd love it. You'd love it, man. man uh so okay so of all the different roles you've had which one was your favorite and which one was the most challenging so print i guess this is what do you prefer print radio or tv what's your favorite and then which one is the most challenging well i'm a print guy but i loved radio but i mean mean, I loved being, I would say between, particularly between the years, late nineties to about 2010. So how about like 98, 97, 98 to about,

to the Vancouver Olympics. Okay. Being a, being the, the, the hockey columnist for the Toronto star was fantastic. It really was a fantastic gig in many ways so i loved that um and the other this other one will be will surprise you okay a little bit

um i got to when i went when i left tsn and went to sportsnet i remember the milliere. What an idiot that guy was saying. Because I was saying, oh, maybe as part of my new job, Mark, if we could do some if I stay at TSN, maybe we could do some tennis because I was really into tennis. And he said, we will never cover tennis on this network. Well, meanwhile, they have all the majors now. And so he's a real visionary. Right. I got a tennis question for you next too i got to work on my first major tennis thing well no i got to go to wimbledon for 10 years i went to tel aviv to cover um canada davis cup and i got to work on a number of davis cup broadcasts when canada got rolling i got to work with a number of Davis Cup broadcasts when Canada got rolling I got to work

with Brad Fay Robert Bettauer Arash Madani Rob Falds and we traveled and we went places and it was so much fun working with those guys and doing those broadcasts that that would be right up there with my great experiences. Here's a question. I'm going to read verbatim from Viraj Dave again because it's about tennis. And I don't personally agree with this, but we'll see what your take is on it because you know your tennis.

He says, is there a problem with Tennis Canada? We have our stars, but after their big shining moment, they fall off a bit. And he says examples are Jeannie, Ranich, and Bianca to an extent. What do you say about that? I guess Jeannie's definitely, that happened with Jeannie, but I don't know if you can put that on Tennis Canada. But what do you say to Garage, Dave?

Well, I'd say all three of those stories, to a greater or lesser degree, are about injuries. So I don't think you can put that on Tennis Canada. I think those have been talented players who ran into injuries and really haven't been able to do what they might have been able to do. But it also shows you how great the great players are, whether it's Federer or Djokovic or Serena. They're able to stay healthy and play a lot.

So I don't think it's anything about Tennis Canada. Tennis Canada is really, I mean, the players that he, I wonder if this fellow who's asking the question, remember what it was like during the 80s and 90s when we had nobody. No. And now we've got a grand slam winner in bianca we've got three men in the i think i think roundage is still in the top 30 or

40 anyways but two men in the top 20 it is remarkable the success that tennis canada's had oh without a doubt and i grew up in that era. There was nothing. Andrew Schneider, you know what I mean? Yeah. No, I mean, there really was. And now, and by the way, now, I'm starting to get the same feel about the Canadian National Men's Soccer Team. And they got those big two games

that's coming this weekend. Right. And I feel like after a generation of nothing happening, they now are really exciting to watch and they've got a chance anyways to get to the next World Cup. And I think they might be able to do

what Tennis Canada has been able to do. And they might be able to follow in the footsteps of our incredible women. WMM says, I believe he covered the Leafs in the Ballard era. Apparently, Harold would accompany the team on the road a lot. We've heard a lot of Maple Leaf Garden stories, but are there any good Harold stories from the road?

I have none because I started covering the Leafs in 89. Right. Too old. And Ballard died the next spring. I only actually really spoke to him once. Of course, Merrick will tell you because it's his favorite story. He buried him.

He also worked at Great Lakes Brewery, by the way, for at least a couple of weeks, Jeff Merrick, so he's been around. Okay, I'm going to wrap up here. I would just be curious. I will say that we talked about Jim Houston briefly. There has also been Chris Johnston is no longer with Sportsnet. And of course on the TSN side, Michael Landsberg and Rod Black are a couple of people who are no longer with the firm, as they say. Is this just an overall,

I don't know about the Jim thing, because it sounds like Jim might have actually retired here, but the other gentleman, maybe this is simply cost-cutting maneuvers on the sports media front? I suspect you're right. I think the money is not there the way it was, and thank God it was there for a few years because it was really good. There's a few people making money, it was really good.

There's a, there's a few people making money, but, um, I think a lot of people, um, have been either cut loose or asked to take huge pay cuts. Um, and,

uh, I think that's happened in radio and television at both TSN and sports that the days when they were, I was blessed that they, they actually were competing for me. And, and, you know,

in that situation is when you do well, they don't compete for anybody anymore. The vault is empty. You can't rob the bank now. The vault's empty here. Okay. Very sad. Now, back to Twitter.

This is my question. So I've asked all those other people to go to my questions. And sincerely, I'm asking you this because I watch you. I follow you on Twitter and I enjoy watching the back and forth. But why bother with these trolls? this because I watch I follow you on Twitter and I enjoy watching the back and forth but why bother with these trolls like these people who come at you relentlessly you always subtweet or

reply like you do poke the bear a bit as if possibly this is entertaining for you and maybe it is maybe this is your chance to tell us because I would think is it worth the aggravation it doesn't aggravate me okay so so you'll you know I find it mildly Because I would think, is it worth the aggravation? It doesn't aggravate me. Okay. So you'll, you know.

I find it mildly entertaining. So this is sort of something you'll do while you watch the game or chill out at night watching TV or whatever. Yeah, I mean, look. Yeah. In a perfect world, and if I was a perfect person, I probably would just ignore it all. But this is not a perfect world, and I'm not a perfect person, I probably would just ignore it all. But this is not a perfect world and I'm not a perfect person.

And I find it mildly amusing. And I find it particularly mildly amusing that people think they're getting to you. So it doesn't get to you? No. Because you do take on a lot of hate. I mean, I'm thinking other guys in this market, and we mentioned Wilner a hundred times since the Wilner show, but also guys,

I know you don't love the being compared to the guy, but Steve Simmons would be another one. We're polarizing figures in this marketplace where people just love to hate you. But I think that means you're doing your job. I think when I, let's say with the Leafs, I think I'm getting it about right when half the emails and Twitter saying, why, why do you hate the Leafs?

And the other one half is saying, why do you, why do you, why do you cheer for the Leafs? I think that's, look, I grew up in an environment where I was, you know, I became a columnist and that was to become an opinion maker and i used to tell myself every column say something right don't just wander around and sort of end up and then at the end say well we'll see what happens right i mean that is just crap and there's too much of that crap out there now and right say something and you know what as i would often say to my beloved wife i've i've taken this opinion and it may not be right i'm i'm not infallible and i'm and it's my best take on it at the time or or sometimes it's something that i think people will find an interesting point of view.

And opinions don't, they aren't right or wrong, they're opinions. Yeah. They're not facts. Or it's a different take on it. You know, and people in hockey in particular, because hockey is so conservative, all they want to hear is the same old cliches over and over and over and over. And that's why I think hockey gets itself in trouble, like what we're seeing with what's going on in Chicago and stuff is there's a lot of people wanting to say the same things,

have the same attitudes. I never really fit into that too well. People need to do what I'm going to do. Read a league of our own. The story of the NHL's first all Canadian division. When we take our photo by the, the tree there, I'm going to hold up this book for the camera. And I'm going to hold up my lasagna. Yes, make sure I grab it for you because that's an empty box.

You'll be very disappointed with that. But Damo, we won't wait two weeks to, sorry, two years to do this again. We're going to get you back. I thought this was the wrap-up interview. I thought this was the wrap-up on my career. Yeah, the eulogy. Shout out to Willie Peterholm. No, remember, you're coming back with Gord Stelic.

Oh, with Gord. I'm going to make that happen. This is not a bluff here. You might need more than 90 minutes. That's why I have this big hard drive. I can go as long as I want. Do you know that? I could do five hours of Gord Stelic. We always start off. as I want. Do you know that? I could do five hours of

Gord Stanley. We always start off. Let me see. What time is it? I mean, we always start off saying, I'm thinking it's going to be in... I got to go. I got to get to the dentist. We've been here for two hours. Well, you didn't tell me about the dentist. Then I got to go to the bathroom. Okay, well, I can help you with that. And that brings us

to the end of our 945th show. Congratulations, Mike. Thank of our 945th show. Congratulations, Mike. Thank you, 945. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at TorontoMike. And Damo is at DamoSpin on Twitter. Be prepared to be blocked.

Prepare to be blocked. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer. Chef Drop is at GetChefDrop. Moneris is at Moneris. McKay CEO Forums are at McKay CEO Forums. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. StickerU is at StickerU. Ridley Funeral Home is at Ridley FH.

And Mike Majeski of Remax Specialist Majeski Group. He's at Majeski Group Homes on Instagram. See you all next week. This podcast has been produced by TMDS and accelerated by Roam Phone. Roam Phone brings you the most reliable virtual phone service to run your business and protect your home number from unwanted calls. Visit RoamPhone.ca to get started.