Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Jamie Campbell: Toronto Mike'd #584

Episode Date: February 13, 2020

Mike chats with Sportsnet Blue Jays Central host Jamie Campbell about his love of baseball, calling Jays games, working with Gregg Zaun and Joe Siddall and how close he came to keeping the seagull killed by Dave Winfield.

Welcome to episode 584 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer. Palma Pasta. Enjoy the taste of fresh homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. StickerU.com. Create custom stickers, labels, tattoos, and decals for your home and your business. The Keitner Group. They love helping buyers find their dream home. Text Toronto Mike one word

to 59559. And Banjo Dunk from Whiskey Jack. One of the most celebrated roots country bluegrass bands in Canadian music history. I'm Mike from torontomike.com

and joining me this week is Sportsnet host Oh, i almost got through it without a mistake jamie campbell Welcome, Jamie. Oh, my goodness. That just gave me chills. Me too. Me too. We share something in common right off the bat.

We both loved this week in baseball. Oh, my goodness. You know, I was down in Dunedin for spring training in 2005, and one of the ESPN channels, I guess it must have been ESPN Classic, was playing episodes of This Week in Baseball over and over and over again. Wow. I got no sleep because every time a half-hour version would run out, they'd replay another one. It was magic.

Like, I love that show so much. I'm getting choked up just listening to it. But I loved it so much. And I saw you tweeting about it, like, months ago. And I'm like, I know what I'm playing when Jamie gets here. Oh, I'm glad somebody understands. playing when Jamie gets here. I'm glad somebody understands.

Because people who are a lot younger than you and I would never know that you just couldn't see the games as often as you do now. You can watch any game you want now. You can see the highlights over and over and over again on your mobile device,

on your television, however you choose. But back then, seeing this week in baseball was the first time you would see that game between the White Sox and the A's. Right. Or the highlights of that game between the Mets and the Cardinals.

That was the first time. And if you wanted to see, you know, Ozzie Smith. Yes. Yes. Doing a backflip. That was the way. So, yeah, fond memories. Now, you've been doing this thing onflip. That was the way.

Yeah, fond memories. Now, you've been doing this thing on Twitter here. Somebody brought it up. I was going to ask you about it anyways, but Mike Grigotsky says, can you ask Jamie how he came up with the daily card tweets? It's a neat idea, and it's a good hashtag to follow. I've been enjoying it too. Oh, good. Yeah, so is that just your personal collection?

I've been enjoying it too. Oh, good. Yeah, so is that just your personal collection? Yeah, sometime in November, I think, I realized that now that the season was over, I needed to keep myself busy. I do have two kids, so I am a busy man anyway, but how do I maintain a winter-long love of baseball when there's no baseball being

played. And I was down in my basement, much like we are here in yours, right? Flipping through my extensive, um, obsessed, driven collection of autographed cards.

And I thought, well, maybe I should share some of these with people that follow me on Twitter because I've never shown anybody, unless you come into my home, you'll never know that they exist. And I spent so many years collecting these personally from, from major league players.

I thought maybe I'll share some of these. And it's been so much fun to post one every morning. So who's the biggest, biggest dink that you had, you ever, you know, tried to get an autograph out of and just wasn't very kind. Probably Jim Rice,

the most valuable player in the American league in 1978, hall of famer got in on his, on his final year on the ballot. That said, he did autograph the cards that I had asked him to autograph at some point. It's just on one particular day, I caught him on a bad day, and he told me to F off.

And I think I was about 14 years old at the time, and to have one of the great players of the time tell you to F off in the lobby of what was then the Hotel Toronto at Richmond and University was jarring. I would say having an adult tell a 14-year-old to F off. Forget the fact he's a ball player and the fans pay a salary, as they say.

But that's not a nice move. That's kind of a dick move. But who's, I mean, it's going to be tough for you to pick one, but like who would be the nicest professional athlete back in the day you would get an autograph from? Or who's the most accommodating, sweetest? Or is it a tie? Well, the first person that comes to mind

is the late Dan Quisenberry. Do you remember Dan Quisenberry? Yeah, he's a Marine, delivery of Kansas City. Are you kidding me? He won the Rolaids Relief Man Award, as I recall. Yes, he did. He was exceptional. I used to collect those sticker books. It was less about

the signatures that I was able to acquire in cases like the quiz and more about whenever the Royals would come to town, I would always sit behind the visiting bullpen and have conversations in game with a lot of these players. And Quisenberry was always so welcoming and it got to the point where he

remembered my name, which I just found, I found, um, completely enlivening because I was so awestruck. I was the kid who watched this week in baseball, right? I mean,

I remember very well because he seemed unhittable. Like there was a period of time there whenever the Jays would, you know, whenever we were facing Quisenberry, just that submarine that just seemed unhittable. Like there was a period of time there whenever the Jays would, you know, whenever we were facing Quisenberry, just that submarine that just seemed unhittable. It did. Yeah. He was remarkable. And then you'll remember this name, Dennis Oil Can Boy.

Of course. Of course. He used to lick his fingers or whatever on the mound. Yeah. And Oil Can would leave me tickets. Wow. Most times when the Red Sox came to town. And I'll never forget one time I saw him

prior to the game on a Friday. It was a three-game weekend series. And he said, I'll leave you a pair. Wow. And I got to the stadium and realized he'd left me a pair for all three games, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. So I'll never forget going home after the Friday night game

and waking up Saturday morning and saying, Hey, Dad, do you want to go to the ball game today? And he said, I don't know if I have the money. My dad didn't make a ton. He was a hard worker, but he didn't make a truckload of money. And I said, No, no, my treat. I've got tickets for the game. He said, How did you get tickets of money. And I said, no, no, my treat. I've got tickets for the, he said, how did you get tickets for the game?

I said, Oil Can left them for me. I mean, that's amazing. And he was blown away by that. He thought, well, we're going to the game today, and you're taking, I think I was like 15 years old. And they were probably good seats, right? Excellent seats, yeah. Yeah, at Exhibition Stadium. It's funny that Oil Can Boyd and Jim Rice played together, right?

They were on the same team. They did, yeah. It's funny that oil can boyd and jim rice played together right they were on the same team yeah it's funny uh amazing and anytime by the way you want to sprinkle in a nostalgic story because hearing these names like quiz and barry and oil can boyd i remember i'm so i i i watched when i could but i listened to tom and jerry you did you know as every night on uh 14 30 you know and then when it moved over to 590 but but I have to fall asleep to those guys and listening to these, about these names. And I love those two.

It's such an honor to have gotten to know them both. Tom, not as well as I know Jerry. Jerry's been in many ways like a mentor to me. Jerry's a good guy. Cause I mean, Tom, we lost him far too soon, sadly. We did. But Jerry is an FOTM. That means Friend of Toronto Mike. He's been on the show. And we were chatting very recently.

In fact, maybe you have an update. What can you tell us about Tony Fernandez's health? Do you know anything? The only thing I know about Tony's health is what I'm seeing along with everybody else on Twitter. And that is that he is at least stable now. I know he's had these issues for some time. Um, but the good news is I think he's passed the worst point from what I know. I saw a tweet from, I don't know if it was his daughter or sister. I can't remember,

but I did see, yeah, I did see that he had, he was responsive and he was, he was improving. So that was good news because it looked pretty dire for a bit there. Oddly, and you'll remember this name, the last conversation I had with Tony Fernandez was actually about the health of Damaso Garcia. I actually... Who has been fighting, it seems, for years, all kinds of various ailments,

including brain cancer, from what I understand. Okay, well, you and I, as you know, he threw out that pitch, that ceremonial first pitch during one of the World Series games. I can't remember if it was 92 or 93. And it really was presented like he wasn't going to be around much longer. Right. Okay. So, I mean, I was a huge Damaso.

I mean, I like these fiery guys like George Bell and Damaso Garcia. These are like a passion in the belly guys. And Damaso loved them. Number seven, second base. see these like a passion in the belly guys and damaso was loved loved him number number seven uh second base and i uh i was basically braced for the fact that damaso was gonna die in the early 90s yes here we are yes i i was told 10 years ago that he was bedridden right so it's unbelievable that he's alive i don't think he's doing particularly well or anything but i mean it's unbelievable that he uh he, he lived this long considering,

uh, yeah. Sad considering if you remember him, he was this, this good looking, you know, he, he had that major league aura about him.

Hard to explain. Yeah. And I had that, uh, all of, uh, complexion. Like he just seemed like a,

like a model or whatever. And, and again, fiery, like, right. He, he's the one who, uh, burned his Jersey model or whatever. And again, fiery, like, right? He's the one who burned his jersey. Oh, yeah. I mean, in FG or whatever.

There were a couple of guys on that team that were. So that's a team, okay. That didn't fall into line. Well, I'm thinking, and you know, we talked about what athletes were dinks. And I have these conversations with people like Mark Hebbshire all the time. And I hear stories about Dave Steeb back when he was a player being a hard ass oh yeah i've heard that well i

mean you saw it too right how many times did you see him turn and stare down somebody and either his infield or outfield who couldn't make a play i mean that was that was clearly him so you had a personal level yes right on a person and i don't know if you ever had a chance to actually get to meet Dave Steve while he was playing. He was a tough one to deal with even if you were just some

14-year-old, eyes wide open fan hanging around by his Honda Civic out in the parking lot of Exhibition Stadium. He was somewhat of a surly individual. Okay, so you got Dave Steves a bit surly, right? You got Damaso Garcia, and you got George Bell on that same team. George, yes.

George gets annoyed because when I was young and would ever approach George Bell, he'd always say the same thing to me, manana, manana. And I was a 14-year-old kid from Oakville. I had no idea what mañana meant. And it occurred to me years later that mañana was Spanish for tomorrow.

Whatever you want, tomorrow. We'll do it later. And to this day, whenever I see George, he just gets tired of me saying mañana to him. The quick story that Dave Perkins told me, he came over with Bob Elliott. This is in, I don't know, winter, I guess. It was December, maybe. But they came on together Perkins told me when he came over with Bob Elliott, like this is in, I don't know what the fall,

uh, winter, I guess it was December maybe, but they came on together and just told me old stories about my old J's teams. And the story that I still find amazing is that when, when Roy Halladay had the no hitter with two outs, uh,

I think it was 98, maybe the last game of 98, maybe it was a Bobby Higginson from the Tigers hits the Homer. Who do you think caught that home run ball that broke up yes in the bullpen remarkable think about that considering how often yeah tomorrow will be perfect for the no hitter thank goodness he got one yeah he did finally get one i was working at the x that day and I didn't get to see it, but I'm glad he got one in Cleveland, right? Yes. Do you remember watching him point to somebody in the

stands? Vaguely. If you've ever seen the video of the final out of Junior Felix catching the ball in right field and then they cut to a close-up of Steve and he's pointing at somebody. He's pointing at a guy

who doesn't live far from me, in fact, by the name of Kevin Boland, who wrote that book. Oh, Tomorrow I'll Be Perfect. Yes. Oh, that's wild. Yes, it was his author who was there, and I guess it was an acknowledgement of,

you know, at some point I will get this. Any relation to Mimico legend Dave Boland. They literally got a memorial for Dave Boland on the wall not too far from here. Really? Yeah. He's a Mimico legend here. Now, okay, so we'll sprinkle this in throughout the chat here today. But yesterday's guest, his name you might be familiar with.

His name is Alan Carter. So, okay, so let me set it up and then you can tell us why you're laughing, which is, so Alan Carter is a news anchor with Global and he's also on Global News Radio 640 and we're chatting and he had seen on Twitter that you were the next guest the next day. And he said, oh, wow. So to give our listeners an idea of what I'm

doing, I'm showing. Here, can you point it at the camera? No, I don't want to. It's private. Okay. I don't know if Here, can you point it at that camera? No, I don't want to. No, it's private, okay. I don't know if I want to post that picture on social media or anywhere, considering that Alan is an esteemed newsman. Oh, yeah, that's fascinating.

He dressed a little differently back then. I see that. I'm going to let him know you showed me that. So Alan reveals you guys were Ryerson classmates? Yes, the graduating class of 1989, yes. That's such a small world. Alan and I partied in university from time to time. Did you know he'd end up an esteemed news anchor in this city?

I had no clue. Back then, I didn't investigate what the ambitions were of everybody else. I was so focused on trying to accomplish what I wanted to do. And to be honest with you, with respect to Alan, I would have imagined him becoming a VJ at Much Music.

I had no idea he aspired to be in news. He did tell me that the CFNY era, the David Marsden spirit of radio, was a big influence on his character and persona. So Alan was part of the graduating class. Tyler Stewart. Right. Yes, Tyler Stewart, who's also been on the show.

So that's three. Now I'm collecting you guys. So the last day of, I'll never forget this, the final day of our tenure there, the day we technically graduated, I had been hired full time at CBC Sports. I was standing out on Yonge Street. And at that time, you're always curious about what your fellow graduates are doing and whether or not they've landed jobs. Right. I'm standing out on Yonge Street and Tyler Stewart comes walking down the street.

And I said, hey, Ty. I said, how are you doing? Have you found work? Right? Because that was the thing that you did back then when you're graduating. And he said, no. He said, but the band's doing well. I said, tell me the name of your band again and I'll come and see you guys play.

And he said, the Bare Naked Ladies. And I remember that name just sticking with me thinking what a crazy name and it'll be so easy to find when i look at now magazine right right when i'm looking for a gig to go see them play that's amazing so he did fairly well and that was a meteoric rise really for bare naked ladies because they they're on speaker's corner doing a bit of yoko ono who's fine and i love speaker's corner, I would catch that clip and then CFNY started playing the mess out of them

and the next thing you know, I remember the cover of the wonderful Bruce Colburn song, Lovers in a Dangerous Time. That's suddenly, much music went, put that on high rotation

and then it's just, they just skyrocketed from there. It's amazing. Did you own the yellow tape? I did not. Well, that's,

I'm going to tell Tyler. Go ahead. Tyler listens to this podcast, so hello to FOTM Tyler not. Well, that's, uh, I'm going to tell Tyler. Go ahead. Tyler listens to this podcast. So hello to FOTM Tyler Stewart. No, no, I'm so proud of Tyler. I've got incriminating photographs of him at parties too, but I just I won't post them. Okay, so before he was able to live off of

Barenaked Lady stuff, he was I know he was working with Super Dave Osborne. Okay, so I know. Bob Einstein, he just recently passed, actually, sadly. But his name was Bob Einstein. And he was like, they were, I think, up in Agincourt, where they do like CTV stuff, as you know, of course. They were filming, I don't know if it was the Super Dave Osborne show.

Maybe it was. But he had a show that was being, and he was, so Tyler Stewart's job was to basically drive Bob Einsteinstein around and help him out a bunch of stuff like seriously so when tyler came on it was shortly after uh super dave died and yeah he i just had him telling me you know bob einstein stories really yeah i had no idea that's why you come on this show jamie i'm gonna figure out by the the way, I asked Alan Carter to name some more famous people that he knew from the class. Can you name some and we'll see if you get...

So Alan Carter, Jamie Campbell, Tyler Stewart. Avery Haynes. Avery Haynes. But Avery never graduated. Avery was so freaking talented that she left about midway through our second year and was hired by CFRB 1010. And we were all blown away that someone,

a station as reputable as CFRB 1010 would come in and take our little Avery away from us. I love Avery Haynes. I'm not ashamed to say that. She's been on the show. She's wonderful. And I mean, I love her sister's band, Metric. You know, there's another guy that I didn't know very well.

The class was about 125, who became a sportscaster. I don't know if I should say his name. Of course you should. How can that be a secret? His name is Steve Vogelsang. So he ended up being a local sports broadcaster in Winnipeg eventually. And I didn't know him that well, so we never stayed in touch with one another. Okay.

But eventually, from what I hear, got arrested for armed bank robbery. That's a desperate time. And I do believe is now incarcerated. Okay. If you can believe that. So they're not all great stories then. Okay. So we got Alan now, Tyler, Avery, Jamie.

Oh, this guy apparently was in the year behind you. But I got to give him a shout out. Dwight Drummond was apparently a year behind you. According to Alan. I don't know if we can trust that. And I feel like Alan would know because as a news anchor, he's monitoring all the Toronto news anchors very closely. And Dwight's one of them.

So on CBC. There were a few people. Anthony Ciuccione, who was the head of the score for a long time, was in my graduating class. He and I did a sports show together. Is that Madonna's last name? I believe it is, yes. Hey, maybe a relation.

Well before me, people like Scott Moore and Keith Pelley. And when I say well, three or four years prior, Joel Darling, I know, was an RTA grad. A lot of people who, names that aren't familiar to a lot of others who listen to this program. Well, here, I'll shout out a couple of RTA grad, a lot of people who, names that aren't familiar to a lot of others. Well, here, I'll shout out a couple of RTA grads a bit behind you, but I will shout out Andrew Stokely, who listeners know,

because Andrew Stokely helped me set up the studio back in the day, and Andrew does work on the Sportsnet Jays games quite often when they're at the Dome. And Rosie, so Rosie, actually, when I first started this little thing several years ago, Rosie was my co-host. And now she's at Your Morning at Bell Media there.

And she was an RTA grad around the same time. So shout out to Stokely and Rosie. Okay. So, okay, I hope Tony's okay because I love Tony Fernandez. And I know you were the MC when he was inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame. In 2008. So how did you get that gig over he was inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame. In 2008. So how did you get that gig over Mike Wilner?

I feel like that's... I kid only because Wilner is my guest tomorrow. Is he coming in tomorrow? Tomorrow, yeah. Nice. He's my Valentine's Day. Why is he not in Dunedin? I know.

He says he's leaving in two weeks or something. Oh, wow. Okay. I'm going on Monday. But why did I do that? They called. The Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame called me and it just so happened

I was at a point in the season where I was not broadcasting the game that day. I was the play-by-play broadcaster for Sportsnet at that time. And for some reason it opened up that the game that day

wasn't a Sportsnet property property so off i went back in the day when they weren't all sports net properties it was excruciatingly hot and we were inside a tent in saint mary's right i remember it well so uh get better tony here you go brent cardi and again uh i'm gonna ask this off the top because we're in the nostalgia vibe here, but Brent Carty just says, it just says this, ask him about Exhibition Stadium. So, I mean, tell me maybe some memory.

Have we got an hour? I'll make time for the Exhibition Stadium talk. I loved it there. So in 1977, my parents moved us from the west side of Oakville to the east side of Oakville, about a 15-minute walk from the GO train station in Oakville. And at the same time, as we know, the Blue Jays came to life in the American League. My dad went to that opening game April 7, 1977.

He comes back with a program, opens up the program and shows me the seating chart to Exhibition Stadium. And this beautiful, there's a picture in the program, which I still have of the stadium empty on this clear sunny day that they'd obviously taken at some point after the construction was completed. And I was completely mesmerized by the prospect of him taking me to a game. The first game he tried to take me to was rained out. It was supposed to be between the Blue Jays and the Red Sox. But finally, in early May of 77, he took me to see a Saturday afternoon game against the Minnesota Twins. And I begged him to take me early so that we could be the first

people through the gate. Wow. And by that time I had become a an obsessed collector of baseball cards so I pretty well knew everybody in the major leagues at that time based on the cards that I was flipping through every night. Right. And we come in the stadium as they open the gates I don't know where my father went because at this point it's, you know, two and a half hours before the first pitch. I ran down to what at the time was a little photo booth beside the Minnesota Twins dugout and sitting there on a stool with his hands behind his head.

Can I guess? Or is this a twin? It's a Minnesota twin. Rod Carew. Not Rod Carew. A guy by the name of Lyman Bostock. I guessed bigger. Okay, yes.

Have you ever heard of Lyman Bostock? No. Okay. So Lyman Bostock at that time was one of the best players in all of the major leagues. And he was sitting there suntanning, or so it looked like. And I was the only person within 100 feet of him.

And I approached him very quietly up against the rail. And he turns and he looks at me. And he says, hey, young man. And I said, hello. And he said, what's your name? I said, my name is Jamie Campbell. He said, I'm Lyman Bostock. Nice to meet you. And he stands up and shakes my hand. Now, Jamie Campbell. He said, I'm Lyman Bostock. Nice to

meet you. And he stands up and shakes my hand. Now you got to understand I was 10, right? I knew who he was because I had his baseball card at home and I was completely mesmerized by the fact that a major league superstar was, was curious about me, had invited me into his world. And it caused me to think days later about where I wanted my life to go. I knew I wanted it to be about this, about big league baseball and about the Blue Jays specifically.

And we had this great conversation. It didn't last that long but he was interested in me and i asked him to sign my program and he was very gracious in doing so and i said you know have a great game today and i wandered off to find my dad or whatever lyman bostock about a year or so later was murdered whoa Whoa. While the then California Angels, he'd signed with the Angels as a free agent. His first two months in the major, or with the Angels on this multi-million dollar deal did not go well.

He went to Gene Autry, the owner of the Angels, and said, I'd like to give back my April salary. Wow. Because I didn't perform up to standard. And Gene Autry said, I won't take your money, but if you want to donate it to charity, you can do that, which he did. Think about that in 2020. That's unfathomable, yeah.

And then he was out with a friend in his hometown of Gary, Indiana. Later that year, when the Angels were visiting Chicago, he was in the backseat of a car, and this deranged man whose wife had jilted him tracked down his wife in the back of a car with Lyman Bostock. It was nothing more than a mistaken identity situation. Wow. And fired a couple of shots through the back of a car

and killed him instantly. Wow. And I was, by that time, he'd become like my favorite player, along with a handful of those original Blue Jays like Bob Baylor and Doug Ault. I was crushed, absolutely crushed. But Lyman Bostock, for him to stand up and acknowledge me and welcome me into his world was a very significant moment in my life. And what it did was, now that I had access to the GO train station,

it caused me to think about how do I make myself part of this world? And it led to, and I don't want to get too deep into this, led to years of me leaving school at a particular time, jumping on a 315 GO train, being at one of two hotels in downtown Toronto and literally sitting in the lobby politely waiting for these players from all these opposing teams to come down and get on the bus and go to Exhibition Stadium. Right.

I got signatures from them on my baseball cards. I got free tickets. They were all American players. They had no friends or relations in Toronto. Right, so an Oil Can Boyd, for example, would have no trouble. He's got nobody else to leave them to. Right. I just had this obsession with it, and it's

one of the reasons why I've got like 3,000 autographed cards at home, right? It became my life, and I'd go and sit by myself. I never went with anybody. I took my dad on occasion when I'd get tickets from somebody, but I loved the game so much. I would go and sit there in the right field seats by myself for days on end and watch baseball

and just try and be part of it. That story you're telling me now reminds me of, in hindsight, it was probably not a very good movie, but I was the right age for this movie and i love this movie tiger town is this disney movie where this kid yeah this kid had his his dad had two tickets to tiger stadium and season tickets and the dad gets sick and then the this roy schneider plays this like roy hobbs type guy anyway anyway i won't do it justice except i was about that age like 10 years old or something and i fell in love love with Tigertown and this whole idea of a kid. He had to go to every game. He was like a good luck charm for the star player and the Tigers were making a run.

It was very natural, like, but for kids. Never seen it. It's called Tigertown. I wonder how it holds up. Now I need to introduce it to my kids. But I love that story. And it's so tragic that the guy, for a moment, you were the primary focus of a major league ball player. Like, I think that's. And it's so tragic that the guy, for a moment, you were the primary focus

of a major league ball player. Like, I think that's magic for a 10. Like, for a brief moment in time, you were the focus. His whole focus was on you. He could have just ignored me. Right. Right.

Most do, but he could have. But he'll never know the impact that that one meeting had on me. And what's fascinating is that this, and it lasted for about eight to 10 years, this obsession I had with getting into Toronto and spending half my day being part of the Blue Jays and Exhibition Stadium and whatever game was going on that day, I ended up meeting a couple of other kids who had this obsession too

in the lobbies of these hotels, one of whom runs a sporting goods store in my neighborhood now. Wow. And we're very good friends. And we used to have this system because we were all kids, right? We didn't have a whole lot of money. I had a paper route. But we really didn't have a whole lot of money. I had a paper route, but we really didn't have a whole lot of money.

Back then, if you walked into Exhibition Stadium, they'd rip your ticket. And then if for some reason you needed to leave, they would poke a small hole in your ticket. Right. You remember this? I do remember this, like a hole punch. So say you left something in your car.

You could go out to your car. You'd hand your ticket to an usher. They'd poke a small hole in it, which says you're allowed to go out and come back in. Well, what we did is the four or five of us would make our way down to the stadium. We'd buy one ticket. The person with the ticket would go in

and go all the way up to the top level. And we found a spot where we could throw the ticket would go in and go all the way up to the top level. And we found a spot where we could throw the ticket. Oh, wow. Out of an opening section of the stadium, and it would flutter down to the guys below. And what you'd do is you'd get it stamped the moment you walked in, and then we'd sort of throw the ticket, the stamp ticket to each other.

That's very clever. And we'd get four kids in on one seat. Did they have the Dominion deal back then? They did, but the Dominion deal was only for the bleachers, right? Yeah, the general admission. And I don't mean this in an arrogant way. I must have gone to a thousand games. I sat in the bleachers one day. Once.

It was with my brother. I'll never forget it because someone threw a hot dog covered in mustard from the upper level of the stadium and landed on his lap and it was against the California Angels. It was the one and only time

I ever sat there because I didn't have access to players out there. You couldn't be close to the players. You're right. You're right. So I always made a point of having to be in the main stadium.

Well, the majority of my visits to Exhibition Stadium, which I loved, were in that Grand Slam because it was a dollar. So they were $2 seats, I think, at the Grand Slam. But they were a buck if you bought them at Dominion, right? Right.

And I mean, I remember if it was a game against, let's say, the Yankees or the Red Sox, I just remember, or no, better, Tigers or Yankees. They'd come over, right? They'd cross the border. Their fans would come over. And I remember fights would always break out. Like, I remember as a kid being met, I thought this was the way it was. Just pockets of fights would break out in the grandstand. And I just figured that's what it's like to go to a ballgame. I haven't seen them fight in a while. That was a crazy, crazy section.

Man, that's crazy. Okay, so, all right. Oh, by the way, just before I forget, because we're talking about this nostalgia, did you ever go to Sluggers? Do you remember Sluggers, the memorabilia shop? Maybe not, it was in... Where was it located?

Either North York or Thorn Hill. I get messed up when we get up there. Did not, I did not. There was one at Bathurst and Eglinton that I used to go to. Okay. Because there's a documentary by my buddy Stu Stone called Jack of All Trades. I've seen it. Okay.

Yeah. Hey, FOTM Stu Stone. And Wilner's in that documentary. Yes, he is. It's really not about card collecting. No, I know. That's the trick here. It's about not about card collecting. No, I know. That's the trick here. It's about his relationship

with his father. Absolutely, right. So I was going to recommend it to you if you hadn't seen it yet. I think I tweeted out a little suggestion to folks who were

as into the craft as I was that they should check it out. It's very good. Because Sluggers was Stu's dad's store. Yes.

So Stu's dad's store. Yes, okay. So Stu Stone, there's your shout out. Everybody who's listening can find it on Netflix, Jack of All Trades. Your dad, Jamie, was the public address announcer for Oakville Blades hockey games. Yes, he was.

What's an Oakville Blade? I have to plead ignorance. It's Junior B. Part of the, and I don't think I'll be able to get the letters correct right now, the Ontario Central Junior B loop. Now I apologize to anybody who plays in the league or follows it. I can't keep up in that respect. But the Oakville Blades have been a junior hockey team for, goodness knows, since the mid-60s. And my dad

was the in- arena public address announcer so as such i always tell people i i fall asleep so easily with noise because my parents and my dad passed about three years ago my mom's doing well and living in milton i i know she won't mind if i admit this but my parents were party animals. So my father, who was the public address announcer for a bunch of 17-year-old hockey players, on Friday nights in Oakville at Old Oakville Arena, which is very close to downtown, we would have to be there, my brother and sister and I,

every Friday night because my dad was the PA announcer and it was the thing to do on Friday nights in Oakville. And we lived in a townhouse in the, um, West end of Oakville near an area called Bronte. And every night after the game, every player and his girlfriend was invited back to our house. Wow.

To spin Peter Frampton records and drink 6,000 beers, right? So my Saturday mornings, unforgettably, were waking up and stepping over 17-year-old junior hockey players who'd passed out on the living room floor to get to my bowl of Shreddies, right? And I used to go to bed at whatever, midnight or 1 o'clock in the morning, listening to like this crazy noises of these teenagers partying with my parents. So, but is it maybe, you know, hearing your dad's voice over this, this might have helped lead you down the path of play by play? All of those things contributed.

They all contributed. And what kind of ball player were you? You played a little. Not a good one. No? No, no. Who's a better ball player, you or Steve Christie?

I would be a better baseball player. He was quite exceptional at soccer and later football. Really? Yeah, he did well. And shockingly, it's funny how guys who reach the high levels of professional athletics seem to be good at everything.

He never played hockey when we were growing up. And then long after he'd become a mainstay in the National Football League, he came home one winter and said, hey, let's go play hockey. And I said, well, one, not a smart move for a guy who uses his right leg for a living. Two, you've never played before. He came out to a game we played in Burlington, a pickup game, and he was incredible.

He couldn't skate to save his life, but his shot was impeccable. His vision of the ice was incredible. And I just thought, wow, I mean, I guess if you play anything at a high level, you can pick up sports quickly. quickly yeah i think a good athlete is a good athlete and they can when yeah once they figure it out you know they always say you know the great one dave winfield i always remember reading the stat on dave when he was uh you know a yankee and i would hear okay dave winfield by the way you witnessed you witnessed the seagull game. Yes, okay.

I sat with the seagull, the corpse, the dead seagull. Okay, tell that real quick and then I'll come back to you. Okay, so the day that Winfield killed the seagull, I was sitting in a front row seat where the Yankee bullpen was and the ball boy who ran out and grabbed the seagull came and put that seagull on the Yankee bench directly in front of me. Wow. While all the Yankee relievers moved to the side to get away from it.

Right. Because he didn't know what to do with it, right? There was no place, there's no garbage can on the field. And being the person, the industrious collector that I was, I literally looked at this thing and thought to myself, and you're going to laugh, I should take this. It was wrapped in a towel. I should take it and put it in my knapsack,

take it home, and find a taxidermist in Oakville and have it stuffed. You know, you should have. Because this might be a collector's item one day. I literally thought that. And I thought, what if I get home? What if I get home and my mom and dad wake up and they find a dead bird in the kitchen in the morning?

What are they going to think? And that's what stopped me from doing that. Any regrets, though? That would have been a pretty cool artifact. Pretty disgusting, though, right? I'm kind of glad I left it alone. That's funny. And just to make sure people know why we're asking about Steve Christie,

not only a teammate, but he's a buddy of yours, right? We've been friends for years. I'll tell you a very quick story. Steve played in two Super Bowls, 27 and 28, lost them both to the Dallas Cowboys. The night before Super Bowl 28, which was played at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta, we're in his room.

He had a contract at that time with Nike, but he didn't like their shoe. So he bought an Italian soccer shoe. I think it was called Diodora. I think Ben Johnson maybe did a campaign for Diodora. So Steve was a graphic artist in college. He bought a black Italian soccer shoe, and the night before the Super Bowl,

he deftly painted a Nike swoosh with white out. You know white out? Of course, a liquid paper. So he put a Nike swoosh on a black Diodora shoe so that he would properly represent Nike in the Super Bowl the next day. He ended up kicking what is still a record 54-yard field goal in that game.

And then the Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio asked for the shoe. Oh. So if you ever get to Canton, Ohio and you can see that shoe, I'm guessing that the whiteout Nike logo was probably chipped away. That's a great story.

By the way, I think it's one of the monkey's moms who invented liquid paper. I have this fact. Come on. Stop. Yeah, I think so. I think Mike Nesmith or something. Really?

Yeah. Jeez, where do you come up with this stuff? I just think it's in there. I hope that's right. Somebody will have to fact check me. But why did I bring up Dave Winfield? I got to close that loop, which is just that I think he was drafted in four leagues. I hope that's right. Somebody will have to fact check me. But why did I bring up Dave Winfield? I got to close that loop, which is just that I think he was drafted

in four leagues, I think, or something. Like NBA, maybe the ABA? Yes. I think. And then Major League Baseball and NFL. Or the Vikings. Right. Which is like a great athlete.

And the Chicago Blackhawks? No. I'm just kidding. That I don't believe is true there. Come on, Jamie. Don't try to fool us. 20 years old, Jamie Campbell gets a job as a librarian and runner for the Hockey Night in Canada archives. And you work with a couple of guys like Ron McLean and Don Cherry.

20 years old. What's that about? I actually tried to get that job when I was 18. The two producers of Hockey Night in Canada at the time, Mark Askin and Steve Lansky, I had somehow found out that they have a position at hockey night in Canada on Saturday nights called a runner. Someone who gets coffee, popcorn run statistics to the commentators.

And while I was in high school, I arranged an interview with those two. I jumped on a go train in the only suit I had and showed up at their office for an interview. And they looked me in the eye and said, we're hate to tell you this, but we don't hire high school students. Can you come back when you're in university? And I said, okay, I will do that. And that's how I got that job. I went back the next year, my first year at Ryerson and, uh, Saturday nights I would spend at Maple Leaf Gardens doing whatever was necessary if if Ron McLean needed statistics I would get them for him if Ron needed coffee or

popcorn or if Dave Hodge needed something on the Wednesday night broadcasts on global which I also worked right I would get anything they needed but the best part of that job was you were responsible in the first intermission for going and getting the guest. So if John Cordick was the guest, you would make sure when he came off the ice, he would follow you into the studio. Wow, like a handler. Yeah, so any visiting player,

I had to go to the far end where the Zamboni came out and stop them and have them skate across the ice to where the studio was located. And then at the end of the game, it was my responsibility to stop the visiting players who were one of the three Molson Cup three stars. And my favorite night was a Saturday on hockey night in Canada and the Oilers had come in and they're prime and they laid waste to a really bad maple leaf team and so about five minutes left to go in the game i was told campbell go and get gretzky he's first messier he's second coffee he's third wow and there i am i don't know 20 years old

in my in my hockey night canada blazer standing at the end of the rink, the game ends, these players are coming off and I'm taking full control of the situation. Wayne, stay right here. You're going out first. Mess, stand right there. You're number two. Hey, coffee, over here. You're going third.

And I was like, wow, man, you're a prick. There was that one, this is, I remember, I was a big, I'm still a big Leaf fan, but there was one time I think Edmonton came to town and we might've won that game, something like 11 to nine. And I think Miroslav Fritscher got four goals. Anyways, it felt like we won the Stanley Cup.

I'll be honest with you, like beating the Oilers, that Oilers team felt like we won the Stanley Cup. But yeah, it was something like 11 to nine. It was unbelievable. Really? Miroslav Fritsacher always had his helmet, his Jofa helmet tilted the wrong way. Did you ever notice that? Yeah, well, I think that was a

European thing at the time. Yes. European style. But yeah, Freacher. Yeah, and I'm trying to think there was another Miroslav, and then Miroslav Inacek came to town. Is that Peter Inacek's brother? Peter Inacek's brother. Yes. Right, so I learned there was a name Miroslav. That's where I learned.

Oh, this is a name in Russia. Okay. Or Czech Republic. Oh, Czechoslovakia at the time. Czechoslovakia. We got to get our geography right, but it's, yeah. But okay, that's a cool gig. What were they like though?

Like Ron, like you must have witnessed a lot of stuff. I did. Ron was like, did you just tell me a little bit about, because these two legends, I mean, until very recently, I don't know if you heard, but Don Cherry is no longer ad hoc. I have heard.

Yes. Yes. But he lasted a long time. He did. Yeah. They were great to me. They, you know,

I made a point of trying not to get in their way because I respected that they had a job to do. And I, and I, what my, my, my thing was, I'll do whatever you need me to do. But in the downtime, I'm going to sit and watch and listen and pay attention to what it is you guys are doing.

And, and so I was able over two years of doing that job to, to absorb a lot of information as to how to properly go about that particular task. I will tell one really quick story about Cherry. We did a New Year's Eve 1990 Saturday night broadcast against the Quebec Nordique, and Cherry and everybody invited the entire crew out for dinner after it was over at a restaurant just north of maple leaf gardens i don't even know if it's still there called bigley arties and we're all sitting around as members of the molson's hockey night in canada crew and the server comes by and i'm sitting

beside rose cherry she's to my left don's to my right so i'm sitting in between them and because dawn was at the end of the table and directly to my right the server asked for his drink order first and then they went counter clockwise around the table so at the end of it i was the last to order which was fine by me because i was also the youngest most insignificant member of that crew right so mclean was there his wife carrie was there ron harrison who was the executive producer at the time maria maida who was the statistician and a friend of mine that we worked together with so they go around and unbeknownst i'm not paying any attention because i'm kind of overwhelmed by the the the table and the people at it donald orders a molson this and ron orders a molson that and ron harrison orders a molson this and i'm not paying any attention and i'm a

labatt 50 drinker at this point right right comes to me at the end and i turn to the lady and i said i'll have a labatt 50 and the whole table goes silent and don looks at me goes jamie table goes silent and don looks at me goes jamie what the hell are you doing and i didn't get what he was i didn't understand right that i just simply ordered the wrong brand i'd ordered a brand that was the direct competitor of the major sponsor of hockey and kid it never occurred to me that i shouldn't be drinking labatt's 50s i still remember the uh me and the boys in our 50s me and the boys and our beer well since we're talking beer way better than Molson

way better than Molson way better than Labatt's I don't know if you're still drinking 50 but you won't be after I give you this fresh six pack of Great Lakes beer courtesy oh yeah that's so again Mike Lackey just turned 50 six pack of Great Lakes beer. Beautiful. Great Lakes Brewery, courtesy of that.

The shinny pants. Oh yeah, that's, so again, Mike Lackey just turned 50 and that's actually Mike Lackey on the label. He's the brewmaster at Great Lakes, which is a fiercely independent family run brewery here in my neck of the woods. So enjoy, my favorite is actually the, in fact, Jack Armstrong.

So, okay, I just, a couple of days ago, Jack Armstrong loves the Great Lakes IPAs. Jack loves beer. Yes, Jack loves beer. And he has a particular fondness for the IPAs at Great Lakes Brewery, so I made sure I got him a bunch of Octopus Wants to Fight. He actually wants some more. Jack loves free beer more than anything, actually.

So I made sure you got an octopus. Thank you. Before I press record, you said you got a an octopus uh before i press record you said you had a quick uh jack armstrong story since we're talking so much baseball he might not come up again this episode did you want to quickly uh yeah not quickly i don't care this is a podcast okay um i'm not sure how many people understand how generous jack is uh If you've ever run into him, as you have, you learn very quickly just what he's made of. I went through a very, very difficult time my first couple of years at Sportsnet, a very difficult personal time. I struggled with depression. And one of the ways

I tried to get myself out of it was to stop doing things for me and instead turn and start doing things for other people and to and to cut a long story really short i went out and started buying up tickets for leaf games and blue jay games from scalpers and then i organized with the hospital for sick children to bring families to games because I knew that at the end of the game, I had the ability to take these kids into the dressing room or the clubhouse and introduce them to Carlos Delgado or to Curtis Joseph or whatever it was. And I, I, I tried to do it for the longest time without anybody knowing about it. But at some point, somebody from Sports Net tipped off, um, William Houston at the Globe and Mail, and he wrote about it but at some point somebody from sports net tipped off um william

houston at the globe and mail and he wrote about it one time and next thing i know i'm getting a phone call from ivan fettson who's the president of ctv calls me up to his office wow it's a big big big name to get it called hands me the ctv private suite for a playoff game wow um and said take your kids to you know saturday night's game on us wow and we're talking you know platinum seats very very they're 12 or 13 tickets it was it was incredible so the day of that game i'm in the studio and Jack is there. And he had heard about what I was doing. And he comes up to me and he says, Jamie, he says, you taking your kids to the game tonight? I said, yes, I am.

I had not known who these kids were. I don't, I never knew who they were until I actually met them at the arena or the stadium. Right. And he goes, make sure they're taken care of. And he reaches into his pocket and he pulls out two $100 bills. American. Two American 100s.

And he jams them into my hand. He says, get them popcorn, get them drinks, get them whatever they want. Wow. I said, Jack, you don't have to do. He says, no, no, no. Just take care of the kids. Oh, man. I'm tearing up over here.

That's a beautiful story. You know, it's one of those minutes where you just, you can't give it back. Right. And I said, I'll make sure they're looked after. So all the kids got whatever they wanted that night. Popcorn, drinks,

souvenirs. Wow. I spent it all. Right. And it was, and it was, it's typical Jack Armstrong. Well,

good on Jack, good on Jack for doing that, but good on you for that, for doing what you were doing. That's awfully selfless. I like, we need more stories like that. There's enough crap flying around. I was at a point in my life where I realized I was

as low as I could possibly be and my whole life to that point had been focused entirely on me and what it was I wanted to accomplish and I never stopped to think about anybody else and that's and that's it's what got me out of it's it's it's what got me out of an unimaginable unimaginable depressive

time in my life and I don't know why I thought of it and I don't know how it came to be really because back then this is 20 some odd years ago well if you're there were the resources uh late 90s i'm guessing this would have been about 99 2000 and there just weren't the you know the bell let's talk um there wasn't there was still a stigma around the depression yeah right yeah i i definitely suffered in silence my My parents might have known. I don't think they truly knew the extent of what I was going through. But it was a situation where I just decided, you've got to figure your way out of this. I would have loved to have had support,

and maybe if I'd opened up to somebody, I would have found it. And I devised one day this idea that maybe what you should do is, is start focusing on other people right now instead of just yourself all the time. And, uh, you know, sick kids is a good place to start. You know, I just, I just randomly thought of it. There was a lovely woman at the hospital at that time named Jennifer Butterly. And she suggested that I come and read back then they had a little library. still do and you could volunteer to read to the kids and once a week I'd go before I'd go into Sportsnet and I would read to kids and it's amazing how this dark cloud that was surrounding me at the time started to very gradually dissipate and while

I was reading to these kids and meeting these families and understanding just how excruciating it would be to have to be there all the time with these kids who were going through various treatments, I thought, wow, you've got access to the Rogers center. It wasn't called the Rogers center back then. You've got access to the air Canada center.

It wasn't called. No, it was the air. Oh yeah. You've got access to the Air Canada Center. It wasn't called. No, it was the Air Canada. Oh, yeah. What can you do? How can you bring those kids into your world? And that's when I started thinking about going and taking them to games. And the first,

when I explained this to a scalper, literally on the street outside of the ACC, what I was doing, he ended up selling me 10 tickets at face value. Oh, wow. The scalper of a heart of gold. And I guess he knew I wasn't telling him some kind of a crazy story.

I was legitimately doing this for a purpose. And I wish I could remember what this for a purpose. And I'll never, I wish I could remember what this guy looked like and I'd go up and I'd remind him every now and then when I walked by that arena. He literally gave me 10 tickets at face. So he made nothing. And I'll never forget that.

Wow. And how are you doing in more recent times with your mental health challenges? Much better. Yeah. challenges. Much better. Yeah, much better. That was a bit of a stage that I think everybody probably goes through at some point in their life. It was the second time I'd gone through it, and I went through a similar situation when my marriage ended about three years ago. But I'm not alone.

I know that there are a lot of people who go through these kind of things. Yeah, I'm glad to see you're doing better, that's for sure. So let's get you to Sportsnet really quickly here, which is that you go to Edmonton, birthplace of my wife, Monica. No kidding. Great city.

And our buddy Alan Carter worked there for a bit in the late 90s. Yeah. So, what is it, 93? You moved to Edmonton and you're a sportscaster for the CBC. Yes. Cool. You got a gig with the CBC.

Did you do that because you were working on the Hockey Night in Canada as a runner and you were able to parlay that into something? I was eventually. It was very difficult to get people to look at my demo tape and take me seriously it might have something to do with the fact that i was 22 23 but i looked like i was 16 yeah you still look awfully young i know that didn't help um but there was a gentleman who was the head of cbc sports at the, named Alan Clark. And I had gone into his office and expressed my frustration.

And my frustration was that I had this really good demo tape and no one was taking a chance on me. I probably sent it to every station in Canada and in some cases actually showed up on their door peddling my tape. And one day he called me into his office and he says, I'm going to help you in some way. And interestingly,

his son Jacob is now the producer of Blue Jay Central. So it's a generational thing. And Alan arranged for me to become the weekend sports anchor for CBC and Edmonton for one year. And the deal was that network sports, CBC network sports would pay my salary in Edmonton for one year to basically train me, but train me on the job.

Right. Which is the best way to learn. And after a year, if CBC Edmonton wanted to retain my services, they would take over my salary, which they did. So I proved my worth over a year, if CBC Edmonton wanted to retain my services, they would take over my salary, which they did. So I proved my worth over a year. They kept me for another three.

And it was four of the greatest years of my life. And I ended up leaving after four and moving to Ottawa to replace, of all people, James Duthie, who had vacated a position in Ottawa. Of course. The sad murder of the sportscaster whose name is alluding me right now. Brian Smith. Right.

Because Duthie told that story on the show. And then I guess, yeah, you take over for Duthie. So I guess that's the chain there. And that's CJOH in Ottawa. And that, I guess you do that, 97, 98, you're there. And then how do you get the gig at Sportsnet? I was in discussion with TSN, hoping to latch on with them

because their Ottawa-based reporter was moving on. And I was hoping to end up there at the time. And then suddenly this, this network called CTV Sportsnet was launched. Right. I was quite focused on a staying in Ottawa because I really liked the city and continuing my work with CJOH and possibly hooking on in some way on a local level with TSN. And suddenly I get this call from my old friend Scott Moore.

He says, I'm coming to town. Can you meet me for lunch? I said, sure. Wasn't too clear on why he wanted to see me. And I'd known him for years. And we go to lunch at this establishment, not far from the studio. And he says,

as you probably know, I'm starting up this network and I want you to be one of our first anchors. And I looked at him and I said, Scott, I'm honored and I appreciate the interest, but I really like it here. And I think I'm going to stay, but thank you anyway. And he goes, Oh, he goes,

well, tell me what are they paying you here? And he pushes this napkin in front of me with a pen. And I wrote down the salary I was making at the time and I pushed it back to him. And he takes the napkin grabs the pen crosses out the salary that i had written down triples it wow and pushes it back to me and i took one look at it and i said when do i start that sounds like a scott moore move. And the worst, when I look back on it years later, I thought, gosh, you had no idea what kind of a negotiating position you had at that very moment, at that moment.

If I had taken the number that he had given me and tacked on, I don't know, 15,000 and pushed it back, he still would have said yes. Right. Right? But I was so blown away by what he'd done. Because he didn't double it, which would have it back, he still would have said yes. Right. Right? But I was so blown away by what he'd done. Because he didn't double it,

which would have been sufficient, I think, probably. But he tripled it. So you've, at that point, he's got you at a place where it's like, you don't want to look the gift horse in the mouth.

It's a, that's a, tripling, you don't see that very often. No. I had no, it's amazing how things turned. In a matter of 60 seconds I went from no thank you I'm staying to okay I guess I'm moving back to Toronto

wow and okay so it's Darren Millard right that you're is your sports what did they call it sports central right sports central Darren Millard by accident so Darren Millard wasn't supposed to be on the opening broadcast on the night we

launched october the 8th 1998 okay um but my my co-host wasn't ready who was this co-host um male or female no male his name was richard provence and richard had struggled in the rehearsals and on opening night the decision was made that instead of richard and i that richard would wait until he was better prepared okay so they brought darren in who wasn't scheduled to be with me darren was scheduled to do an entirely different shift with Kevin Quinn, who's now the voice of the Edmonton Oilers. Wow. So Darren and I ended up hosting the very, very first edition

of Sportsnet Central, October 8, 1998, the first and only time we ever worked together on that program, which is fascinating, right? So then the next night, day two, my regular co-host takes the chair and we ended up working together for about a year. And Darren went to his regular partner and we essentially never worked together on the same set again.

And Darren's in Vegas now. Yes, he is. Working. Doing very well. Yeah. Good for him. Good for him. All right. Now let's in Vegas now. Yes, he is. Working. Doing very well. Yeah. Yeah. Good for him. Good for him.

All right. Now, let's talk a little bit about the things before you get the play-by-play gig, which I want to ask you about, because that sounds like possibly a dream come true. But hold on to that one for a moment. You're, let's see, what do you, tell us, you're reporting from the Super Bowl and the Olympics and what were you doing up until you get the play-by-play gig on Sportsnet Baseball? Hosting the late night edition of Sportsnet Central, which became Sportsnet News, which became Sportsnet Connected for a while. It had about three different names. And now it's Sportsnet Central, if I'm correct. Yes. It was originally called Sports Central. Right.

But it changed over the years. I did everything I could possibly do when various assignments came up. Super Bowls every year, it seems. Grey Cup one year. And then when we got the Major League Baseball contract, I got to do all the post-season coverage. Right. So the combination of Rod Black and later,

oh my goodness, why is his name escaping me? I'm having a brain fart right now. It happens. Rob Foulds? Rob Foulds. Yeah, okay. Did the play-by-play with John Cerruti. Right. And they didn't have any kind of a studio presence in those days but they did have a studio presence for the

postseason so i would take over postseason baseball as soon as the jays were were routinely eliminated from contention yeah you came at the wrong time jamie yeah and then we'd bring in various analysts on on the postseason including warren sockew and a couple of years we had Ryan Dempster. And I loved baseball so much, I wasn't able to latch onto the game broadcast. So I made sure that they knew that, hey, I need to be and want to be part of the playoff broadcast in some way. Right. And that privilege was granted to me.

Now, sadly, of course, I think it was the last game of the season, right? We lost John Cerruti. 2004. A lot of sad stories we're sharing today. Yeah. And John, so I had done a game that season with John at the last minute. So I had done a game that season with John at the last minute. I was at my desk at the studio and Scott Moore called me and said,

can you fill in for Faldzi tomorrow and call play-by-play of the Yankees-Blue Jays game? And I said, of course I can. Of course, I was also, you know, pooping my pants at that time because the game was about, you know about 12 hours away at that time and I'd never done a broadcast before. And John Cerruti was my partner that day and the Blue Jays got completely waxed. I think the final score was about 12-3. But John was

so gracious. He knew that I'd been put in a very difficult position and he was exceptional. And he took me aside before the broadcast and said, don't worry about this. Like, you know, we'll make it through this and you'll be just fine. He said, just rely on your natural broadcast instincts

and you'll be just fine. That was, I mean, that was a terrible season already. Like, I remember that being a nightmare season. And then to end like that, it was like, wow. Like, to lose John Cerruti. So sad. So tell us exactly. So Cerruti, of course, passes away.

Yes. Tragically. But so how does that, like, does Rob, they decided to make a change of Rob and bring you in for 2005? They just decided to make a change. They do that, right? Every once in a while, they make changes. And they did it with me five years later with Buck Martinez, right? They just decided it was time for change and um i got a phone call from rick's rick briggs jude who was the executive producer at the time and he took me to lunch and said here's what i'm thinking

would you be interested and i said it's what i've dreamed of of course course I'm interested. Yes. And I said, you realize I've never done this before, but for, you know, substituting for, for falls one day. And he said, you'll be fine. And I said, okay, I'm good. And I took it very, very seriously. I, I, I was, I was a student of the craft. Uh, did you, would you listen in on, you know, people would often debate play-by-play guys for the Blue Jays. Like,

they'll be like, oh, you know, when Shulman was play-by-play and Buck Martinez was doing Analyst, that's my favorite. Or they'll be like,

oh, nothing beats Tom and Jerry, you know, you know, different camps or whatever. And then you're, you're coming in this, you know,

those are kind of two, I would call those two, like, beloved. Iconic voices. Right. Like, did you, did you coming in this, you know, those are kind of two, I would call those two like beloved. Iconic voices. Right. Like did you listen in on, you know, I guess I call it criticism. Comparisons.

I did. I paid attention to criticism because criticism in many ways can teach you and educate you as to how to be better at what you're doing, oddly enough. Some people try to shield themselves from criticism, and I welcomed it because I wanted to know what people thought. I reached out to Shulman well before my first game, well before, and went up to his neighborhood, and we sat down and had lunch, and he schooled me as best as he could and prepared me as best as he could i'd done a lot of of watching and listening

to taped games um over the course of of that off season i consulted with jerry who was wonderful uh i went and visited j Jerry at his home once, and we sat down and just went over the importance of play-by-play and the do's and don'ts and things to be prepared for. I wasn't perfect, but I look back on it now. I remember when Roy Halladay passed away, and somebody posted one particular game that he was absolutely dominant i think against the yankees in his last year as a member of the blue jays and and it was from my broadcast and i listened to it

with a very critical eye and this is years removed from it right and i remember thinking wow that was excellent like you did an amazing job of not over-talking. And some people were very critical of me for not saying enough. Because I never subscribed to the American way of broadcasting, which was, excuse me, you have to talk all the time.

Right. You've got to fill every second. I'd never believe that, especially with baseball. Right. The beauty of baseball is that, especially on TV, the pictures can tell you.

Oh, no. I think your instinct there is absolutely correct. Those two names. That didn't go over well, though, with a lot of people. That philosophy. In your defense, if I will, those two names I mentioned, so Dan Shulman on the television and then Tom Cheek on the radio,

of all time, two of the finest of all time. You know what I mean? Like these are two, forget Toronto, forget Toronto. Like, and again,

I haven't heard a lot, I mean, we'll leave Tom Cheek out of it. Maybe I got a huge bias there, but Dan Schulman is one of the greatest television play-by-play, baseball play-by-play guys ever. Unparalleled.

Yeah. No question. So, you know, to be compared to that is, yeah. And I think, I think you did a No question. So, you know, to be compared to that is, yeah. And I think you did a great job. I want to know the signature call, I guess, to talk.

So, you know, you can kiss that one goodbye. Which only became something because it became something I repeated. It wasn't something that I was attempting to use very often. It was just something that came to mind quite frequently, if that makes sense. I can assure you that if you somehow managed to assemble every home run ever hit, it wasn't always that way, right? Some things don't call for a standard usable line. I remember Vernon Wells in my first year hit a walk-off home run at the Dome off Mariana Rivera. And I can promise you, I didn't say you can kiss that one goodbye. I mean, the moment was far too exalting

to just use some kind of a... Catchphrase? A catchphrase, yeah. Which, you know, and that was, I believe you've gone on record but of course it makes sense that that was

used by Fergie Oliver so just like mom way back yeah come on if I were on that show I always said

I'll just I'll be the guy who loads it with ketchup okay and then you'll know it's mine you need like

a little little cheat there okay okay amazing now in 2004 at the all-starStar Game, you caught the David Ortiz home run, right? That was quite a day. It was also the day that I introduced former President George Herbert Walker Bush as the...

Herschel, right? Is that Herbert? Is it Herbert? Herbert. Is it? Yes. Why did I think it was Herschel? Okay.

You would know. I introduced... Oh Oh you know I Herschel Walker. I interviewed him and introduced him as the 40th president of the United States and I don't know how my research was so off. Oh what is he? He was actually 41. Okay. And somebody sent me a picture. This is a really good picture of the two of us in conversation and two secret servicemen standing behind us and one's whispering to the other. And the other is saying,

he just called him 40. And I thought, Oh, how did I mess that one up? Oh my God. Yeah. That's because, uh,

yeah, Reagan was 40. Right. And on the same night, um, sixth inning, I'm sitting out in the outfield seats with Warren Saku in a seat reserved for the writer of the Washington Post, but it was empty. So that's where we sat. And David Ortiz hits this bomb off the, uh, off a pitch from Carl Pavano. And I could tell by the trajectory, this thing is headed right for me. pitch from Carl Povano and I could tell by the trajectory this thing is headed

right for me and I barely had to move to grab it Dan Schulman tells his great story he was doing the radio broadcast and he looked at his monitor and saw a close-up of me holding the ball aloft and for a split second said he should he should he thought about saying, there's Jamie Campbell with the baseball,

but then he realized he's speaking exclusively to an American audience. So he refrained, which I appreciate. And maybe the best part of that close-up on Fox was I went down to the American League clubhouse afterward to give the ball to Ortiz. Wow. And when I walked into the clubhouse, Ortiz is on the other side of the room and he turns,

and you got to understand, I was wearing this pastel blue suit, red curly hair. He turned, so as the designated hitter, he had gone into the clubhouse and watched the home run over and over again and kept ending on this redhead who'd caught his baseball, he turns and goes, hey, you're the guy that caught my baseball before I'd even so much as

stepped foot inside the room. Right. So I come over to him. Well, I came over to him and I said, yeah, I wanted to give you the ball back. And he looks at me and says, for nothing? Yeah.

And I said, yeah, why do you say that? Because Manny Ramirez had hit a home run in the same game, and whoever caught it came down to the American League clubhouse and wanted $10,000 for the baseball. And Manny said, go ask for yourself. And Ortiz and Manny were buds. So he knows this, and he's probably thinking to himself, whoever comes down with my

ball better be ready for negotiation. And I come down saying, here, have the ball back. What a nice guy. And he looked at me and said, are you sure you want to just give it to me? And I said, well, you know, if you want to give me one of your jerseys at some point,

I am the play-by-play guy for the Blue Jays. I'm going to be seeing you around. And 2005, we do a series at Fenway Park. I see him around the batting cage. He says, hey, come into the clubhouse when the game's over tonight. And I went down into the clubhouse and Ortiz is getting undressed

and he pulls off his jersey. Oh, good for him. He hands it to him and he says, now we're square. I said, yes, sir. That's cool. Here, I'll give you a moment to rest your voice here, give you some more gifts here. Do you enjoy Italian food?

Yes, I do. That's a good answer there too. Holy smokes. I have, this is an empty box actually. That's for display purposes only. This is really yours, but this is an empty box, actually. That's for display purposes only. This is really yours, but this is in the freezer right now. So in my freezer upstairs,

I have a delicious frozen lasagna for you to take home with you today. Perfect. Palma Pasta, palmapasta.com. They cater your home events and your work events, and you can go to skip the dishes and find them there if you're not able to get to one of their stores in mississauga or oakville and i'm telling you jamie you're going to be tweeting at me that it's the best lasagna you've ever got from a store this is tremendous

my family loves it so your family will too i look forward to it thank you palma pasta here's i know you've been wanting a tor mic to sticker. So that is courtesy of StickerU.com. StickerU.com is where I made the decals on the wall here. And I've had a bunch of stuff made there because it's quality stuff. You upload the image, you pick what you want, what quantity you want, it gets delivered to you. They're just great people too, great Toronto business.

And they're not just Toronto business because they're online. So you can get it anywhere in the world. But stickeru.com to get your stickers and decals and temporary tattoos. So enjoy that sticker. I have a book for you too.

Stomp and Tom. This book is called My Good Times of Stomp and Tom because Duncan Fremlin, who I call Banjo Dunk, spent quite a bit of time with Stomp and Tom on the road. He wrote a book about it. And I'mjo Dunk, spent quite a bit of time with Stompin' Tom on the road. He wrote a book about it. And I'm going to play just a little bit of Banjo Dunk. He's got a message for us.

So here's Banjo Dunk. This is Banjo Dunk. And for the last few weeks, you've been hearing my ads on Toronto Mic'd about the big Stompin' Tom show coming up on April 16th, 2020. But there's another Banjo Dunk production that's happening very soon. My music buddy Douglas John Cameron and I, known internationally as Doogie and Dunn, are going to be performing in Oakville at the Moonshine Cafe on February 27th, not too far from Toronto Mike Head Office. So, if you live in Toronto, Oakville, Mississauga,

Burlington, Milton, and surrounding areas, you'll find all the information you need at themoonshinecafe.com. We look forward to seeing you on February 27th. There, it's worth the return trip to Oakville. Yes, the Mo moonshine cafe right enjoying that thank you for this and finally uh this is a message for all fotms uh listening to this great conversation with jamie campbell if by the way did people call you soupy was this your nickname no okay because we got a leaf's got a campbell and uh his nickname soupy and then

hebs he's like yeah if your name's Campbell, everyone calls you Soupy because of Campbell Soup. Not true. The only person who's ever called me Soupy in my life was former third base coach Brian Butterfield. The only human that's ever called me Soupy. Wow. Okay.

So tomorrow I record an episode of Hebsey. Let Hebsey know it's not true. Hebsey, I'm going to tell him I met a Campbell who was not called Soupy. So thank you for clearing that up. If any FOTMs out there have any questions at all about Toronto real estate, I ask you to text Toronto Mike, that's one word, to 59559. The Keitner Group have partnered with Toronto Mike to help fuel the real talk here.

And I sincerely believe that Austin Keitner, he'll be the one who gets your message and engages with you. He can help you. So no obligation to sign anything or do anything, but have a conversation about your real estate questions with Austin Keitner, and I would appreciate it. And Jamie, I'd appreciate you telling me

the sad story of your play-by-play career coming to an end. Buck Martinez takes your gig not so sad it was sad at the time it was devastating at the time um and it was a surreal moment for me to be in the office of a gentleman by the name of rick briggs jude when he told me of the change i was absolutely absolutely devastated. But a couple of things happened immediately and then a month or two later. Immediately after I got out of that office and came to the realization that my life had changed in some way because at that moment, Blue Jay Central did not exist. At that moment, I had no idea where my career was

going. Not a clue. And about 30 minutes after I got out of that office and I was completely, completely crestfallen, I got a phone call from my nanny to say that my youngest son was in an ambulance on his way to the hospital because he'd had a seizure. And it jarred me back into what's really important. And I never worried, never again worried about the loss of the play-by-play job. Not once. It never crossed my mind after spending two days in hospital with my youngest son,

the loss of an assignment never, never crossed my mind again. Jamie, that's called perspective. It's not hard. Not to mention the fact, as I like to tell people, Buck Martinez was in professional baseball the year I was born. Right.

So it's not like I'm being replaced by some junior. Kansas City, right? This is where he started? He's a Royal. Yeah, he was playing pro ball the year I was born. So to be replaced by somebody with his tenure, with his resume, with his resume with his ability was an honor and he's still there and he's still there and he'll be there this year and next year and likely a couple of years after that i don't think buck's going anywhere

oh i i mean and by all accounts uh he's a gentleman. He's a good guy, right? This is a guy I hear nothing but good things about Buck. He's wonderful. Yeah, he's wonderful. I love our off-the-ear conversations because he's so darn interesting. If you love baseball, to have a conversation with Buck Martinez is to just sit and listen because there's so much there. He's been through so much. He's played with so many different players

in so many different circumstances. He's got a story for every player, it seems, that I ever loved or followed. And a great head of hair. Great hair, yes. For a very short period of time, his son went to the same primary school as I did. He was younger than me.

Really? He was there at the same time. That I did. He was younger than me. Really? He was there at the same time. That was a big deal. Yeah. Jane and Bluer. And it was like, oh, Buck Martinez's son is here. Nice. It was a big freaking deal here.

Okay. So Buck Martinez comes in and then you're moved to Blue Jay Central. So they create this. Not immediately. Okay. So the only thing I had to do after I was taken off play-by-play to Blue Jay Central. So they create this. Not immediately. Okay. So the only thing I had to do after I was taken off play-by-play was the Vancouver Olympics,

which came up about three months after I was dismissed. And you're part of history. You were, yes. And by the way, whoever owns the rights to Olympic footage has done a very good job scrubbing it from places like YouTube.

I couldn't. Isn't that interesting? I could not. Honestly, I... That's the IOC. Okay, because I could actually find, I could find, I'm speaking, of course, about Alexander Bilodeau.

I was able to find his race with no commentary on it. Like, I can see complete footage, sanctioned footage, great HD footage of it all happening. But it's, I can't get a commenter voice on it. And I searched and I searched. And why was I searching?

Because I wanted to play it right now. Because you called, Jamie Campbell, baseball guy, you called Canada's first gold medal on home soil. Because that was, of course, we were all watching the men's moguls when Alexander Bilodeau. And do you remember your call? I do. I'd play it right now if I could,

but I can't. Can you recreate it? And then the IOC can suck it. Yeah. I don't know if I want to recreate it. I'll read it. That'll be, I'll read it.

You read it and I'll tell you a story about it. And Alex Bilodeau has done it. He has done it. He has done it. Gold. Now I'm not doing it justice. A gold medal for Alex Bilodeau. Oh it. He has done it. He has done it. Gold medal. I'm not doing it justice. A gold medal for Alex Bilodeau. Oh, relax, Canada.

You can breathe easy now. This country finally has won Olympic gold right here at home. Okay. You just did it better than that. From the moment relax on. It says relax, Canada. Repeat that. Relax, Canada.

You can breathe easy now. You can breathe easy now. Okay. I'll tell you a quick story I've never told anybody the night before Jen Heil was favored to win the gold medal in the women's moguls and she didn't she missed

by a hair and she won the silver lost to an american by the name of hannah carney in the lead up to the games there was so much talk about finally winning a gold medal in canada because it had not been done in montreal in 76 and it had not been done in calgary in 88 and the the talk in the lead up was excessive. And everybody knew that that first gold was going to be special for that very reason. And I knew that it would be special. And I knew that I may have had an opportunity to be on the microphone when it happened. So I had to be prepared with something to say to summarize it.

So the night before Jen Heil's performance in my hotel, I grabbed a piece of stationery and wrote down the line you just read that begins with relax Canada. Relax Canada, you can breathe easy now. This country finally has Olympic gold right here at home. At home. So when Jen Heil made her final run the night before, I had that piece of paper in front of me

thinking that if she wins the gold medal, I would at some point summarize the achievement using the line I had written down. Well, she didn't win. And what I learned from that, what I should have known is that you can never predict an outcome in sports.

Right. So don't prepare for something. The most famous, speaking of Blue Jays and a name we've mentioned a bunch of times, but the most famous call I can think of off the top

of my head right now is Touch Them All Joe. Yes. Which was, as you know, and I've been told by people like Jerry Haworth, et cetera, that this was a very spontaneous call. Absolutely it was. Joe's being, you know, and I've been told by people like Jerry Haworth, etc., that this was a very spontaneous call. Absolutely it was. Joe's being, you know,

making sure he touches all the bases. Yes. Wonderful. So on the subject of spontaneity, the next night, you have to remember, Alex Belladeau had not won a single World Cup event the entire year. So I never expected him to win gold. I

thought if he wins a medal at all, that's an achievement. Well, there in this first run, he has a remarkable run, ends up in second place going into the final run. And he is the second last person coming down the hill. The last person that could have beat him after he takes the gold is a Frenchman by the name of Guilbeau Collat. And as Collat comes across the line, I know that his run isn't fast enough nor good enough to beat Villadeau. So I'm thinking to myself, I think Alex, and we'll wait for the scoring summary to confirm this, has just won the gold medal. And i'm stunned at the development and when they post the the number saying he's finished first i then go into he's done it because i'm shocked i'm absolutely shocked so that's where you hear me say you know he's done it he's done it right i'm stunned so. So this is a spontaneous reaction.

Meanwhile, with my left hand, I'm reaching into this pile of papers from the night previous, wondering if maybe, if I have that line I'd written down for Jen Heil the night before, and suddenly out comes the piece of paper. And I looked at it and I thought,

it's still relevant. So I say, it's still relevant. So I say, relax, Canada. Right? So the he's done it, he's done it is spontaneous. Right. But the line that I use after I say relax was written down two days prior just in case. Well, you needed, you know, as I recall,

that was a CTV had the rights to that Olympics, even though you're a Rogers guy. We'll talk recall that was a uh ctv had the rights to that olympics even though you're a rogers guy but we'll talk about that in a moment although i get confused when uh sports net goes to rogers like i can't remember but it was well rogers way before around 2003 2003 okay so we'll get into that a moment but you know stephen brunt was doing all these essays and stuff and uh there were so many montages and that song song, which I still can't listen to, the I Believe song was... Oh, you can't?

No, I can't do it because it was so much. And I, by the way, I was glued to every moment of that Olympics. It was pretty magical because we had, as you said, we'd never won a gold.

We didn't win a gold at Montreal, not that I was old enough to remember it. And I do remember very much the 88 Olympics in Calgary and we didn't win a gold there. Elizabeth Manley finished second. Karen Percy. Right. There's a few close

calls. But getting that first one in Vancouver because it took a bit, right? And then it was like, okay. And then they kept coming. It was unbelievable. I believe that was the record most golds. Yes. It still is. Unbelievable. And it ends with a golden goal.

I'm going to hope you were at that, Matt, game. I bought a scalper ticket the night before. Yes. Did you hear Iggy? That's the one thing. I get the shivers when I listen to his amazing... I did. I did hear that.

Yes, it was incredible how quiet the arena was because people were petrified. Yes. That 20 minutes between the end of regulation after Parise had scored with 24 seconds to go. Right.

And the beginning of overtime for people who were watching and from this country, my stomach was in another territory. It was an awful

feeling. And the arena was so quiet because people were on edge. Yep. And we heard Iggy. That's why you

hear it on the broadcast. It's so clear in the broadcast and you know, you can, and I've seen montages of different countries calling it or whatever and it, yes, that Iggy pierces through the silence. Like you just hear Iggy and it's so unbelievable that, you know, that moment

of Sidney calling for Jerome McGinley to get him the puck and then slipping it past Ryan Miller. So the night before I'd gone down to one of those accredited scalping areas and I asked them if they had a ticket for the gold medal game. And the guy says, yes, I do.

I have one. It's a single ticket. It's yours for 1200 bucks. And I said, I'll take it. And I ended up going outside and calling my then wife, now ex-wife very quickly and said, Hey, do you mind if I drop 1200 bucks on a ticket for the game tomorrow? And she said, no, go ahead. It's your money. Um, so I did. And as I'm walking

up Robson street with this $1,200 ticket that I just purchased in my pocket, I get a call from Brad Fay and he says, hey, congratulations. I said, for what? Like two weeks of excellent broadcasting? He says, no. Doug Beforth, who was then the head of Sportsnet, called him and was supposed to be calling me to say,

you guys did such a great job. I've got tickets to the game for you tomorrow. That's wild. I was about to ask you how you were unable to score a ticket through your, you know, connections for the, you know, calling the first gold medal.

Because everybody wanted a ticket for that game, right? Wow. You know, everyone. Sure. Who worked for either Sportsnet, TSN,

or CTV wanted a ticket to that game. Is that, and I don't know if you'll know the answer to this, but I, is that possibly the, the single most watched moment of anything in this country, like with the most eyeballs in this

country watching the same thing? Is that I saw somewhere recently where 66% of this country was watching that goal. Think about that because you got a whole subset of people who just don't give a shit about sports and want nothing to do with it.

And then there's a whole other little segment of people who simply don't have even see TV. Right. And you have to put those people aside and to consider that two thirds of this country could be watching the same thing at the same time. What a magical moment. It was unbelievable. It was unbelievable. Oh, wow. I think Stephen Brunt described it as the cherry on top. It really unbelievable. It was unbelievable. Yeah. Oh, wow. It was just, it was, it was,

I think Stephen Brunt described it as the cherry on top. It really was. The games would have been a massive success, but there would have been something missing if Canada hadn't won a gold medal in men's hockey. No disrespect to the women at all who were a magnificent story in their own right. Yes.

It was nice to win them both, but you're right. It was sort of, Iggy completed the most spectacular time of our lives for many of us. I'm not sure there's going to be a broadcast experience

for me because I'm on the, shall we say, the downside of my career, right? I think I've reached the apex that will match those 17 days.

You know, the day before, one of the least talked about gold medal victories for Canada was a snowboarder by the name of JCJ Anderson, who was a blueberry farmer from Quebec. And it was this awful freezing rain, cold as heck day up at Cypress mountain. And the stands weren't even full for his gold medal run.

That's how bad the weather was. And down below us, we were in this heated, warm broadcast booth. And down below us, his wife and two young daughters sat freezing. And I knew they were cold. And the kids were about to watch their dad do something spectacular. And they, you know, they were shaking. They were so cold. So my broadcast partner, Tara Tagan, who knew the family, called down to them, opened the window and they, you know, they were shaking. They were so cold. So my broadcast partner, Tara Tagan,

who knew the family, called down to them, opened the window and said, come up and watch with us. Come into this warm booth. The kids could not have been happier. Right. They were soaked. And so his wife and two daughters

sat in the broadcast booth with us watching their dad win a gold medal. It was spectacular. Amazing. I actually went to Cypress Mountain in August, 2019, just to just, I was in the hood and I wanted to see all these places like from the 2010 Olympics.

It's all, it's all incredible. So great Olympic experience. That's in 2010, of course, the Olympics in Vancouver slash Whistler area. Okay. And when do you end up,

is that the summer? And then that summer in 2010 is when Blue Jay Central starts up? Blue Jay Central in the half shell, as I like to call it, it became a part of Sportsnet Central, the six o'clock edition, but not a permanent show at that time.

Okay. So I hosted from the dome on my own without an analyst. So I hosted from the dome on my own without an analyst. And in every lead into a ball game, I would start the show from the stadium 15 minutes before first pitch. And the next year, during spring training, Greg Zahn, who was then attempting to make the san diego padres promptly retired called me and said i'm done what can we do about being a permanent part of the

broadcast and i said let me call nelson millman and let him know because Nelson and I had discussed the idea of a pregame show that was every night and a half an hour before every game. Radio? Because Millman was radio, right? He was, at that time, he was the executive producer of, on the TV side.

He'll be happy to hear his name again because Jack Armstrong was shouting him out just two episodes ago. So Nelson and I kind of hatched this idea of a pregame show for every broadcast that at the time was called, I think, Jays Connected, but eventually became Blue Jays Central. And we had a freshly retired longtime catcher

who was very happy to move to Canada and become my broadcast partner at the time. I once saw him hit a walk-off Grand Slam. It might have been a Father's Day game. Yes, because I had all my kids with me. I think it was a Father's Day game. And subsequently, there was a couple in a row. Who's the guy who hit the two in a row a few years back?

Steve Pearce. Right. Of course. Yes, of course. World Series champion, Steve Pearce. Same year he won the World Series, right? Right. Of course. Yes, of course. World Series champion. Steve Pierce. Same year he won the World Series, right? Right.

Because he got traded mid-season. Right. And my son, my oldest son, was at both those games. So I was telling him how lucky he was to see three walk-off Grand Slams. Because apparently there was one before he was born. But I think there was only the four, I think, in Blue Jay history. And he had seen three of them. Really? And he's not a big fan.

Ready for this? Ready for this? Not a baseball fan. Not. That's okay. So you got dragged to all those games and they just happened to be the walk-off games. I meet a lot of people who aren't baseball fans.

Younger, right? I feel like the, I don't know, maybe I feel with my son, because I grew up like you, loving baseball, just adoring baseball. And I can't get my son into it, but he loves the Raptors and Leafs, and he watches them a lot. But it's too slow.

He just can't seem to get into the pacing of baseball. They're ruined, right? It's a whole generation of attention deficit disorder. But that said, how old is your son? 18. 18, okay. I see so many kids at the stadium who love baseball. It's a personal choice. I didn't grow up

with basketball. I know nothing about basketball. I don't actually watch basketball because it's not a sport that I care about. That's fair. There's a lot of sports I don't care about. I meet lots of people who don't watch baseball. But I also meet lots of people who love baseball. Sure.

There's a timeless, almost romantic essence to baseball that I really enjoy. Find the things you love. Oh yeah, baseball's spectacular in that regard. So there's, okay, back to the zone here in a minute, but 2015, 2016, of course, Blue Jay fever strikes again, everything.

So my wife starts watching games with me because she likes events and all of a sudden there's ALCSs and things, high stakes. And those moments before the pitch, like baseball has this anticipation, maybe a runner on second, one out and the batter's at the plate.

So there's no action. Yeah. But to me, it's edge of the seat. Like it's amazing. Anticipation. Anticipation. Yeah. Meanwhile, like, so my wife sees it as inactivity,

like as if there's nothing happening. So it's almost like, I almost feel like you need to be introduced to baseball young in order to appreciate those moments of anticipation possibly. And in a way, you have to invest enough time to understand that at times of inaction, there's actually lots of action. It's just not physical. It's in the contemplation and the imagination of what has to happen next, how the next pitch has to be executed, and how that play will develop and unfold because of it. will develop and unfold because of it. Absolutely, absolutely.

Okay, if I don't ask you this question, my listeners will shoot me. But what was it like? What was Greg Zahn like? Not that he's still with us, everybody. He's still alive. He's still alive, Greg. Lives in Oakville. I just got connected to him on LinkedIn.

He's teaching baseball to young people. Greg Zahn, Greg of 2Gs, who hit the walk-off Grand Slam. What was it like working with him? What is he like as a person he's a very generous person which sort of belies his image his image is more of one who's gruff and highly opinionated which he is and certainly was on television and that's one of the reasons why I suggested to Sportsnet that we hire him because in my time in the clubhouse, I'd never met a man that was as eloquent and well-spoken and at the same time strongly opinionated as Greg. And I knew right away just in conversations that he'd make an excellent analyst. He was easy to work with on some levels because there was nothing

he couldn't handle conversationally. He was hard to work with on other levels because he felt that if he was going to be critical, he had to keep a distance from the players. He couldn't be buddy-buddy with them. So he rarely made his way down to the players. He couldn't be buddy-buddy with them. Right. So he rarely made his way down to the field. And that kind of drew the ire of some players, right? They felt if Zahn's up there being critical, how come he's not showing his face down here? And Greg felt he needs, he always felt that he needed that divide

in order to be able to properly critique the players and play that he was seeing it did seem for a while that Greg Zahn was the I would say designated pit bull like he was he could be critical uh where not every not everyone who covers the Jays in my perspective as a a fan, would be as critical as Greg Zahn seemed to be. And I figured that was because he played the game. Maybe he had a bit more license because he played the game. Sure. It gave him license.

It also, as you can imagine, established a rapport with the audience that was either I like him or I don't like him. That's the thing about Greg. Yeah, he was a bit polarizing, sure. You either really liked him or I don't like him. That's the thing about Greg. Yeah, he's a bit polarizing, sure. You either really liked him or you didn't like him. There was no middle ground with Greg. No, that's fair.

And I think, I mean, one of his nicknames in the fan circles was Zon Cherry because he started wearing the collared. He didn't start wearing, he was dressing like that long before he ever made it to television. Okay. And people think he was doing that to be like Don Cherry. He wasn't start where he was. He was dressing like that long before he ever made it to television. Okay. People think he was doing that to be like Don Cherry. He wasn't. He was always that way. I'm glad you're clarifying that here.

So we're going to lose that nickname, Don Cherry. Now, in 2017, there's a sudden, I guess the word would be a termination of Greg Zahn. Yes. And Greg will have to speak for Greg on what's happening there. But from your perspective, did you feel like any of the, how do I say this,

guilty by association? Because you were so closely aligned with Greg Zahn and there was a lot of smell there. Yes. I did not sleep for two days. And when I found out about it, I was actually on a train to Montreal with my son's hockey team.

He had a tournament in Montreal, and it was two of the worst days of my life. I literally didn't sleep because I was concerned with whether or not my character would be assessed based on the reasons for Greg's dismissal. And I had a friend, I was actually dating somebody at the time,

who reassured me that if I was secure in my character, if I knew who I was and knew how I behaved, then I had nothing to worry about and I took great comfort in hearing that because I like I forget the way you you termed it it did guilty by association I worried that was I behaving inappropriately at any time in a corporate environment? And I knew deep down inside I was not. But it was hard to sort of digest all of that and come to grips with that in the moments after the dismissal.

Did you, to protect yourself, did you feel like laying low, as they say? Like to lay low and let some time go by? Because it was such a, I guess it was a bit of a, it was a Me Too type incident. I don't even remember the details now. Some emails to colleagues or something that were, Me Too is the way I would describe it. Yeah, Me Too on a different level than.

That's such a vast spectrum. Yeah, that term covers a lot of ground. Sure. I didn't so much lay low. I don't remember being on social media much for the first week. But I also remember, oddly enough, at this arena in the outskirts of Montreal,

having people come up to me and tell me how sorry they were and asking me if I was okay. And I thought, that's reassuring, and it's fascinating, and I'm grateful that people would be that way. It was a very difficult time, people would be that way. It was a very difficult time. And it's,

well, I don't know. I don't have much to say about, about the time that followed. It was, it was, it was definitely a hard time in my life. Are you still buds with Greg?

Absolutely. Yep. We're very good friends. Well, I could tell you here real quick. He's a wonderful human being and he's a very generous person. Because you talked about getting those tickets to the gold medal game in 2010. And I, in 2015,

the World Junior Hockey Championship Canada was in the gold medal game. This is Connor McDavid's team, and I stole me, and it was a really good team, and we're playing the Russians. And I was lucky enough to get a ticket to this game. So I'm going to this game, and I'm in the concourse before the game.

It's crazy. And I can see. I know where this is going. I see Greg Zahn and Jamie Campbell. I don't know if you were getting tickets, somehow trying to score tickets, getting tickets so that you two could go see this. He got tickets that put us right behind the Canadian bench.

And I had told him that day, I said, look, I'm going to go down there and get a scalper ticket and sit way up in the upper deck and just be there. He said, let me make a phone call. And the next thing you know, we're spending 350 bucks and we're right behind the bench. And it was weird because some of the Canadian players were coming off the ice and looking at us like,

hey, I know those two. Sure, sure, of course. So I knew you guys were good buds. Yeah. And Greg and I will always be friends. We established a very good friendship over those years. And as much as I worried about in the aftermath the impact it might have on me personally,

I was also very concerned with anyone who may have felt victimized. So that was of utmost importance to me as well because it's a place that I'm close to. It's where I've been employed for 21 years. So it was not a fun time, not a fun time at all. Is there a path of redemption back in this day and age for somebody like Greg Zahn?

Because you mentioned he's a good guy and he's generous and it sounds like he's a friend of yours because you appreciate him as a human being. I hope so. I hope there is. Because, you know, he's just a... To know Greg, to know him the way I know him, he's just such a kind soul.

I know him. He's just such a kind soul. And he loves people. And anybody that worked with us at that time knows that Greg used to have parties at his house. And it didn't matter what you did at Sportsnet. It didn't matter what label or job you had, from the executive producers to the vice presidents to the brand new interns. It didn't matter. You were invited. You were always welcome at his home. And he was that kind of person. And upon his departure, they replaced him with Joe Siddle.

Is that right? Wonderful man, yeah. him with Joe Siddle. Is that right? Wonderful man. Yeah. Joe's a wonderful man. And Joe admittedly doesn't have the critical edge that Greg does. But Joe can be critical and you don't know it because he's such a nice man. And he has experienced immense grief in his life. Right. He and his wife, Tamara, lost their 14- 14 year old son to cancer about 6 years ago, Kevin

and the kind of grief and I remember with Greg going to visit Kevin about 3 months before he passed away in his room at the hospital for sick children. And their other three kids, Mackenzie, Brooke, and Brett were there. And this is a family from Windsor.

So no one left Kevin's side for about five or six months. That hospital room had one of them there 24 hours a day until kevin sadly passed he was 14 years old and to know joe anybody that's met joe and tamra and the three kids you you they are such kind generous souls you would never know that they have experienced such grief. He's an amazing man. I encourage anybody that gets the chance to come down and say hello to us at the Rogers Center because we're on the concourse. We're not hard to find. I would caution people that we don't necessarily see you or hear you. For anybody that's come down and been ignored, keep in mind, we wear earpieces that you can't see. We're listening to our broadcast

and the lights are bright enough that I can't see you anyway. Just be careful. It's not that we're ignoring you. It's just that in many cases, we can't either hear you or see you. But either way, to get five minutes with Joe Siddle is something else.

He is just a gracious, compassionate human being. Well, I'm going to make it my goal to get 90 minutes of Joe Siddle in this basement. Oh, you'll be able to do that. Just wait till the season starts because he doesn't live here in the off season. Right, right, right, right. I'm going to do my best.

He's a very handsome man too. I always, when I heard him on the radio and you'd see him, you'd go, he should be on television, right? That's a handsome guy. Yeah, he's a good man. You know, I can say that. All right, a few quick hits here.

Again, I know we've gone very long here and I really appreciate this because you've been fantastic. But just a little moment maybe about, you know, I just watched recently Ford versus Ferrari. So I've been thinking a lot about car racing, okay? Great movie, by the way. I don't know if you've seen it. It was very good, yes. It was excellent.

But Gilles Villeneuve is one of your heroes, right? Or one of your sporting heroes, at least. And you named one of your sons after him? I named my youngest son Jack. Jack Villeneuve Campbell, because Gilles was my ultimate sports hero. It's funny that I ended up in baseball.

I had heroes scattered about, right? I had those I loved in baseball, those I loved in hockey. But Gilles Villeneuve trumped them all. And 1977 was such a big year for me because it's when I first really got introduced to baseball. But it was also the year that my parents took me to the Canadian Grand Prix at Moseport. And I was mesmerized by Formula One at the time. What I didn't realize is that there was a Canadian in Formula One,

and only that very weekend, the very first ride he ever had with Ferrari was the weekend I went and saw him at Mossport in October of 77, and I was completely taken by it, and he became my, I think I know everything there is to know about Jill. I'm pretty sure I do. To the point where when he was inducted posthumously

into the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame, I went to the ceremony, went backstage, snuck backstage, introduced myself to his entire family, and had his then nine-year-old son Jacques sign the program for me. Wow. In little nine-year-old chicken scratch. sign the program for me. Wow. In little nine-year-old chicken scratch. And yeah, he did all right himself. Yeah, went on to become world champion

and Indy 500 champion. But for the longest time, one of my greatest regrets in life was that I never got to meet Gilles Villeneuve. And so the day he died, May 8th of 1982, was almost a sadder day than my own father's death because I had a great life with my father. So when my dad passed away, I was ready for it.

And I had assessed the life we had together. I maxed out my time with my dad. And I thought of the grief that I felt afterward, but the grief I felt when Jules Villeneuve died, who was my hero and someone I'd never actually come in contact with, was what felt greater. As odd as that might sound to you. I'm just thinking now about,

you know, the guy who turned, I forget his name now, the Minnesota twin who, Lyman Bostock. Right. And his unfortunate early passing. Yes. So there's a lot

of common thread throughout the episode. A lot of heroes passing. Some heroes passing. But in fact, we recently lost Neil Peart. Yes. So you... Why am I playing limelight?

You could probably guess. Firstly, you tweeted a line from this song yesterday. Did you see that? Yeah, because I was tagged on it. You were tagged on it. That's right, yes. So of course I saw it. Because it was a reply to a question from Brian.

Hi, Brian. Brian says, the Montreal Expos now have a limelight to proceed. There you go. Hence the limelight. Yeah, I didn't understand the reference to limelight. And it was capitalized, too. So I think it's an insight. I think if you listen to the writer's block on 590, I think it's a reference from that.

With Steve Bronfman. Yeah, with Steve Bronfman. Stephen Bronfman, right? But I don't remember... Okay, Bob Bronfman. Yes, yes. Okay, so I'll ask the question and then I'm sure it's something

maybe Jeff Blair said or something like that. But we'll find out from Brian what the heck it meant. But the Montreal Expos now have a limelight to proceed as Stephen Bronfman told Jeff Blair

and Stephen Bronfman yesterday. Blair and Stephen Brunt yesterday. Do you share the same optimism? So a little back story is Brian, great FOTM, is from Montreal and is a diehard Expos fan, and he's longing for his team to return. So he needs hope. And can you give him some hope? I can, based on what bronfman said and i firmly believe that bronfman in conjunction with ownership of the tampa bay rays um sternberg have become

close i think he alluded to this they spent some time together recently in Florida, and they're both trying to attain the same goal, and that is on the Florida side, they want to keep the Tampa Bay Rays in Tampa, and they seem to think that the only way that is possible is to build a new facility and play half a season there in conjunction with another city. And this seems to have the support of the Commissioner of Baseball.

In fact, it does. And so this outlandish idea that people laughed at initially of the Montreal X-rays, as I like to call them, isn't so outlandish. Now, how it would work from a player's perspective is beyond me. Can you imagine being part of an organization where you have to find a place to live in two different cities? Well, it's like the Toronto Wolfpack.

Yes. Okay, you know, half the schedule is in Europe and then half the schedule is here. It's very disruptive to your, if you have kids especially, and their schooling and all that jazz. But yeah, I laughed at it too and thought it was ridiculous. But there's hope for you, Brian.

I firmly believe Major League Baseball will be back in Montreal sometime. I just don't know when it's going to be. That's all Brian needs to hear. Paul, quick hit here because it's very timely, but how do you feel about Dave Hudgin's involvement with the Astros fiasco

and still being able to be a bench coach? On the subject of redemption, we're all afforded, at least I would hope, we're all afforded a second chance. He seemed quite apologetic the other day when he spoke

to the masses. He wasn't quite as forthcoming when he spoke to the masses he wasn't quite as forthcoming when he spoke with john lot at the winter fest recently so i think some of the people involved intimately involved in this scheme are now realizing that they have to own up to their indiscretions and and the people i'm waiting to hear from frankly are people like alex bregman who was darn right smug when confronted with it uh recently carlos correa and george springer and and every one of them let's hear what you have to say and be honest about it and don't and don't just rest on what the commissioner's report finds let's hear what you have to say and be honest about it and don't just rest on what the commissioner's report finds. Let's hear what you have to say about the damage you've done to baseball

because I think there is damage. I think it's repairable because baseball has, as you know, has overcome a lot of bumps in the road. Yeah, sure, there's Joe. Yeah, let's begin there. But this one, what they have done is an injustice in many ways. And it's a disrespect to the game itself and to the integrity of the game and to the integrity of their opponents. Not just the Mike Bowles singers of the world,

but everybody that had to deal with a team that was blatantly cheating. I find it all kind of, as a long forever baseball fan, it's totally gross. And I feel like, I kind of wish they'd take the title away. Like I'm at that point, I'm so angry about this whole thing.

I just feel like. Maybe one day they will, right? I don't think they can do that just yet. But those Astros players that were involved. Yeah. And look, they can all hide behind, well, Carlos Beltran was the ringleader and we didn't want to trump his authority.

I'm sorry. Right. If you know it's wrong, stand up and say something. Like all those movies we've seen where guards at, you know, in the Holocaust at the, at Auschwitz, you'd have a guard who would be held responsible for the death because they were following orders.

They're following orders, right. I think there's some good, I think the reader was a good one here. We're talking about the World War II movies here. But let me close by just asking again, when are you leaving for spring training? Monday.

Maybe I, maybe Wilner's coming in Friday because he is leaving next week. Maybe it wasn't two weeks off, but he's definitely in Toronto tomorrow because he's going to be here. But he might be shortly, he might be leaving next week. He'll be leaving soon.

Right. I might have those dates wrong. So any quick predictions before I play out? What's your crystal ball saying for the 2020 Blue Jays? That it'll be an enjoyable season and that they'll be competitive. I'm not good on numbers. I'm not fond of predictions. You're not going to make a win total? I don't like doing

that because it's always wrong. And I'll take it out and I'll just play it at the end of the season and just go, listen to how wrong Jamie Campbell was. You're smart. They'll be ultra competitive. Let's just put it that way. Dude, I love this, man. You were fantastic.

Well, thanks for having me. I had a great time. You earned your beer, you earned your sticker, you earned your pasta. Thank you so much for taking the time today. Thank you, Mike.

And that brings us to the end of our 584th show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. Jamie is at Snet Campbell. That's like Sports on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. Jamie is at Snet Campbell. That's like Sportsnet, but it's Snet Campbell. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery

are at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. The Keitner Group are at The Keitner Group. K-E-I-T-N-E-R for Keitner. And Banjo Dunk is at Banjo Dunk with a C. See you all tomorrow.

And my Valentine's Day guest is Mike Wilner. downtown This podcast has been produced by TMDS and accelerated by Rome phone. Rome phone brings you the most reliable virtual phone service to run your 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. Everything is rose and green Well, you've been under my skin for more than eight years It's been eight years of laughter and eight years of tears