Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Jim McKenny: Toronto Mike'd #521

Episode Date: October 2, 2019

Mike chats with former Toronto Maple Leaf and CityTV sports broadcaster Jim McKenny about his life as a Leaf, working for Moses, the highs and lows, and what he's up to these days. Peter Gross joins us to celebrate the launch of Gallagher and Gross Save the World.

Citi Pulse. Everywhere. Welcome to episode 521 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, StickerU.com, Brian Master from KW Realty, Capadia LLP CPAs and Pumpkins After Dark. I'm Mike from torontomike.com and my guest this week, former Maple Leaf, former City TV sports broadcaster, Jim Howie McKinney. Welcome, Jim.

Yeah. Nice to be here, Mike. It only took me, what, four years texting here and there to finally... Four years? I feel like it. Four years. But worth the wait. I'm glad to have you here, man.

I'm glad I came today. I might be dead tomorrow. You know? Who knows? As we talked before I pressed record, Warren Zevon, you saw Warren Zevon at. I did see Warren Zevon at the Phoenix. Yeah, with John Whaley, a good close personal friend of mine and also a City TV alumni. Just had him on the program because.

You're kidding. No. Did he mention my name? I got to go back and review the tape. I hope he did. But, uh, so me too. I sincerely do on the 30th anniversary of, uh, breakfast television and Romer dropped by and we called, uh, David Onley. We called Steve Anthony. We called, uh, John Whaley. So he did it on the phone, but it was like the first time we had heard from him in quite some

time. It was fantastic fantastic it was great so okay but i never got on breakfast television i really did you get on breakfast peter gross is also here with us uh one of the stars of the gross and gallagher saves the world almost i haven't got all the i haven't got all the uh information peter what's the name of your new show gallagher and gross save the world we spent weeks and weeks arguing over who would go first there were lawyers involved there were online polls for sure did i break the tie no yeah you may we went alphabetically i okay jim i don't know my retrogression i know i never knew what retrogression meant. I always lost golf tournaments due to retrogression.

It means to go backwards. If you're tied on the 18th, it's whoever got the best score on the 11th. Okay, good. Good, that's clear. So before we tell people the exciting news about Gallagher and Gross Save the World, Jim and Peter, how do you guys know each other? Like, I mean, when do you guys know each other like like i mean when did you guys become buds and uh are you the bffs peter tells me you are yeah we became acquaintances i

don't know about buds but uh acquaintances when uh peter was working at i think city tv or we might have first met at uh at eli rills oh seriously at the uh we might have we might have going for the lead of uh face off so that's i was that's 1971 um wow but but if we cross paths then we didn't really have much of a conversation i remember interviewing jim uh right at the end of his uh tenure with the leafs and he actually did made a hilarious piece with me about how important it was to be the last guy on the bench the guy who opens and closes the gate for the guys to come in is it the world according to gross was that no that was pre-world according to gross. By the way, why didn't you get the lead in Face Off? Because Art Hindle got it, right?

I did three or four screen tests. I was given all the opportunities in the world, but I was such a bad actor that they had to get rid of me. So they got Art Hindle, who was an acquaintance of mine or a friend of mine at that time, and Art bullshitted them that he'd played hockey as a kid and he couldn't skate or anything. He was a football player.

And so we had to teach him how to lace up his skates and all that kind of stuff. And we sort of steered him around the rink and I did all the on ice stuff. But, you know, it was a classic movie. So you're basically the stand-in for Art Hindle in Face Off. Basically, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So it was okay. I didn't get paid or anything for that. But I got to go to acting lessons. And I made a lot of friends there that I still have today. So it was well worthwhile. Johnny Bassett was the producer. So it was well worthwhile.

Johnny Bassett was the producer. If you see Face Off, what they do is they took actual scenes from real Leaf games, so Jimmy's wearing number 18, and he would take a hit and go flying through the air, and they would cut to the close-up of Art Hindle hitting the ice. Some very fine pieces of editing in that film. Yeah, I've never seen it.

Really? You've never watched it? Thanks for sharing that with us, yeah. He's got it on a laser disc. I went to the opening, the gala. They remastered it. I did some acid that night. I had to leave. We're going to get to that.

I freaked out a little bit. Okay, without further ado, Peter Gross, do you want to make the big announcement or do you want me to make it and then well i'm not 100 clear on what's happening but john gallagher and i have produced eight i wonder we didn't produce you produced and we just star it's your stories and your words and you and john gallagher also from city tv sports at some point uh you guys uh created this wonderful podcast mini-series eight episodes about about 22 minutes each episode and they're themed like one episode is about uh money where you guys basically disclose exactly how much you made at every gig you guys had which is amazing because no one does that although i'm about to ask mckinney later what he was getting paid by moses

but there's an episode about moses we did yeah we went 22 minutes on Moses. We could have gone three times that. There's an episode on sex that might get you arrested. Possibly. And this is just unbelievable stuff. You didn't tell them that story. I did. The one you begged me not to. You did not. Yeah,

you shouldn't have done that. I did it in a real delicate, gentle fashion. Austin Matthews can rest assured that he has not done anything wrong. Once he hears that. So it's out there now. So this is the exciting news and people listening or watching live on Periscope. You've dropped

those eight episodes? Dropped them at nine in the morning. We're on air? Well, there are some people watching us record. They can see us. You look great. I don't think I brushed my teeth today. Don't worry. It's not that high res. Okay, good. So everybody listening should go to their podcaster of choice,

like if it's iTunes or Spotify. Actually, basically, however you're listening to this, assuming you're listening in something like a Google Podcasts or there's a lot of options, Stitcher, TuneIn, go and search for Gallagher and Gross Save the World and subscribe to that and binge these eight episodes that dropped a couple hours ago. People are already listening. I'm already getting feedback.

Is there a way of measuring the three people who will actually go and listen to these things? I'm telling you now, I've received more than three notes from people who have dove in to say this is amazing i'm telling you this is not i'm sure i'm biased this is positive feedback positive feedback you've got to be kidding your mother was very busy i've told my mother she cannot listen to any of this just tell her to skip episode seven she's 96 years old she's a saint she doesn't know half the things I've done in my life, and I've put it all out there. Jim, will you listen to Gallagher and Gross Save the World? I would. I would.

Not for an awfully long time, but I would listen to it. Yeah. I can't say how long I'd be attentive. Congratulations on the dropping of Gallagher and Gross Save the World, Mr. Peter Gross. And thank you for your help. And it's been a pleasure working with you and John. It's been great.

It's been that great. Give us our money back. Hey, and I'll talk offline. We'll see how it goes. By the way, potential sponsors, reach out to Peter or John because if we have some monetary backing, this podcast series will continue. So please don't be shy on that regard.

Reach out and have a conversation with these two fine gentlemen. Now... Did you call us two fine gentlemen? You're talking about gross and... The whole premise of the eight episodes is that we're not two fine gentlemen. Peter, you're a client.

I need to be nice to you. That's how it works. You bought my favor now. I live in the real world. Where does the nickname Howie come from? Howie, because my idol when I was playing junior was Howie Young. And we also had a guy on our team at Neil McNeil. His name was Jim McKendry.

And I played with him one year at Neil McNeil and the second year with the Marlies. They got us mixed up all the time so they needed a nickname for me so they called me Howie. Howie Young was one of the finest alcoholics to ever play in the NHL. It was an honor to use his name for that many years you know i still am to close friends of mine still call me howie i heard i had pete calls me jim jim okay so i'll call you uh mr mckinney i'll call you that's good yeah the police use that term

most of the time please step out of the car. Yeah. Gord Martin was on recently, and he calls you Howie. Yeah, he did. Oh, good, good. And what was your relationship? What's your relationship like with Gord? Oh, very good.

You know, I worked with him for 25 years, and you never really had to worry when you were on air if you're screwed up because Gord was always there to jump in and help you along. So, you know, he was fantastic, very generous. And we're going to do this in chronological order. So I'm going to get you playing pro hockey and then kind of get you to City TV. But because we heard his voice. Well, you can go all over the place. I will because I opened with some Mark Daly's.

I want to ask you, what was it like with Mark? Yeah, that brought shivers down my spine. He was great. Mark, especially when he was with Catherine Humphreys, who eventually took over my job. They just had some sort of magic between them. And, you know, it was a lot of fun to watch them. So Mark was a tremendous talent.

And I started with him actually at CHUM, and I was volunteering there doing sports on the weekend, and a couple of times I had hockey tournaments I had to go to, so Mark would graciously fill in. And he was great. He was a star at that time. And I was just getting started. I never did make stardom status in broadcasting,

but I lasted a long time. I wish I had gotten into the pension plan. I wouldn't be here today. I will tell you, whether or not you, uh, you're a legend in the field depends who you're talking to. There's a lot of us who look back at the Jim McKinney sports casts at City TV, great fondness

and, uh. Pete saw the early ones. Yeah. You don't have to mention that, you know, but I had to edit too. He was teaching me how to edit and Peter's taught me how to do stories and edit out in the field. So I could go out and do a high school football game and do the voiceover right there.

And then all I had to do is match the pictures to the voice and I'd do a stand-up they'd put on the front. And an extra they'd put on the end of it. And I could come back and give all that information to the editor they could edit my stories in under under a half hour whereas if they sat in with a reporter it would take like two two and a half hours to to cut a uh a minute and a half story so So it was very efficient. I was always very grateful to Peter to have taught me that, although it was very difficult at the start. But now, because you and Peter, your friendship, dare I say, has blossomed where you guys are.

I wanted to get Peter in here to record some stuff for his podcast, and he's in Saratoga? Saratoga. So you guys take this trip annually where's that i was just thinking about it today when i was opening my mail i have about 3600 dollars on my credit cards which i can attribute so 3500 of that so that means it was a success absolutely a huge win. Anything under 10 grand, really.

Now we're going to get into some frank discussion about addictions, etc. But Peter's been very honest with us all about his gambling addiction. Peter, you've been forthright about this. You're a self-named degenerate gambler. I'm not putting words in your mouth. I've got some serious issues because of my gambling. Charles Barkley uses that term. Jim and I are a very good company together.

Well, I want to ask Jim, Jim, do you set a limit? What's the term they say? Set a limit and play within it? Or do you have gambling under control of some discipline? Well, yeah, I think you set a limit, and then once you get stuck for that, once you get to your limit, then you double it and see if you can get your money back. Yeah, you go to the track with $200, okay?

And you say, I'm only going to bet the $200 plus whatever I can get on my credit cards. Oh, no. Plus whatever I can get on my bank account. And I've got a TD Canada Trust card. And actually, when I'm in Saratoga, I can press some buttons on my phone and move money from my RSP into my account. Take it away. You're not doing a bid.

That's always a good investment. That's all about creating limits, okay? So that you don't bet more than you should. And I won't name names here, but after your most recent episode on Toronto Mike where you were so honest, Peter, about your gambling issues, I got a note, like a very detailed, lovely note from someone who runs some addiction group or addiction foundation yeah something like

that and they were very interested in uh doing something like recorded something with you and i uh i wondered you heard from these people after your appearance i think i think i exchanged some email and just said you're not interested in i'm not i'm i'm i'm in i'm in denial no pete's not a a type three um gambler he's a type two who gambles he gambles hard but uh like once he gets to a certain area he can stop or moderate so that makes him a type two okay what's type one a type one is is somebody like you who might bet once every four years. Okay, that's me. Okay, yeah. We call them pussies.

And then you get your hard drinker or hard gambler. Then you get your chronic gambler, which is a type three, who may or may not start out as a light gambler like yourself. Okay. Or they may or may not become a hard gambler, but at some stage of his gambling career, he begins to lose all control of his wagering once he starts to gamble. You know, just.

No control. They just keep going. And Pete does have control. He had like lack of control is the problem in all addiction. You know, you have no choice. No alcoholic, no drug addict has any choice at all. drug addict has any choice at all. Once their mind goes towards their addiction or towards their drug of choice, they call it, but, you know, your drug of choice is whatever they have most of, you know, usually. But some people say, well, I'm just an alcoholic, you know. There's no just

there. An alcoholic dies the worst death of anybody. You know, and more people die of addiction or addiction-related diseases than all the cancers put together. Wow. But, you know, they put billions of dollars into cancer research. I think they put hundreds into addiction research. Well, here, before, I have a great clip where you're named one of the top 100 maple leaves of all time.

Like it's a very short clip. That'll kind of introduce the professional hockey career of Jim McKinney. But before that, would you mind talking to us about your own personal struggles with alcohol? I had no struggles with it. It's just a matter of going to the beer store. What's the struggle involved there?

I was just a nightmare to be around because you never knew if I was going to show up or whether I wasn't. And I never knew whether I was going to show up. I'd go out for milk and come home two days later and have no idea what happened. But it's valuable to me because now i'm a counselor and so i know exactly how an addict feels after they've gone out for i know the pitiful incomprehensible demoralization that they feel everybody else thinks that they're uh weak and and uh you know they can't handle their booze and, you know, but it's not that at all.

It's a mental disease, you know, and all addicts are mentally ill, you know, because if you know you have that phenomenon of craving, once you put the stuff into you that you're going to go to oblivion, why would you do it? You know, so you got to be nuts. When would you do it? You know, so you, you gotta be meant, you gotta be nuts. When did you, when did you stop drinking? Uh, when I was 40, 40, I, I, I had a, an inkling that I might've had a problem with

alcohol when I was 17, but I never got, you know, I never got it under control until I was 40 years old. And now I've been clean for, I'm coming up on 31 years. Good for you, man. Which is what, it had nothing to do with me. It's just I have the opportunity to work with others, and I know how to do the 12 steps, and all I have to do is teach others how to do the 12 steps and do certain prayers and do meditation.

Pete had to listen to all my meditations because I forgot my headphones when I went to Saratoga, so I bought a speaker at, it was cheap at Walmart, which is Pete's favorite store. Are you a greeter there? No, no, you can buy the Metamucil there and the wafers. Can I interject here anytime peter i take offense with jim saying it had nothing to do with him because um there's very few people who can do what jim has done and that is to be sober for 30 years after being a ridiculous drunk for so long and it does take a certain amount of mental and intellectual

strength to do what he's done and he will never take jim will never take credit for anything good he's done in his life he's a humble man that's part of his mental illness yeah well but it's a matter of surrender it's not of quitting everybody wants to quit like you know quit and that's it i'm i'm not doing this anymore you know and but you've you've got a great grasp of the solution which is to yeah but i've been doing it for 30 years well you've gotten good and i've had lucky i've been fortunate to have people put in my path that have taught me all these things so uh and i keep doing it i keep giving it away so i do it every day i'm meeting somebody today

i saw somebody yesterday. I work at a treatment center, Addiction Recovery Toronto. We might as well plug them. No, do it. Yeah, it's up on Kipling at Albion. And it's a great place. We have a treatment center there and then a halfway house across the street. And you're working with addicts and their recovery.

Drugs and alcoholics, yeah, and they're all great. Like when they're not using, I worked out in Port Hope for six years, and I would go out there on a Thursday and stay till Sunday. And I had a room and I had iPods and iPads and iPhones and everything sitting in the room. I never lost a thing in six, seven years. Nothing was ever taken out of my room. Sometimes I'd misplace it, and then I'd be blaming everybody in the house. Then I'd have to go around and make amends.

It's just old age. But it's rewarding work. You know, you don't get a lot of wins, you know, out of a hundred people, you might get four that get it, but, uh, it's, it's worth it. I mean, that's four people that you're saving their lives. And they carry the message too. So that's four more people that are out there and they get four and everybody gets, you know, four out of a hundred and you shouldn't, you shouldn't get down when you're not successful because I don't, I don't care whether the people I'm working with get better or not. I, I'm,

you know, I want, I'm supposed to be free of care, worry, and boredom. That's what, that's what recovery does for you is, is to get rid of that care. I'm just there to help. You know, I, I tell them I'm a loser, you know, so you don't have to feel bad. But if it's a mental illness, you're not a loser. Oh, I'm a loser. Yeah. It took me, uh, uh, in the big book that I work out of it, it took me

the forward to the first edition me forward to the first edition, forward to the second edition, forward to the third, forward to the fourth, the doctor's opinion in 60 pages to figure out that I was alcoholic and I couldn't manage my own life, and two, that no human power could have relieved my alcoholism, and three, that God couldn't would if you were sought. God can relieve it. He can't remove it. He can make it a lot less, and I can survive. You mentioned you started drinking as a teenager.

Yeah, I'm from Ottawa. Is that why? You've never been to Ottawa? I've been to Ottawa, yeah. Yeah, the drinking age in Ottawa is 21, and Hull is 12. Right. Okay, so we spent a lot of time on the number five bus going over to Hull.

You get a tray of draft for two bucks. Wow. Once you could drink a tray of draft without puke, you were happening. So let me now play this 30 second clip about you as one of the great Maple Leafs of all time because it'll introduce your hockey career. Who's talking here?

Here, without further ado, here, let's listen in here. Okay. Jim McKinney, who once pronounced that half the game is mental and the other half is being mental, would go on to play 14 seasons in the blue and white. Along the way, he became

the fifth highest scoring defenseman in the history of the Toronto Maple Leaf Hockey Club. Jim prompted high praise, albeit maybe a touch enthusiastic, when his GM Jim Gregory professed, I wouldn't trade Jim McKinney for Bobby Orr straight up. That's a bad GM, right? That was, yeah. That was when I was 16, when I was, I was peaking at 16. I think my best year was when I was 17,

then it was downhill from there on out. Does alcoholism play a role in that downhill at all? I don't think so. I don't, you know. You say downhill as if you had some, you had a great career, but Bobby Orr is, that's next level. I had a great career till Borya Solman got here. That was the end of it.

There is a famous story. Probably 1964, 65, when you were playing Junior B. Who did you play Junior B with? Junior B? I never played Junior B. I skipped Junior B. I went from Bantam to Junior A. What was the game that the Russian coach, Tarasov, came to?

Oh, we played, yeah. Well, there was an all-star team from the OHL. And we had, like, Mickey Redmond, Danny Grant, Serge Savard, Bobby Orr. So the story is that the great Russian coach, Tarasov, I think, came to the game because Bobby Orr was playing. And after the game, they interviewed him, and he said, Bobby Orr, a good player, I think, came to the game because Bobby Orr was playing. And after the game, they interviewed him and he said, Bobby Orr,

a good player, best player on ice, Jim McKinney. Jim hates that story. Yeah. Why do you hate that story? I don't think Tarasov is working. He's a used car salesman now. He's not working in the hockey business anymore. Yeah. I mean, I always feel bad for those guys. They compare

first round picks and say oh it's the next coming or this is the michael jordan of a hockey who they say that about somebody and it's it's not you know you were being compared to bobby or and then you had a great career but of course bobby or was bobby or and yeah uh and a great guy like bobby or as a better person than he is a player. He's an amazing guy. I could go on and on about him, but this show's about me. There's enough of Bobby.

See, Bobby never appeared on City TV, so I haven't extended an invitation. No, he didn't. He might have had a cameo appearance here and there, but nothing serious. Jim's got Bobby's number if you want him to come in next week. Okay, I'll make room for Bobby. Why not?

Once I've done Jim, I can do Bobby. I said Jim first. Why not? That's my role. Explain to Bobby who I was or who I am. Tell me about, there's a goal you scored in the AHL against the Axe, Gary Smith. Oh, yeah.

I was just golfing at Timber Ridge two days ago, and a guy, one of the bag boys there, was talking about Bart Crashly, who plays golf there. Bart used to live, I played against him in junior. He was in the Detroit chain, and he played out of junior. He was in the Detroit chain and he played out of Hamilton. He was a good hockey player. And he had the goal scoring record in Dallas of 24 goals for a defenseman. And I had 24 going into the last game of the year. We were playing against Fort Worth. Gary Smith was a really good friend of mine.

I grew up with him in Ottawa and went to Hull with him many times. And as we were skating around in the warm-up, I just said to Axe, which is his nickname, I said, Axe, I need one tonight. So the next time he skated around he said no problem did he whisper like five hole or something oh yeah well yeah in the first period i had a chance like from the top of the circle i i had the pocket and i went to shoot and i looked up at the net the whole net was empty smitty was totally off his angle like he I looked up at the net. The whole net was empty. Smitty was totally off his angle like he was right out of the net.

And I was laughing so hard I missed the net. And in the last 10 seconds of the game, we had a power play. Mike O'Connell shot one from the point. I tipped it and Smitty let it go through his legs. And then like that was it. I had the record for the Dallas Blackhawks in the Central League, which, you know. That's something.

A lot of people wouldn't brag about, but I do, you know. That's a great story anyways. It was good, yeah. And I didn't get there till Christmas. Roger sent me down there at Christmas time. I said, well, Roger, if somebody gets hurt, I'll probably come back. He says, no, you're never coming back here.

So tell me, I, sorry, you go ahead. Yeah, it's okay. Now, can you tell me a little bit about Punch Imlach? Punch, well, he was the king of Toronto when the team was winning, you know, and he was actually an amazing coach and all the guys that played for him liked him. I wasn't crazy about him because he sent me down. Like, I blamed it on him rather than I realize now that all my troubles are of my own making. And luckily, I got sent down.

I ended up going to Tulsa, then getting sent to Rochester. And I was a 19-year know, 19 year old full blown alcoholic. And there was another guy on the team that was whining and moaning about everything. So not, nobody wanted a room with either one of us. So I ended up room with Don Cherry for like three years, you know, which was great. So what was that like? Grace is the greatest, but he's the best. Uh, I, I, you know,

he would go on those rants like he does on TV, but most of the time he was a really, really good guy. And I like the rants too because, you know, he was great when he was pissed. And he was a good hockey player too. He could play. He could block shots. He could rush the puck.

You know, he could fight. He was the whole deal. But a great guy off the puck. You know, he could fight. He was the whole deal. But a great guy off the ice. And he was in a Scottish band, one of those big pipe bands. And he used to play the big drums. And you'd see him in his room twirling those broomsticks or whatever they hit that. The batons, yeah.

The batons, yeah, whatever they hit that great big drum with because that was his deal. Then he'd go through and look through all these Scottish shops for a little knife to stick in his socks. So we spent a lot of time there. We finally found one in Seattle. Luckily, there was a bar right next door, so we went and celebrated. But Grapes wasn't a heavy drinker.

He, he was just, uh, you know, he'd have six or seven beers and that'd be it. He's a lightweight. Which would barely, yeah, which would barely get me started. And, uh, then he'd leave and, uh, I'd carry on. And there's a clipping from the newspaper. I think it's out of the Toronto Star this is from 1969 okay I'll read it it says this is a quote from you I should point

out 1969 that's right either I make the Leafs this year or I want to be traded to an NHL team that can use me or I quit I've been in the minor leagues three years I've served my penance if I'm not ready by now I'm 22 then I should be looking for another vocation.

Do you remember this? No, I don't remember that at all. Actually, in fact, I even took a screen cap of the print here. What paper was that? I think it was Eternal Star, 1969. And I just thought it was interesting.

I should be looking for another vocation because at some point in this episode... I was playing good then anyways. I just played in Russia with Team Canada. So I had like a month and a half jump on all the other guys going into training camp. So I had a good camp and I think I got like 35 points or something that year. My bonus was 35 points.

I had that by Christmas. So I wound things down for the second half just so they didn't have high expectations for me the year after. I was looking for a little longevity, you know. Sure. Now, you mentioned in that clip I played where you're one of the top 100 Maple Leafs of all time. By the way, the Leafs season starts tonight.

Do you still watch? Oh yeah. Yeah. Especially if I've wagered on the game. But you ever bet against the Leafs? I haven't bet because I don't know. I don't have any feel for the team. I think that I think they're going to be good.

You know, they have a ton of talent and a lot of things have to go right for them to, to win. But they, they, they're always prepared for every game that they play and they're in every game all last year that, you know, you had to work hard to beat them. So, you know, and who, who knows what their defense is going to be like this year. All they got left is Morgan Riley from the original cast, and they'll have Muzzins for the whole year and CeCe.

I hear Sandin is really something. I haven't had a chance to see him live to what he does without the puck. That's the main thing in hockey. Like Sidney Crosby is an amazing offensive hockey player, but without the puck, he's the best in the league by far. He can engage in the play just within a split second because he's always in the right position. He sort of fashions himself after Peter Forsberg,

and he looked at all of Forsberg's tapes, and that's how he got to be such a good player without the puck. He's amazing. And that's the kind of thing that like an Austin Matthews has to learn. But I love the kid. I love the kid. And then when he got in the jackpot last week,

I would have slapped the C on him the next morning. I said, here's a kid with character. They're supposed to make that announcement today, right? Because I heard that. Well, yeah, I hope they give it to him. I hope they make him the captain, although I love Tavares. And, you know, anybody they give it to, who cares?

It doesn't really make much difference who's the captain. It's not going to win you the Stanley Cup. You know, they could give it to, you know, they could give it to me. I was the captain of the Marlies for three weeks. And then I had a little, it was one of those. Had an incident? Curfew. Yeah, it was a curfew problem.

Yeah, somebody phoned out, my landlady and myself and Jimmy Keon had been out, and he says, are the boys in? And she says, in? She says, I haven't seen them for three days. So, yeah, we got suspended for that. And then that's when we played the Russians that time, and if we didn't play good against the Russians, we were gone.

We were suspended. So we played okay. I think that it ended up in a 7-7 all tie. We were up 7-6 and then Derek Sanderson spit on somebody and got a two minute penalty and then the game

ended up in a tie. But they gave us a suitcase for that. The place was packed. I don't know how much money they brought in, but each guy on our team got a suitcase. Like in Pulp Fiction, I envision. It was a Samsonite with the snap thing on top.

Okay, and it's empty? They didn't put any money in there? Empty, oh yeah, totally empty. Just making sure. No pucks or anything in there. And so we all went up to the Parkside Tavern after the game and had a few beers.

And then the next day at the gardens, there was a message from the manager at the Parkside asking me what he was supposed to do with these 20 suitcases. I said, oh, I'll just give them away to friends. That's okay. I'll bring them down away to friends. That's funny. I'll bring them down to the workroom here at the garden. So Peter's already warned us you like to undersell yourself. So let me just give some perspective to Leaf fans listening.

Because we heard in that clip you're the fifth highest points. Sixth highest, actually. Yeah, Thomas Cabriolet went by me. And when that happened, I went and saw Tommy. Oh, yeah, you're sixth. I thought you were a lot better than that. So here are the guys ahead of you. Okay, so Borg Salming,

Thomas Caberle, Tim Horden, and Ian Turnbull. That's it. There's a fifth missing there somewhere. No, because Borg, Caberle, Horden, Turnbull. Who am I missing? Maybe somebody super recently. Okay, I have to go to the archives and Who am I missing? Maybe somebody like super recently.

Okay, I have to go to the archives and find who I'm missing. It doesn't matter. Who's counting? I am. Yeah? Would you? Well, it doesn't make much difference to me if I was the sixth or the ninth highest scorer or the 15th highest scorer. At least you scored some.

You know, so that's okay. And I was lucky. I played on the power play until Boyer got there. And so then you get extra points for all that. Oh, for sure. For sure. You can dine in on that. So it was great.

I played a couple of games with Daryl Sittler when Daryl was the best center. He was probably the best hockey player in, in, in the world after he'd scored that goal against the Czechs and they, they won the world cup or something. When he came back from there, oh God, he was just, he owned the puck. No, no one guy could ever get it from him. So he'd always draw two players to him and he'd

usually go over to his left and then the right winger just break into the hole. He just dropped the puck into the hole. And I had like six, seven breakaways in three games I hadn't had a breakaway in my life. And kept hitting posts and I scored a couple of goals, but then we were playing Montreal one night and Red Kelly came over to me.

He says, I think we're going to try Lanny on that right side tonight. And the rest is history. The rest is history. And so was I. Yeah. Yeah. So, but it was great.

You know, Lanny was great. I loved Lanny. I was actually at the game where Sittler scored 10 points. Wow. I was at that game. That beats me. So why did. He wouldn't have scored the 10 points if I wasn't a healthy scratch that night.

You know, because then Boston would have been right in it. Nice to be part of history. Reese, right? This goaltender for the Bruins, something Dave, something Reese? Dave Reese. Dave Reese, yeah. Okay. Why was he never pulled in that game?

Like, do we know why? Because Graves hated him and he wanted to get rid of him. So he just, he left them in there and let him die. That's cruel and unusual punishment. Yeah, well, it's okay. I was sitting up at the Golden Mug watching it on TV right up the street from the gardens.

Do you get access to the, what's it called, the Alumni Lounge at the Scotiabank Arena? Yeah, a couple of times every year you get to bring a couple of guests into the Alumni Box. So it's not like a gold ticket that you can just come and go every game.

I think you can, yeah, I think you can go all the time. I never go because the game's so fast now that I can't follow it. So I like to watch it at home and then I get all the replays and I can do a heavy up on Bodog if, you know, if they get behind and I think they can make a comeback. I got in there once.

Like one time in my life I got into the Alumni Lounge box. Stu Gavin got me in there once. Oh, okay. So you got to know somebody. So obviously I'm just trying to, I was thinking, oh, maybe if Howie's there all the time, maybe he can sneak me in once or twice. But let me ask a question.

Probably not. Probably not. I only get it a couple of times. Stewie's sort of one of the officials there. I think Stewie does some work for the alumni. He's a finance guy now. He does financial services. Yeah, you have to have a couple of million bucks before they look after you or something.

So I'll tell them about my $3,300. It's going to find out if Peter was with Stu Gavin, but no, you don't have the two mil. Not yet. Not yet. No, if this Gallagher and Gross Saves the World thing takes off. Do you mind?

Let me play the promo. I never played promo. Let me play the promo. So everybody again, reminder, go to search for Gallagher and Gross Save the promo. I never play promo. Let me play the promo. Here's the promo. So everybody, again, reminder, go to searchforgallagher and grow, save the world. Also, on torontomic.com, I just posted a link to a page that has links to subscribe. If you're an Apple person, here, go here.

If you're a Google person, go here. If you're a Spotify user, go here. So that's all conveniently placed at torontomic.com right now. But let me play the promo and before i play it the voice we hear at the beginning is may pots how did we secure uh the great may pots for this i had nothing to do with it gallagher knows all the great women in the world as we learned in episode seven right discussed. Okay, here's the promo. Gallagher and Gross save the world. Yeah, right.

This is funny. Oh, it's not supposed to be funny? This is serious? Okay, then. Gallagher and Gross save the world with your hosts, Peter Gross and John Gallagher. John Gallagher. He's loud, obnoxious, over-the-top,

nine-time winner of the Toronto Sun Sportscaster of the Year, Foster Hewitt Award winner. Peter Gross. Mischievous, creative, hilarious. A five-time Edward R. Murrell Award winner. Gallagher once lit David Bowie's cigarette. Peter lost a game of squash to Wayne Gretzky, who had never played the game before.

Gallagher claims he woke up next to Paris Hilton. She was right there. Peter, who was shorter than most jockeys, once slept with a six-foot fashion model. John Gallagher was once a Quebec boxing star. Undefeated. Peter Gross once wrestled a 500-pound bear. And I won. John Gallagher was fired by City TV and AM740.

Peter Gross was fired by City TV and AM 740. Peter Gross was fired by City TV and 680 News. And which one of us did more cocaine? I snorted a small mountain in the Andes. Gallagher and Gross saved the world. So if that doesn't whet your appetite, nothing will, right? I got to go listen to those things. You're excited, Jim?

Yeah. I got Spotify. I don't know where I'd find it on Spotify. Search for Gallagher and Gross. Yeah, just search for it in the search field. Oh, really? Yeah, it's that easy. Oh, okay.

On Spotify, of course. I'll put it on my playlist. Do it up. We mentioned him at some point. I'm sure. I hope so. Which episode? That'll be the only one I'll take.

I can't remember. I'll just listen to it over and over and over again. Before I have you off the leaves here, I need to ask you a question from a listener. Where is it here, Mike? Okay. Kevin wants me to ask you about Jacques Plante. Jacques Plante.

Good player. Good player. Cheap. Like cheap in that he wouldn't pick up the time? They had to get him an apartment and then he called Howie Starkman who was our, he looked after all the players and did all the business and that.

And Jacques wondered where all the players and did all the business and that and and uh jacques wondered where all the the cutlery and um and plates and everything were because uh you know he needed those to eat like he didn't think he was gonna you know have to be responsible to buy the buy the all that kind of stuff you know so uh but he was a good But he was a good player. He was a great player. He made Bernie Perrant way better. He worked with Bernie for about three, four months, and Bernie was twice the goalie. And the Flyers ended up benefiting him.

Yeah, yeah. He was amazing. Because we had Jacques and Bernie, and I don't know, was Eddie Johnson there at that that time i'm not sure yeah that's how bad our defense was we had three goalies instead of uh just two jock plow of course he got a lot of heat for being the first guy to put a mask on like what what a coward right and now it's like who were the how crazy were they before that they didn't wear any facial mask it's kind of nuts when you think about it. One time he squealed on us for drinking too.

Oh, that's like a rat. Yeah, he went to Johnny McClellan and told him that the guys were really drinking a lot. And Johnny says, tell me something I don't know. Jimmy, you're kidding me. In 74, you played in the all-star game. Yeah.

Yeah. That was just because, uh, Daryl Sittler's wife was, um, was, um, delivering a baby at the time. So, uh, Daryl couldn't show up. So I, uh, I got, I got roped into playing in that game and I got a phone call at about 10 o'clock at night at the Palmer House in Chicago,

and it went somehow like, Jim, this is Scotty. I want you to play for me tomorrow night. And I said, Cash, fuck off. I thought it was Cashman screwing around, right? So then Jim Gregory came to the door about a half hour later and told me I had to play the next night. I'd just gotten arrested in Atlanta about two nights before.

We had the big bowling for dollars. It was well documented in most of the newspapers and tv stations in in canada which we had a bit of a problem there um can you imagine if that happened water fight can you imagine if that happened today oh god yeah because yeah because everybody could have seen it yeah well tell me uh what are we talking about here? Just remind me. Oh, there was a, we played against Atlanta and then in the hotel in Atlanta, started with a water fight.

Then we started unscrewing the light fixtures and there were these balls that we whistled down the hallway and when they hit the wall, they just explode. Errol Thompson opened his door once at the wrong time, and he had little blood spots all over his body. Trapnil. Yeah, we loved that. So he really got into it then.

And then I got into the stairwell where I found all the room service plates that had been taken off the floor that night. And so I had sort of had control out in the middle of the... Can you imagine? Yeah. And so I was whistling those down the corridor. And then four or five cops and Red Kelly came around the corner and caught me. And so I ran to my room, and Timmy Ecclestone was my roomie.

And just as I got to the door, I heard a click, and I heard Timmy screaming and laughing on the other side. Yeah, I said, oh, I love you. And, oh, yeah, so then it wasn't good after that. and oh yeah so then I was it wasn't good after that I had to go with red too uh because I was the player rep for the the Leafs at that time the only reason I was the player rep because every time you got you were the player rep you got traded so I figured that'd be a good way to get traded plus you got a trip to uh I just asked them where the trip was. They said Bermuda this year. I said, I'm in.

I'll be the, yeah, I'll be the player rep. That sounds like a good deal. Oh, yeah, it was great. Paul Hawkyard says, when he found out you were coming on Toronto Mic'd, he said, totally awesome. And awesome's in all caps, by the way. That means something. Yeah. Howie is a Toronto legend.

He probably missed where he got it stuck. He also put legend. He goes, Howie is a Toronto legend. He put legend in all caps as well. So you're a legend. And both as an athlete and broadcaster, ask him about the Vic Tanney or Super Jim photo ads. Priceless.

Oh, well, I was in between jobs at that time, okay? And I think I was doing some modeling and uh that was one of the legitimate jobs that i had uh my main job was for uh safety supply i did bomb suits because i was the only model strong enough to to walk around in a 100-pound bomb suit. Wow. Yeah, so it was show business at its finest. I was going to say this is post-hockey pre-City TV. That was between, yeah, that was between hockey and going to City TV. I was doing some high-fashion modeling for Safety Supply.

And I guess that was one of the gigs that i had i yeah i'm glad he got a kick out of that i enjoyed getting though i think 200 bucks or something when was your whatever it was vic tannies yeah yeah i didn't get a membership or anything but uh you know it was okay okay okay any fine. No, you can't sneeze at that. Now, when does your pro hockey, like what year approximately are we talking about your pro hockey career coming to an end? Well, I retired in 75, but I didn't tell anybody. So they kept paying me for about another five years and then sent me to Dallas. And then I went over, I got traded to Minnesota.

Right. Uh, that was in about 1979. And that was the year Minnesota went together with Cleveland. So, um, fortunately Toronto was paying all my salary. Uh, They didn't get anything for me. The only agreement that the North Stars had to come to was that they would keep me. Don't send them back. So I went there, and then at Christmas time, they sent me down to Oklahoma City, and then I was finished. My contract was up. I was on a five-year deal for, I think, 120 a year.

And then I went over to Europe, and I couldn't get a job in Europe because I called Eagleson's office, and they weren't going to make any money off me signing over there. I wouldn't make, you know, and it wasn't worth their while to make a call. So they just told me that they're not taking any guys over 30 years old over there, which was BS. And so it ended up where I was with Robbie Walton, a friend of mine, and another guy, Urs Ammerly, who was from Rappersville in Switzerland. Robbie had played in Rappersville.

He said that, told Urs that I was looking for a job. So Urs called the president of the team, and I negotiated my contract in French. In French. And he wanted to know if I wanted to get paid on Canadien or on Amérique. And I said, Freddie, I think we're going to get along fine. I'll take that Améric.

What kind of money was that? I think I made 30 grand over there and then I was doing some modeling over there. I was at International Top Models here in Toronto and before I left, I went in to check in and I had my book there and you have all these pictures of yourself and that stuff. And then there was another book there, some guy from New York had said, international top models, New York, New York. So I just figured,

why not take his pictures out of that, put them in mine and put mine in his. And then I took him over to Switzerland and passed my pictures around in this portfolio. And they all thought I was from New York. Smart. So I worked for every photographer in Zurich once. They never called me back, but they never talked amongst each other. So I got to work with them. Yeah, there's no centralized database or whatever.

That was fabulous. Fantastic. So I got a lot of work done. I made another maybe $15,000, $20,000 doing that. And then my kids were going to school. My daughter was at the American International School. My son was at the Elk School in Kilchburg, right next to the lint plant.

So he got a lot of chocolate, and not a lot of knowledge, but big on chocolate. And so the team paid for those things. And so you ended up, you made a good living over there. And I know guys were making three or four times what I was making, but it was a lot more than I could make modeling or anything. So, you know, and I was happy to play over there. We played outdoors.

It was, you know, the rink in Rappersville was outdoors. So we played in the snow and the rain and all that kind of stuff. And then we'd play up in the mountains up in Ombree where it was about 40 below one night we were playing up there. And it had a covered rink, but the ends were open. So the wind would just whip right through, right? I told all the juniors, they grabbed an extra blanket because I'm not coming off tonight. I played the whole 60 minutes.

You had to keep moving. Stay warm. Oh, God, it was freezing cold, but it was great. Okay, this is a perfect time to segue you from a pro hockey star to a broadcaster at City TV, but I need to give you some gifts. So let's step down. I'm going to give you, and I don't know if Peter's going to try to score this himself or you guys going to share it here, but this is for Jim.

It's a large meat lasagna. It's frozen, but it's from Palma's Kitchen, from Palma Pasta. And Jim, they'd love for you to take that home with you today. Well, yeah, I'm going to be very popular at home. I wish I still had my dog. She loved any kind of pasta. I was here previously for a podcast that I did with you, Mike. You gave me one of these. And generally speaking, when you get something frozen your expectations aren't too high took this home this palma lasagna was fantastic yeah you're probably thinking oh it's like you pick it up in a grocery store but

no this this is uh the authentic recipe that they've been using for decades uh the palma is the name of the uh matriarch of the petrucci family and it's a family-run business still the same recipes they started this up in the 80s so it's the real deal i urge everybody to go to palmapasta.com find out they're in mississauga and oakville and they're on skip the dishes too and here's the big news maybe i'll see jim there peter better see you there but on december 7th at noon toronto Listener Experience will be held at Palmas Kitchen. I got a pretty good feeling I'm going to be there. Well, make sure you're taken care of.

I want you there because we can talk a little. Who's your guest that day? Might be Jim McKinney. I don't know. I have to negotiate. Can you get me Don Cherry? Can you get me Don Cherry? It's in his backyard.

I don't think so. I don't know. All right, I won't put that on the post. He would do it if I asked him to, but I can't ask him. What I have to do is get Peter to get you to get Don Cherry to come to TMLX5. Okay, yeah. Sounds like it could work.

This is pretty well the extent of my influence. Okay, well, this is fantastic. I'm honored to have Jim here. So, Jim, you not only get the lasagna, but there's some stickeru.com stickers here. Okay, and I can put them on my car? Oh, I'd love it. If I had a car, yeah.

I'll just put them on my bag that I take on the subway. You stick it on that bag, and I would be honored. Stickeru. Stickeru.com. And stickers, if you're getting decals or stickers You stick it on that bag and I would be honored. Sticker you. Sticker you.com. Stickers if you're getting decals or stickers or buttons or temporary tattoos or you get the idea. Yeah, if you ever need any of that stuff, you just go to sticker you.com. Right, sticker you.com. And you can upload the image online and then just say how many of what you want.

And it's a great price and great service. And they put, they created the decals behind us and they created those stickers for you. These are all waterproof and everything. It's super, uh, absolutely waterproof. Are you kidding?

I have one in my car. Uh, it survived the rainstorm last night, so it's in good shape. So they also have a bricks and mortar store on queen street, which you should check out in your bath or stare. And also there's a contest going on so if anyone takes a photo of toronto that they deem to be an iconic toronto photo uh tweet it at toronto mike and sticker you and use the hashtag sticker uto

sticker uto and you're gonna you could win a hundred dollars to spend at the uh bricks and mortar store on queen street and they'll also take your image and create some stickers out of it for you. So please enter that contest. Fantastic. So you got stickers. That actually you got in your hand is not a condom. Who thought it was a condom? It looks like a condom. That would be Gallagher. Gallagher probably

thought it was a condom. I don't know what it is. It's for mounting your phone on something. My wife loves it. You stick it on the back of your phone and then your phone, it's like a tripod almost like a stand so you could watch things on your phone on something? My wife loves it. You stick it on the back of your phone and then your phone, it's like a tripod almost, like a stand, so you can watch things on your phone. It's very convenient. You pop it out and then it leans it on the table,

whatever, and you can watch your phone or if you have a video on there. You can watch horse races on your phone. Right. Popsocket. Bingo. And I got one for you too, Peter. I'll get you one. But that's from Kappa D LLP. So let me play a clip. This is another thing we've been running here where listeners would submit questions for Rupesh Kapadia,

the rock star accountant who sees beyond the numbers. Sheila sent in a question, and Rupesh recorded an answer to her question. So here's Rupesh. Hi, I'm Rupesh Kapadia, the rock star accountant who sees beyond numbers. Today's Toronto Mic'd listener question comes from Sheila. Sheila wants to know the CRA policy with respect to record retention.

So here you go, Sheila. First off, you have to retain records in Canada at your place of business or residence. The records should be kept for six years from the end of the tax year. So in a way, you have to keep the records for seven years. And finally, the documents can be stored in an accessible and readable electronic format. I think the requirement is that the electronic document should be clear and identical to the paper document and should not have been tempered with. But please ensure that you have multiple backups of the electronic documents if you do decide to keep it in electronic format. I hope this answers your questions.

Until next time, keep rocking. Thank you. So thanks, Rupesh. That's for Sheila. And if either of you gents need some accounting help, I can get you a free consultation with Rupesh, Rockstar accountant. Really? Yeah. Let me know. Let me know. He takes care of you. You might need some help, Peter, with your moving some finances around. Or with the Gallagher and Groves operation, when it takes off, you might need to hide something in some shelter somewhere

in some Cayman Islands account or something like that. That would be good. He can help you with that. Now, pumpkins after dark. This is happening in Milton. So this is 5,000 hand-carved pumpkins that illuminate the skies at Country Heritage Park in Milton. So this is 5,000 hand-carved pumpkins that illuminate the skies at Country Heritage Park in Milton, Ontario.

It's going on now, and it goes till November 3rd. You can go to pumpkinsafterdark.com right now and book your day and time you want to go. I can't wait to go. I have tickets for you, Jim. I'll email you two PDFs, and you can check it out for free.

But for everybody else, you can save 10% if you use the promo code Pumpkin Mike. So use Pumpkin Mike at pumpkinsafterdark.com. So I go to look at pumpkins? It's, yeah, but 5,000 hand-carved pumpkin. I'm 72 years old. There's music too.

I don't spend my evenings looking at pumpkins. Trust me. Where's this happening? Milton. This is Milton, Ontario. Now that's right around the corner from mohawk oh yeah combine these efforts change let's see yeah peter's the brain what time should start when the dark when it's dark like a seven o'clock post okay right afterwards but you're

you got the tickets you can pass them on to a to a loved one or whatnot that's fabulous and enjoy that now last this is exciting for me i don't get to do this every episode. I'm announcing a new partner of the program. This is thrilling for me because this gentleman came over the other day and recorded a special message for Jim McKinney because this guy knows you, Jim. His name is Brian Master.

And Brian Master is with Keller Williams Realty Solutions Brokerage. I know Brian Master. with Keller Williams Realty Solutions Brokerage. I know Brian Master. Let's hear. He used to be at City TV at one time. City TV, Chum FM. Yeah, which is Chum City. Yeah, of course.

Let's hear from Brian. This is a message for you, Jim. Hi, it's Brian Master. You probably know me from being on the radio for quite a while, but I'm also Brian Master, sales representative with Keller Williams Realty Solutions Brokerage. And I get to ask the famous Jim McKinney a question here. Jim, do you remember that charity race that you and Jonathan Gross and I did?

I can't remember who it was for. It was around Queens Park in front of the ROM, down Queens Park around the circle. And we came back up huffing and puffing and coughing. I'll never forget. You got to the finish line, and what did you do? Had a smoke. No.

Yeah, I remember, Brian, yes. We didn't do that well in that race, did we? I don't know. But I remember racing in a master's race there where I got dropped, and I was the last one there. And it was a criterion around the, that's what they call a circle race in cycling. Velodrome? No.

No, no. Oh, that's what I was going to say. Yeah, I went on the velodrome in Delhi. Almost got killed. Yeah, I didn't have the skills. It's got that angle, right? Oh, yes, sir. And your wheels compress.

I'm trying to get this. Oh, yeah. Okay, my wife swears by it. You pull, yeah, so you glue it to the back of the phone. Like glue it. Like there's a sticker that comes off and it goes on the back of the phone. And you pull it out and you can, it, like glue it, like there's a sticker that comes off and it goes on the back of the phone and you pull it out and you can,

it angles like a, yeah, I mean. Oh yeah, I see now. Yeah, but you gotta, you know what you gotta do.

So, that's a sticker. At the back, that 3M part, that comes off, peels off and then you glue it. Yeah,

my wife swears by it. She thinks these are the coolest things, pop sockets. So, Brian Master, by the way, if you email him at letsgetyouhome at kw. Master, by the way, if you email him at letsgetyouhome

at kw.com, he'd love to add you to his mailing list. He's an honest real estate salesman. And we're going to hear more from him. As they all are. Well, not all of them, of course. There's 50,000 of them, you know. They can't all be honest. There are? I don't know.

Sounds about right, don't you think? Peter figured out the Capadilla pop socket, which is fantastic. Not really. Not really. It's pretty sophisticated for me. Well, here, let's get you to City TV. Here's the story I'm dying to hear is, Jim,

how do you end up at City TV? At that time, I was working at Q107 Radio. And I was also doing Canadian-Italian hockey on Friday nights from St. Mike's Arena with Brad Diamond. So I had a little TV experience. And luckily, I got hired by Gary Slate to work in sales and on air at Q107. After seven months, he fired me from sales and kept me on air. So I was on with Gene Valaitis and- Jesse and Gene?

No, that was later. Okay, pre-Jesse and Gene, gotcha. Yeah, that was later. Yeah, so there was James Leitis and Scruffy. Yeah, and so, yeah, it was great. That was rock and roll radio and lots of fun. I worked there for two and a half, three years, and then I kept bugging Gross to see if I'd get a job at City TV, and Jim Taddy left.

Yes, guy. At that time, I was doing a job at City TV, and Jim Taddy left. Yes, guy. At that time, I was doing a lot of running. I was the next-door neighbor of Moses, so it had to go through Moses. I don't know whether he made it real tough on me or I just made it tough on myself, but after about 25 auditions, I ended up getting the job. I think the main reason I got the job is because I'd run bets to, uh, Greenwood park or, uh, for,

for my boss over here every night, I'd have to go to go down there and bet the double right after the show. And then, uh, maybe if there if there was something good in one of the later races, I'd have to run back down there. I could get down there in my Volkswagen in about seven and a half minutes and lay one in. My version of this goes like this. I don't know if he'll subscribe to this. Probably talking 79, 80, around that and um i was

doing the late night sports and then after 11 like really 11 30 jim would come in and would read a sportscast and um to be perfectly honest that the first few were terrible no they were terrible he was he was stiff he was just stiff on air. So out of desperation, one night he's doing the sports, and I'm standing behind the camera, and every time he talked about a football game, I would do like a mime of a guy throwing a pass and making a great save. And if hockey, I'd slap shot and catch the ball.

So I was just acting like a complete maniac behind the camera. He got a smile on his face and he relaxed and it kind of made him enjoy it more. Boy, he ended up doing a lot of sportscasts. I hear the music in the background. Yeah, this is the City Pulse at 6.

Gonna Fly Now by Maynard Ferguson. Really? Yeah. Showtime. I'm up in 20 minutes. As long as there isn't a snowstorm. Right.

All he did was weather at City TV. You know, we were talking about Gordon Martin over before. Yeah. We did a gag. You won't see this in television anymore. We had the freedom to do this. So we set up this gag. I was doing the 6 o'clock sports one day, and two-thirds of the way through the sportscast,

I started stumbling and lost my way. And Martineau, the camera pulls wide, Martineau says to me, are you all right? Can you carry on? I said, no, I'm gassed. I'm out. And he taps his left arm, right? Because the talk at that time was who was going to be the closer for the Blue Jays.

Right. So I left the seat. Jim came on and saved the sports cast. Well, that's great. You just won't see that kind of thing anymore. No, because it's fun. Yeah. Right?

The fun's not allowed anymore. Is that right? Everyone just seems to be a carbon copy of everyone else now. Well, we talked about this before, especially in the Gallagher and Gross episode about the Moses episode. We talked a lot about this. But tell me, maybe I'll ask Jim for his perspective, but what was it like working for Moses,

like the culture Moses cultivated at City TV? It was fantastic. I mean, he let you do whatever you wanted to do, you know, and if you made a mistake, he'd call you up to the office and ream you out. But, you know, that's okay. I learned a lot. And I learned, you know, from Moses and from Peter, from everybody at City TV. Do you want to name drop?

Don't mean to interrupt, of course, but I love hearing like some of the people you remember working with back then. Mark Daly, Peter. The Voice. John Whaley, Greg Manzik, Debbie Van Kiekebel they started with. I think Ann Romer was second.

And Catherine came, I guess, later on. We've got to give a shout-out to Bill Litanosoff, the greatest sports cameraman of all time. Yeah, Bill Litanosoff and Russ Salzberg. I forgot Russ. Why would we give a shout-out to Russ Salzberg? the tennis and and uh russ salzburg i forgot russ you know and your arguments with russ but uh yeah bill the tennis off was by far the the best sports camera guy in cameraman in in in the world i would imagine because most guys to get a highlight package of a game would have to

shoot maybe 15 20 minutes of this right and then they'd edit it down to a minute and a half bill could do it on about seven minutes wow and he had this way of pulling the camera away and just looking at you and that's all you needed to know uh yeah it's done yeah very recent guest uh was lauren honickman oh and lauren told the story of what happened to Bill. Yeah, terrible accident. He got run down shooting a crime scene, and he's now blind. He's a complete quadriplegic. But when you go to visit him, he's still 100% okay.

Still sharp. A huge Bruins fan. Huge. And just his courage in accepting what happened to him because it's one of the very worst things you will ever he lost everything in a split second um and doesn't spend a second feeling sorry for himself is he's a amazing inspiration uh lauren and his wife host a birthday party for him i hope i have my story right and he was telling me about you about some of the people

who attended this most recent one. And you guys were both there. Yeah. Gord was there. Yeah, we try and go see Bill as much as possible. Jojo was there. Steve Hurlbut was there. Martineau was there.

A lot of the, Big Al McCormick, another cameraman was there. A lot of the, uh, big Al McCormick, uh, another cameraman was there, but, uh, just when you build it so much for my work and for Jim's work in terms of heightening and enhancing what we were doing. Cause his, his remarkable skill as a sports cameraman is just, uh, unparalleled. Will Bill listen to Gallagher and grow, save the world? Probably. I guess he can't watch anything. So he, his, his lifeline is radio and theater of the mind. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Will listen to Gallagher and Groh's Save the World? Probably, because he can't watch anything.

So his lifeline is radio. Theater of the mind. Yeah, yeah. Maybe he'll listen to this episode, so you can give a shout out to him. Hi, Bill. Hi, Bill. Yeah, the Bruins are going to be okay, Bill.

You know what he'd say? He'd say, I'm just the cameraman. Never wanted any attention. Yeah, he was an incredible guy when he when he first was injured and and uh there were a few screw-ups with um the insurance we tried to do a show we were going to do a show where i'd walk around a golf course and and talk to another sports celebrity. And, you know, we had to do a pilot. And so I phoned Bobby Orr and asked him if he'd do it. And he did it, and he wouldn't take the money for it. You know, we wanted to pay him a certain amount.

He wouldn't take any money for it. Wow. And he stayed and did it for two or three hours at Ovenberg up in Muskoka. And, you know, it's just, Bobby's such an amazing guy to have done that. And he only did it because he knew that Bill was a huge Bruins fan. Right. And, you know, we never did get the show going. We sold it to Rogers, and then they decided not to take it.

And so it never went any further. But Bill did very well with his lawyers. And I think John Whaley really helped him out a lot. So he did okay. He's doing great. Good to hear. I'm going to play a little bit of you, Jim, on City Pulse Sports. So here's a little taste.

Here's the girls' highlights. I just shot them. You got the guys already there, right? Yes. 1993, by the way great crowd really good game too sports next with Howie

they really shuffled the deck in the NHL today yeah sad Gordon it isn't the way of the world the league's losing a little tradition and gaining a lot of bucks here we go there's no more Norris division it's the Central now.

Tampa is gone, and the Jets and Dallas have been added. Welcome, Teemu. The Ducks lead things up in the Pacific. It appears that they can forget about making the playoffs for at least a decade. He's doing the math in their head. The Northeast over in the Eastern Conference looks like a meat grinder. Your basic atoms with the penguins added.

And the Atlantic, well, it's a bit of a cakewalk there. Six trips a season to Florida. Need I say any more? I love it. I'm just listening back. A little nostalgia here, but it's got a little personality, right? It's fun. I miss the old City Pulse sports.

Here, I'll bring it down, Jim. Well, we're allowed to do that. You're allowed to be a character. You're allowed to go out and like kid sports, high school sports. When I first started there, Pete said, you got to set some goals when you're doing this. And so I set a goal to get a hundred or a thousand kids on TV. I think it started with a hundred to get their names and show them playing their sport. And it just kept going.

And then I went to a thousand and uh i ended up getting like 10 000 kids on tv you know so it was amazing i loved doing high school sports if you went to one of these high school sports events you could be guaranteed that every single kid who saw the camera would turn on city of course and then you have them you have them for life right because uh they'll never they'll never stop telling the story and the family will tune in and they'll be talking about the time they were on City TV.

I still see them now on the street and they say, oh yeah, you came to our high school. Yeah. It's a big deal. I was one of your athletes of the week. I think the one thing Jim and I shared in common is that for a certain period of time at City TV,

we far preferred going out to a high school football game than the Leafs or the Blue Jays because that was... Or the Raptors. Yeah, well, everyone was covering that, and that's how we were different. Right. Now, just earlier, I played some of that Gonna Fly Now by Maynard Ferguson. But here's the other City Pulse jam, right? This was City Pulse Tonight. If you have any Pavlovian dog reaction to it, do you remember this?

Does anyone know the name of this song? This is a little trivia you'll never get, but it's called Pentatus. I hope I'm saying that right. Pentatus. Yeah, you've got it. I think that's right. But you hear the opening beats to this, and you want to hear, like, tonight. You can kind of hear Mark Daly or whatever in your mind's eye.

Yeah, it would be Mark Daly, wouldn't it? He did all the promos. He used to make hundreds of dollars doing all the promos for City TV. He was the voice. That's what they called him. That's right. The voice. Amazing pipes. But here, like, you know, murder in Uptown,

Cabbage Town, whatever. Alright, we'll bring it down. So thanks to Ed Conroy for those two songs anyways. Thank you, Ed. I want to take us to December 27th, 2009, which is the final Jim McKinney broadcast. That's the final, Jim.

But I mean, before I get there, any other stories or memories you want to share from those many, many, many years working at City TV? I like going there every day. I couldn't wait to get to work. When I first started there, I think I missed seven Mondays in a row, and then I got pulled aside by one of the producers, and they said, listen, there's a bit of a pattern going on here.

one of the producers and they said, listen, there's a bit of a pattern going on here. And then, you know, after that, I, you know, I was full of gratitude that I had a job. And like, I never missed the most time I ever took off at city was two weeks. And I think I only did that maybe three times in 25 years. And now I, you know, never got into the pension plan. Because I didn't even know they had one. I always thought I was going to get fired the next day anyway, so it didn't really matter.

But I loved all the people there. The people that were on air, you know,'re calling vons and peter silverman and watch it buddy yeah yeah yeah yeah and uh oh bob um bob hunter bob hunter well david only such a great story yeah yeah yeah david only thought i can only be in radio because i had polio and i'm in a wheelchair and nobody wants to see a guy in a wheelchair on TV. Moses saw something that he'd done, because Onley was very bright, and offered him a job. And apparently for the first couple of weeks, they kept shooting David from the waist up so you couldn't really tell that he had this issue.

And Moses reamed the cameraman and cameraman says you shoot him full body right i want people to see because because uh that was moses moses wanted real people on tv and that made no difference because only was bright and articulate knowledgeable right now yeah absolutely that's a the vision of moses now may i ask about Brian Linehan? Because I was a big fan of his interviews. Brian, yeah. Brian was sort of a superstar, though. He had his own office and everything over in Much Music. And we didn't see him that much in the newsroom.

But he was always a great guy. He's famous for his interviews about one-third of the way. And in the interviews interviews the biggest stars in the world would say how did you know that he was so well prepared in a pre-internet world those weren't easy to find those facts so he had good people working with him and for him you know he was but he was a good guy he could deliver the goods he was fantastic why like what happens that it comes to an end for uh for howie on uh december 27th 2009 uh well two words katherine humphries she was better than gallagher and i put together the first night she went on

and uh it was just a matter of us hanging. I told John not to cause any waves here. Maybe we can just hang on and, uh, you know, last another five, six, seven years. And, uh, John started to complain about his, uh, airtime and that. And, uh, he got gassed after two years and then I then I lasted about five or six. Then she wanted the six o'clock show and, and way more money. So they had to get rid of me. So they called me in and, and offered me a

termination contract. I said to the guy, does that mean I'm fired? And the guy says, uh, yeah. How are you with that? I said, great. I said, what's the deal? He said, oh, you're such an icon and everything. We're going to give you the biggest buyout that we've ever given anybody. We're going

to give you a $50,000. This was in February of 2009 or 2010 or whatever, back then. And in February, he said, we'll give you $50,000 and then you can work till July and then it's over. And I February, he said, we'll give you $50,000, and then you can work till July, and then it's over. And I said, well, that's very flattering. I said, but my wife would kill me if I didn't talk to this friend of hers that he's some kind of labor guy or something. So as soon as I got out of the office, I had two labor lawyers on speed dial. I hit number one. David Harris picked it up, and I said,

Dave, I just got gassed. He said, great, come on over. So I went over to see him, and then he told me everything to say and what I might be able to get. And so I went back to see the guy from Rogers. His name was somebody Smith, but it probably wasn't his real name because all he did was go around and fire people. Oh, man.

Yeah, so I said, you know, Mr. Smith, take your time with this, but if you were me, would you take the 50 grand and work till July or just walk out the door right now and get 400? He said, you'll never get it. I said, we'll see. Nice talking to you. And so I went out and then I ended up getting like 300 or something, but they kept me on every Saturday because Catherine didn't like working on the weekend. So I worked every Saturday for a whole year. So everybody thought

I still had a job. I didn't have to be in there until 3.30 every day, but I would be there at noon sharp and then set up all the racing channels because they didn't have a racing channel. I would bat horses all day long. I would have paid to work there. It was just, it was fabulous. It was really good. Hey, let's do a quick PSA that if anyone out

there, no matter what your industry, but you get that, you know, hey, meet us in this room or whatever, this boardroom, whatever. And then you got to, usually there's a, meet us in this room or whatever, this boardroom, whatever, and then you got to, usually there's a couple of people there, somebody from HR, maybe the person

you report to, but you'll get an envelope, not an envelope, like a portfolio, like Manila, whatever they're going, they'll get some papers passed to you.

Never sign anything in these meetings. Like this is just, just because some people I think might be naive and think, oh, to get this money,

I got to sign it now. Never, ever, ever sign it in the meeting, always. Well, your ego takes a hit, right? And so even though I got a good buyout, I was still hot at Rogers, and then I figured, you know, they employ 60,000 people feeding their kids and doing all this and doing that. And I did okay by it.

And I would have stayed there forever, so I would have never got a job in recovery that I'm doing now. Like for the last 10 years, I've been working in drug and alcohol recovery business. And it's been great. I love it. The money's not even close to what it was at City TV, but I enjoy the work better. It's more rewarding.

Yeah, yeah. That four out of 100 is well worth it. It's great. No, good for you, good for you. well worth it yeah it's great no no good for you good for you now so we basically stopped seeing your your handsome mug on the screen in 2009 late 2009 and then yeah that was due to hd i think you're not so handsome when you're on that hd peter remind me when did moses leave chump city uh interestingly enough moses was sent packing almost to the week that i was fired in 2004 so i okay vintage 2004 and then when does rogers take over uh do you remember that uh

it had to be it had to be after 2006 because i returned to 680 news and I remember being at 680 News when they took over. Gotcha. So 2006, 2007, 2008. So Jim, how would you compare and contrast the Moses era to the, let's just say the Rogers era. I know there's an era before Rogers takes over where Moses is gone. Yeah, the Moses influence was always there for every moment that it would, but it started to be less and less. And then you, you start getting less cameras to go out.

At one time we had 25 cameras that, you know, and trucks and, and cameramen that would take you out and to do local shoots. Now I think they have six, you know, so it's, it's very expensive to go out and do that and gather news

and to do the high school football. You can never do the high school football games now because I used to go out at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, get there at 3.30, shoot till 4.30, and then come back and edit and then write my script and go on. Now with the traffic so bad, you couldn't do it. You'd have to have a chopper to you know, to do that kind of stuff. So it's impossible.

And they've cut way back. I think a lot of the revenues went out of television and onto the internet. And so I was in that exchange. But I was there at the right time. Like the time that I was working from like 80, 89 to uh, uh, 2000, nine, 14 or 2009 or whenever it was, uh, was the best time to be in TV and city TV was the best TV station in the world to work at. By far the best in the world because I went to these goofy games down in the States

where they would have teams from every major market throughout the States and in Japan and in Europe. And they all knew City TV. Everybody copied City TV. There was one station in every market that would use the city tv template so you know it was great i think what happened with city tv is that at the onset in the in the mid 70s that uh particularly the the presentation of the news was so different and so exciting and so locally based um that it grabbed an audience because people

could see it was so different and so much more entertaining. And what happened was then City TV began to get big numbers. And when they got big numbers, they wanted to compete with CTV. So over the course of maybe 20 years, there was this shift to become more moderate, more conservative, you know, more shirt and tie. Right. And so that whole, that era could only exist, you know, from 1975 maybe to 1990 or into the 90s. Right.

Of the reporter being such a part of the story and of the in-your-face kind of reporting and where the personalities like mark daly and katherine humphries and mckinney and myself and jojo chinto and gallagher right there's a personality right bob hunter was right bob hunter you know and ben but what you said you know peter silverman you know col yeah, yeah. Where the reporters were almost bigger than the stories. And now that ceases to exist. Yeah.

Unfortunately, yeah. You can remember Colin Vaughn coming into the station, you know, clear out this editing suite. I'm the lead. Then we'd go out and laugh about it after. Check your ego at the door or not. Yeah, yeah. So it's been about 10 years since, and you mentioned, Jim,

what you've been up to helping people with their recovery at the Canadian Centre for Addictions? Yeah, I was out in Port Hope. We started in Port Perry and then moved to Port Hope. And then I couldn't drive out there anymore so then I changed to Art, to Addiction

Recovery Toronto up at Kipling and Albion. It takes me just, yeah, well they call it Etobicoke. In the brochure they call it Etobicoke. Well it is Etobicoke. It's Rexdale in Etobicoke. Like, yeah. In the brochure they call it Etobicoke. Well, it is Etobicoke. It's Rexdale in Etobicoke. Yeah.

Like Russian dolls. Yeah. And so, yeah, I've been there for a while and I enjoy

the work, but it takes me just as long to drive from there back to Sherbourne and Bloor

where I live now than it took me to drive to Port Hope. You need a helicopter, my friend. Yeah. Well, with the thing on Eglinton Avenue there,

whatever's going on there. Going to the subway. There's a subway or a bomb shelter or whatever they're doing there. Maybe both. It's big. Yeah. But, you know, eventually the city's just

growing. So on my way out here, I saw like 17 cranes downtown. I think we lead the, I don't know, do we lead the universe in cranes in the sky? Have you seen Woodbine? Could be. Yeah, well, Woodbine too. Yeah, there's a massive thing going on at Woodbine. Usually I'm looking at the form when I'm driving by there, so I don't really see it.

I'm not counting cranes, but, you know, yeah, there's lots. Now, let me, so you've had a, I want to say you've had some heartbreak and you've had some, like, literal heartbreak since you left television. Yeah, yeah, my daughter got killed in a car accident over in Brisbane, Australia.

That was maybe five, six years ago. My condolences to you. Yeah, yeah. I can't imagine. That's not what you were teeing up there, though, was it? Well, that was the heartbreak. That was the heartbreak. Yeah, that was devastating.

Yeah, that's the only thing that would ever bother me. But when you talk about literal heartbreak. Well, that's it. So I'm clever with words, episode 521 here. So that is definitely, without a doubt, the heartbreak I was alluding to in 2013. And then Montego Bay, Jamaica, you had a... Oh, yeah.

Because this was big news. I remember reading it and thinking, we better not lose McKinney, I was thinking. Yeah, Bob McElwitt said to me, best career move you ever made. So I had a major heart attack. Well, I didn't even know I was having a heart attack. I was at this trial resort and had chest pains and that.

I thought I had indigestion or something. So they called an ambulance. I took the ambulance down. The guy, there should have been the tip-off for me. The guy came out of the guard room and said, don't take him to the hospital. Whatever you do, take him to the Half Moon Clinic. So they took me to this Half Moon Clinic,

which was funded by Johnny Cash. So I'm a big Johnny Cash fan now, always was. And I go in there, and I'm lying there for about three hours. And I finally say to the doctor, I said, Doc, what's going on here? He says, oh, you're having a heart attack. I said, no kidding, a little one? He said, oh, no, it's massive.

I said, like, I could die here any second? The guy says, yeah, for sure. So I said, well, give me that phone over there. So I called my boss at city tv and uh i said stats you know that third drawer of mine clear it out right now put it all in a paper bag and throw it under gallagher's desk he says what's going on i said i'll call you tomorrow wow then i had to get a plane and a you know doctors and I had to borrow $70,000 from my friend because I had insurance but I didn't have it with me in my pants pocket so I had to

I needed $70,000 to pay to have the plane come with with a doctor and a pilot and a co-pilot. And then I had to pay the emergency department at Miami South Hospital. And then I had to pay some other costs. And so a friend of mine's wife put it on his credit card. He was at a trade show in Edmonton. He ran his business off his Visa card. The Visa called him and said, your wife's discharged $70,000 US onto your Visa card.

And then he had a heart attack. Oh, yeah. He almost had a coronary himself, but he was happy after because when I paid him back, he got all kinds of points and everything. Oh, I bet. So he traveled all over the place. So how's your health now?

Did you have surgery? What did you have? Nip and tuck. Oh, I bet. I bet. So he traveled all over the place. So how's your health now? Like, did you have a surgery? What did you have? Nip and tuck. You know, I don't know. One day to another, I don't know. Last year I had a bad year. I tore my, what do you call it? Achilles heel.

I tore that. And then I had an episode in early February where my heart raced and my defibrillator went off three times to knock me back into, into a sink. And then I was in the, in the hospital for like 11 days. But, you know, other than that, everything's been great. You know, really it's, you know, I, I, I'm grateful for the, the doctors and all the, all the, you know, I'm grateful for the doctors and all the, you know, the people that have looked after me. Ron Taylor was my GP there for years, and what an amazing guy.

We have an understanding when we go to Saratoga, if he should suddenly die and I'm alive in the double. He can leave me in the car and then take me to Montreal. Yeah, but I can watch the next race. Oh, my God. Well, Jim, what an absolute pleasure this was. I could easily do four or five hours talking to you about your hockey playing days and your years.

I watched you on City TV. You were in my living room all the time. That was my go-to station for news. And please take care of my friend Peter Gross and keep him in that Category 2 gambler. Oh, yeah. Don't let him slip into 3. Because I feel like he's 2.9.

He's teetering. Just keep his eye on him. But enjoy the lasagna, the stickers, and the pumpkins after dark. And thanks again for doing this. Oh, great. And Peter, before we sign off, again, everyone listening should subscribe to Gallagher and Gross Save the World. Congrats on that, my friend. And we mean that literally.

We will save the world, okay? We will cure cancer. But we need your help. Just a matter of time. We will cure heart disease. Eventually. And that brings us to the end of our 521st show. You can follow me on Twitter.

I'm at Toronto Mike. Jim, you're not on Twitter, are you? No, I don't think so. I couldn't find you on there. I've never heard of it. But Peter's on there. Peter the Gross. Yeah, I've been trying to promote myself a little bit more since, like Jim, I am unemployed.

Or unemployable. I did see you making some good attempts at tweets. I've been subtweeting your stuff, so keep at it. And as people listen to Gallagher and Gross, they might be tweeting at you, and it's good to be engaged with the listeners. Are friends at Great Lakes

Brewery or at Great Lakes Beer? Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. Brian Master, again, is at LetsGetYouHome at kw.com. LetsGetYouHome at kw.com. Capadia LLP is at Capadia LLP. And Pumpkins After Dark are at PumpkinsAfterDark.com. See you all next week. It's true because everything is coming up rosy and gray. Yeah, the wind is cold, but the smell of snow won't stay today. And your smile is fine, and it's just like mine, and it won't go away. Because everything is rosy and gray.

Well, I've been told that there's a sucker born every day but I wonder