Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Mark Hebscher: Toronto Mike'd #1403

Episode Date: January 2, 2024

In this 1403rd episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Mark Hebscher for the first time since the final episode of Hebsy on Sports. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Advantaged Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada and Electronic Products Recycling Association.

Welcome to episode 1403. It's not 1430, it's 1403. It's not 1430, it's 1403. You'll have to come back. Of Toronto Mic'd. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery. A fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta.

Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. And don't worry, Mark, that box won't be empty when you leave. RecycleMyElectronics.ca. Committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past. And Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. And yes, that measuring tape is for you, courtesy of Brad Jones at Ridley Funeral Home. Today, returning to Toronto, Mike, for the first time,

well, it's the first time we've had a face-to-face chat since you retired from Hebsey on sports. It's Mark Hebbshire. Hey, not since Cinco de Mayo, Mike, have we spoken? Wow, that's a long time ago. Okay, and here we are in 2024.

Happy New Year to you. And to you and the family and everybody. Boy, 2023 was just, I don't know. It was weird. Well, we're going to recap it all because we haven't heard your voice in a while. But I want to say- We're not going to do a year-ender though, are we, Mike?

Not a year-ender? Well, remember, this is not Hebsey on Sports. It's John and Mike. No, but you know, everybody does year-enders. Like, let's look back to January of last year. You don't like those. No, I don't because you're putting it in some kind of a segment. Like, you know, can you remember back to 10 months ago?

Well, okay, but it is a good way to recap what happened. It's a lazy way to finish the year of news. Some people go on holidays. Some people enjoy it. But before we move too far, yes, it's Happy New Year. Everybody can celebrate the new year. It's January 2nd, but happy belated birthday. Your birthday was yesterday.

My birthday is January the 1st. So people automatically or or don't, like, you know, oh, happy new year, happy birthday. You know, ask anyone that's got a birthday between December 23rd and January the 2nd or something like that, and you'll find a similar response,

and that is you really don't get the full birthday effect as someone in August or in June or whatever. It's because it's during the holidays. But at least if you're Jan 1, like people don't typically, I don't think you have a New Year's party. Like you do a New Year's Eve thing on December 31st, but New Year's, usually it's a low key day. Like having a birthday party from our Kebs here would not detract from all the other festivities, I would think. True. So you got under the wire, but but happy birthday so as we speak uh we're minutes removed from canada losing a quarterfinal in the world juniors to check check yeah am i saying that right check yeah uh what is your interest level in that tournament mark hebbshire oh mike that's a tough one you know there's so many there it used to be that it was the only thing going on

on boxing day and like you know i mean you'd have some bowl games now it's like do i have to arrange my life around a preliminary round okay quarterfinal all right you know it's you know winner take all um but do i have to arrange my life my viewing schedule my sleep habits around the no i don't so recording schedule you know i driving over i listened on the radio i listened to the game on the radio i still don't know who the play by play voice was that i heard i know that davante smith pelly was the color uh commentator on the tsn radio broadcast but the i listened for two period the announcer never uh once revealed his name this is something that's going in the book never once said hi it's bill smith here along

with davante sm-Pelly. So I don't know the guy, and I didn't recognize his voice. I'm usually pretty good at that. I know that voice. Of course you are, yeah. And I thought, this is a good chapter for my book right here.

Well, what book are we talking about right now? The book that I'm writing, I'm currently writing, that I've signed a contract to write, and I have to write. So that's why I came on the show, Mike. Is that why you're here? Because to say hi to you? No, because to say hi to you no i need to get some ideas i need to get some other material i need material is it a fictional book is it no of course not no it's

my it's your memoir imagine hebzion sports talking about sports media because you know you talk about what you know it's like mike could you do something on podcasting i think i have a pretty good idea so for me it's like i pitched an idea i had an i have a book agent brian wood great guy and the idea and ken reed came and i came up with this we were playing golf right and he's like uh he's written some books and he said i give him pitched in this idea i think i had mentioned this to you before that for years i had gotten um athletes uh to tell me about the first uh like game. You remember your first game? Yeah, we played many, many clips on this program.

Many clips from that. So I'd accumulated all this material. Oh, it's Hebsie on Sports, I mean. Right. I forgot what we're doing here. It's the same thing. It's your show, too. It's a different song.

Now that I think of it, the show really should have been called Hebsie on Mike. It would have been perfect on MIC. Oh, good, because M-I-K-E. So anyway, we pitched this idea right the idea goes to the publisher you pitch it pitch it everybody rejects the idea who wants to hear about hockey players first goals and first game no there's some good stories and then nobody cares so really it's kind of like you know people aren't going to read this i mean they might but

yeah man right and then this and then one publisher at the publisher at ecw press was like wait a minute um mark hepscher I used to watch him on TV. I like his stuff. I haven't heard of him. Do you think he could write a book on something other than that? And yeah, so, you know, we'd love to hear what he's got to say about the sports media nowadays, because it's just so different from I'm sure that, you know, he's got experiences from when he started in sports media, followed sports media, how different it is now.

Yeah. Wow. Okay. Can we expect this, how different it is now. Yeah. Wow. Okay. Can we expect this like next December? A year. Yeah. Like two years from now. Two years from now.

Almost two years from now. Yeah. Oh my God. In the fall of 2025. The fall of 2025. So yeah, it's basically, I got a year to write it. Okay. And in that, you know, you write it and then it goes to the editor and then you go back

and forth and then there's packaging and you're adding photos, stuff like that so in essence it's got to be several months before it's actually comes out on like the actual print version comes out it's got to be to the get to the publisher for the printer and all that stuff okay this is exciting you mentioned the name ken reed he's actually uh made his debut last month i know i know i heard okay good you don't think you don't think you don't think when we're playing golf together, your name might have come up? Well, I don't know when you played. You can't always bring on the celebrities that you want to from media because they're so fucking worried.

I know this. They're so worried. The PR departments, which are running sports anyway. Oh, the TSN, the Bell Media people are scared, but the Rogers people too. Rogers people are, yeah. So it's like, I don't know. But Ken Reed came over.

Yeah, because, because Ken's not worried. But yeah, but he's also not worried that, you know, he's going to say something that's going to upset somebody

that's going to go to the, you know, management that's going to go, hey, come over here, we're going to, but there is that fear in the media industry.

That sucks, right? Like, because, you know, these people, so many, your job is so precious to you

and your family and your livelihood, of course, and then there's so few of them, and you don't want to fuck it up by coming on Toronto Mic'd and saying something stupid, right? I know I'm getting a lot of people out there. I would love to come on.

I love your show, but I don't want to rile the PR overlords at this cable company. Well, there you go. There's another chapter for the book. Thanks, Mike. I already got two ideas right off the bat. By the end of this program,

the whole book will be written. Okay, we'll just transcribe the conversation here. But just remember, and I've spoken to our buddy Milan Talsania. Okay, last time. Because you and I and he, along with others on occasion, have done how many sports media podcasts?

I wanted to do it quarterly. How many did we do? Six, eight of them or something? And Brian Gerstein before that. Yeah, and Brian, right. So I had reached out to Milan. I now live up in his neck of the woods too. I live up in Markham now

and he's in like Richmond Hill up there. So I'm like, hey, we should get together because I mean, who consumes more sports media than you? Right. Right? Because I was in sports media so I couldn't be consuming while I was performing, that type of thing, right?

He was watching and listening to everything. Oh, yeah. He was the guy that had on the headphones listening to the talk show while he was watching the scores and highlights flip by while he's reading the athletic and long-form journalism and listening to the latest Toronto Mike podcast. Love Milan. Hello, Milan. You're listening at home. There you go. Hello to Brian Gerstein, who's actually on

the live stream, live.torontomic.com. How's Brian doing? Brian's got some questions for you later. I'm going to hit you with some Brian Gerstein questions, but I want to say hi quickly to Andrew Ward, Ian Service, Levi Fumpka, Moose Grumpy, Rob Pruce, keyboardist from Spoons.

Sure. Hey, shout out to Burlington. And hey, there you go. It all ties together. Hey Ref is here. Hello to Hey Ref. Canada Kev is here. You've smoked some weed with Canada Kev. There were some good times there.

And YYZ Gord. Anyway, it's a great crew. A lot of people missed you. We got a lot of ground to cover. And I warned you, I pulled a lengthy clip. I'm going to play pretty early here. But I got a note from Peter Kent. My man, Peter Kent.

It's a big deal, Peter Kent. Well, I used to work with Peter at Global. Yeah, he says, I'm looking forward to your chat. He said, BBC Mark. BBC Mark. BBC Mark. I don't know what BBC stands for. Okay.

Was fun working with him. Maybe FOTM. Anyway, maybe it's autocorrect. I don't know if BBC stands for it. Okay. Was fun working with him. Maybe, anyway, maybe it's autocorrect. I'm trying to crack the code. Peter Kent is on a whole different intellectual level than I am. No, no, no, no, no, no. Don't say that. No, no, no. No, listen, Peter.

He's a great man. Peter's one of the guys. Don't kid yourself. Oh, he loves his music. No, he's one of the guys. But, you know, when you have to present yourself a certain way on television, and before that on radio, I think, and following in the footsteps of your famous brother, the Scud Stud.

Right. No, absolutely. You know what I mean? You've got to be able to let your hair down sometimes. Did you hear his visit? His visit was remarkable. He was great. Yes, he was great.

Okay, it was fun working with him. This is you now, back to Peter Kent. It was fun working with him and Taddy on the late shift at Global in the 1990s. One possible question, remembering a minor kerfuffle over his comments on curling. Ask if his views on the roaring game have evolved since then. And then Peter drops a yes guy, but now he's going to get an invoice.

But a yes guy, but that's Taddy though. I know, I know. Actually, Jim did the intermissions on the radio today. Him and Anthony Stewart, by the way, which were great. Anthony Stewart is so good on radio, right? I'm not nuts about him on tv he's getting a little better but he's really good on radio it just goes to show you there's certain you know um platforms i guess we'd call them mike that are just that suit people better than others some writers are great writers when they try to become broadcasters, they suck. They fucking suck.

And listen, there's also broadcasters out there who can write to broadcast, right? But when it comes to writing something in print, that's what you're going to look at and go, I don't know. Who do you think is a good example of someone who's a great writer but terrible on the radio or television? See, there's one difference, and that is, is this person a panelist? In other words, is their job to just appear on television and do the same thing they've done in print pretty much? Or have they gone from being a writer or a columnist to hosting, interviewing a show?

Let's say host. Leave the panelists alone. Leave the panelists alone, like a host. That's a tough one, man. I don't know. There's a few, I guess. But I just think that that falls into a different category of were you trained as a broadcaster? Were you trained as a journalist?

Or were you just not trained at all? You were an athlete and someone said, hey, you know, here's a little test. And look, all it takes is one producer of one show, a producer to say, look, come over with me. Let me give you a couple of tips. And then that person becomes your mentor your teacher your instructor as well as your boss let's say and that's how you learned so you go well if it wasn't for you know fill in the blanks who who was my early when i first started at whatever network and if it wasn't for that person's direction i would have never been where i am today it's great

it's true it doesn't mean that you're a great broadcaster it doesn't mean that the person that taught you knew the what the fuck they were talking about it just seemed to work for you so you look at some broadcasters now and go how did this person get to the position that they're at now right how did they get there it's like you see a couple right and you go how did this guy meet this girl how did they you know and you come up with scenarios in your mind how did it happen and a lot of times the scenario is yeah this person happened to be in the right place at the right time, isn't making a lot of money, was attractive to an advertiser, producer, whatever case.

Maybe they brought an advertiser with them. Check the boxes or the timing of that person. Let's say it was, for example, a female, a person of color, a person of different sexual orientation well that checks three boxes right there and so oh really and you and we can pay you forty thousand dollars a year and put you on television and great just do us a favor go to the college of whatever you know for a year so you know you've had some you know i went to this you know ryerson or whatever um whatever it's called tmu fuck that place what do you mean by fuck that well because that's the

whole thing no the law the uh all the fucking law students there who fucking signed that petition let's just fucking let's kill all the jews okay so oh fuck that educate me uh i did hear a little about this but i have a question i didn't come here today you didn't come here for that button this whole thing i'm just saying that that that this that particular place this whole fucking thing let's change the name of it because because right and we went through it with lou marsh that's different it's different right it was lou marsh it was this guy who was fucking writing this shit for years and people were believing him and that's how that's where anti-semitism and racism begins when you're reading something i don't know this guy says okay i guess we can call him those names that perpetuated it so he was as much he

was a bigger part he was a part of the problem he wasn't a part of the solution he didn't say let's all get together and not be racist and treat people as equals so that thing was uh there was a cause there but this whole thing with dundas and ryerson and let's oh wait a second did you know that he was just like oh Oh, apparently he wasn't. Apparently he was an abolitionist. Oh, we're not sure. Well,

we've already decided to change the name. Well, fuck that. And the naming, the renaming of young Dundas square, like, come on. You say,

keep the name. Keep it. Come on. So we're going to do, we're going to change names as time goes on of everything. But you were adamant that the Lou Marsh Award should be renamed. Yes, yes, I was. So it depends, I suppose.

Yeah, no, that's true. That's true. But it's just, no one ever said anything about it before. And now you're right. It didn't all come up at one time, but there was a lot of writing since Bruce Kidd back in the, geez, I think he wrote about it back in the 70s or 80s, about how, you know, because of Tom Lombard,

the way he was treated, you know, some of this, you know, a lot of these things, but at the time was like, you know, how much,

what am I going to do? I'm going to protest? I'm not going to accept the award? But Bruce Kidd never called it the Lou Marsh Award. Right, right. He didn't recognize the man who it was named after. Okay,

I'm going to bring us back in line here, because the great Peter Kent, FOT Peter Kent, just wants to know, if your comments on curling have, in his word, evolved since then. Yes, they have. They have. And I'll tell you why. Because women's curling is way more exciting than men's curling. Way more exciting and way more emotional.

Right? Like you're allowed to be emotional. and way more emotional, right? Like you're allowed to be emotional. So I, you know, when I started paying a little more attention, and again, not every curling thing, like there's curling that's on sports that sometimes it's just your average kind of a midweek curling, you know, Wednesday night curling or whatever.

I'm talking the briar. And I'm talking the Olympics or the world champions. High stakes. Yeah, big stuff like that, right? You know, if newfoundland is playing you know manitoba um i don't have that much interest but if there's a particular player especially the skip of one of those squads on the women's teams that's like you know let's go emotionally charged or whatever and and i'm not gonna be honest with you and and and attractive

that doesn't hurt doesn't hurt to be attractive do attractive. Do the men players have to be attractive? Just the women players? Yeah, I think so too. You want a hot guy out there. Well, it's not a hot guy. It's just, you know, you want them well-groomed. You want the person to fit. Thank you.

You know, that kind of a thing. They're representing their province or their squad or whatever. So, you know, and I can freely admit this because, Mike, I can't get in trouble anymore. See, I look at all these friends of mine, colleagues that are still in the business, and they're they're worried walking on they're worried i could what if i said something what if you said something in 1997 that came back to haunt you what if someone took a piece of tape from a sports line show that i did in whatever year and said yeah there's mark

hebscher racist motherfucker right but but wait it's more like misogyny like i don't think they're gonna find anything racist from mark hebscher but could see, there will be clips where you probably, maybe you're not as big. But, but you can't. Women's hockey or something. You can't, not only is it unfair, it's completely out of context. What was life like in 19, you know, that year? But you do realize you can talk similarly about people like Lou Marsh, right? Like, like at his time, it was, I'm not going to say it was in vogue but it was uh definitely more socially acceptable to be uh no no the reason indigenous because the reason being

it was socially acceptable is because writers like him like him were normalizing it more than normalizing and i think more encouraging it like hey you know how does that little in you know whatever he called him chief what you know wamp wumpum, you know, in print. And remember, in print lasts, you know, it lasts forever, man. Like, well, Lou Martin's been writing it, so I guess it's true. So I guess it's okay that we do this. In fact, let's keep doing it. Now, Peter can't use the phrase, yes, guy, which is what Jim

Taddy would say. That's, you know what, that was a global, so Peter can use that, of course, because Peter was there when it was being used, you know, ad nauseam. Yes, guy. At global. Well, he's still using it. In the newsroom. I mean, everybody, right? It was actually can use that of course because peter was there when it was being used you know ad nauseum yes at global well he's still using in the newsroom i mean everybody right it was actually a guy named a fellow named steve kless you know who's our studio director a great guy right and it was like you know people would say yes sir no sir and whatever however it came about it was yes guy

and then you know it evolved to we gee if there was some any you know we're you know doing quebec nordique games, right? Like, Wee Gee. The origin story. Right, but when you write Wee Gee, it looks like Wee Guy. Right. Right? And the street in Montreal is called, G-U-Y,

is called what street? What's it called? Gee Street? No, it's called Guy Street. Okay. Just to fuck you up even more, right? I'm going over to Route de la Guy. No, no, it's Guy Street.

What? This is Montreal, isn't it? Next is Rue Saint-Catherine. Anyway. So since we last talked on May 5th, no, it's Guy Streak. What? This is Montreal, isn't it? Next is Rue Saint-Catherine. Anyway. So since we last talked on May 5th, 2023, have you had any interactions with Jim Teddy? No, I haven't had any interactions with him. But you know what?

A lot of times if people post something and they're talking about Sportsline, they'll tag both Jim and I. And we will both, right? We won't go to each other and go, hey, are you going to like that? Or are you going to put a thumbs up for that? You know, I'll see something like that.

And we'll, you know, we will both, you know, be part of the same thread where it's like, well, thanks for that or appreciate that. Well, you're going to forever be associated with each other. You're like, you know, talk to the Jay Onwrights and more than that. I don't have a problem with that, Mike, because let's face it, what Jim and I did,

we revolutionized sports television. We just did. Highly influential in this country, and we can see it in how it evolved. It was, let's be like Hebsey and Taddy. Yeah. Look, if it wasn't for me and Jim and what Global allowed us to do, different from all the other stations. This was back in, Bob McCown started in 81, so Jim and I got together in 84, summer of 84,

during the LA Olympics, as I recall. And no one ever said, you know, you can't do this. It evolved because it was like, look, we're watching games. And remember, he had worked for City before that, and pretty wide open stuff, fun reporting, you know, with Peter Gross and John Saunders, and they had a lot of fun doing reporting you know with peter gross and john saunders and they had a lot of fun doing you know stuff there was a pretty a lot of it was off the wall stuff but still it was good you know it was there was journalism it was good reporting uh and i had been doing you

know the jays games the pre and post game show and before that i was a talk show host on radio yelling and screaming at people and telling them you know get lost and hanging up on them and telling they should be wearing a straight jacket and that your idea for a trade was ridiculous and you know all that shit before twitter no anyone ever thought of twitter that's what the talk show was that's exactly what it was your main influence with that like was there a particular that was mccallan bob mccallan because i produced bob's talk show when i first started in radio right and bob was when bob started doing the talk when i first started listening radio right and bob was when bob started doing the talk when i first started listening to bob there was dick beddoes who had a show called hockey hotline

right monday nights on cfrb dave hodge and or bill stevenson and i'm not sure fred locking would be a part of that they did a really good i think it might have been two hours or at least an hour for sure eight to nine maybe or eight to ten and it was great because it had argo stuff and it had you know in the well the blue days were just coming along then so it might have been just before that so there was argo stuff there was leaf stuff it was good reporting you know you had guys like fred locking and senile joshi and doug b forth who were part of the cfrb 1010 sports team they were fantastic man like really good but it wasn't on that often it was like once a week well cowan when he came on he would come on after the games i think when the jays started he was doing pa for the jays but he also would come on afterwards like 10 till midnight kind of

a thing have you reached out to bob since his uh strokes uh i haven't you can't really get through to bob right and um but you know yeah i've commented on a lot of the postings you know i hope i hope he gets better and quite frankly if you go into your archives go see the interview he did on joe tilly's show he was fabulous joe had him i'm going to say it was about a month ago now he was great he was you know he wasn't he didn't seem to me like he didn't the way he articulated he didn't seem that he was under the effects of a stroke he had trouble remembering things he also had had to explain that it was difficult for him you know like you know his your saliva and you know it's like stuff like that he's you know i mean the man had two strokes um and so but it was a good show it was i was surprised at how coming up he was

great so go find that show that joe tilly's great great canadian sports show uh the bob mccowan one from i think i'm gonna say mid-december early december okay cool yeah cool now we're gonna take uh this is your answer peter kent's question by the way you did evolve because now you like women's curling i like that i'd like i just you know there's and i can't i really i can't pick out one in particular i do know that i had interviewed the late sandra schmurler i thought she was just fantastic man i just thought she was really perry lefkoe wrote a book about her yeah yeah she was great like really so down to earth and just like you know your neighbor your neighbor's mom or whatever she and like but like a tiger she was a tiger

fantastic you know and competitive and you'd hear that emotion you know what she's a she's a champion and of course a gold medalist and died so young died way too soon now uh quick question from the the live stream is what years did you produce mccallan we're trying to document your life here hebsey uh okay so um what years did i produce mccallan so i wanted to be a sportscaster and i would show up i knew where he parked his car underground across from behind maple leaf gardens and then walk to half a block to the radio station so i would stake the place out at like 5 30 in the morning at 5 30 in the morning he'd come out of the parking garage and i'd like be there and all the rubbies were on the streets there right for sure they're yeah and um you know those like sort of warming

incinerators you know that's a big great yeah that's yeah that's where the rubbies would hang out there of course or they would be in the um in the um the corridor uh as you walked into the radio station right at grenville and young there like right across from the mcdonald's there was a bad area like it was really so i'd be i'd startle the guy he said what are you doing here i want a job so i shadowed him for a couple of days and then he said i can give i want to you know i said i want to be a sportscaster and he said well we'll take you into foster and bill hewitt ron hewitt and got me a gig and i produced 1430 right yeah and i produced his show and it was great because he needed a producer he needed some he couldn't make all the calls himself and there were no cell phones in those days.

So you had to arrange call outs or call ins. Usually it was call outs, right? So like, give me your number at home. I'll phone you at 10 o'clock, right? Right. Or my, and so now he's got a producer. My producer will call you. So we would make these arrangements during the day.

And he had like Muhammad Ali's phone number at his place in Michigan. He had like coaches, like Joe Paterno's phone number at his place in michigan he had like coaches like joe paterno's phone number and wow what do you have like it was great it was great and so it was very exciting to put a show together where you're talking about the things that were topical he had pat gillick and sam ewing of the blue jays and one day they were sam was chewing tobacco and spitting it into a cup and pat was drinking red wine out of a cup and everybody getting sloshed and it was a hell of a show really good so this was great this is what i was introduced to so bob was a big

influence but at first bob was he was straightforward you know know it all kind he knew everything but he didn't show like a lot of personality we used to listen to this guy pete franklin out of cleveland right i've heard this name, yes. This guy was wild. And the Cleveland Cavaliers were a terrible, terrible team. And Cleveland Indians were a terrible, terrible team. And the Cleveland Browns were a terrible team. Right, they were just awful. All their teams were bad.

And the Cleveland Barons had left town. They were an NHL team in Cleveland. They had an NHL team in Cleveland. So this city was just horrible. We would listen to this guy and he would rail on people. And he would just, and he was anti-management of every single cleveland team because they were all so bad fire this guy trade this guy what are you out of your mind hanging up on people call you know jerks uh and he was tremendous right and way over the top so we would listen to this guy and you know after a while mccowan took some of those elements a bit of an edge a bit more of an what do you know what you're talking about stuff like that but at the same time he honed his interview skills he was such a good interview

bob was a very very underrated interviewer don't think about the last couple of years where people were accusing of mailing it in or he had and really good people on the panel. He was a great interviewer, one-on-one. And on radio, he had all kinds of time. And so this is how you develop it. You're in a conversation with someone. You're getting deep into a conversation. You're 10 minutes, 15 minutes in. You're getting into some deep stuff.

The person you're interviewing is pretty relaxed now. They're willing to talk. Maybe they're sitting on the couch having a beer or two. I don't know. But what's happening is as time goes on, you get to know the person better. Right. You feel.

Well, you gain their trust. You gain their trust, but you also gain confidence that you can ask a question that you would have never thought of asking. At this point, you know, were you really screwing so-and-so's wife? Pause. Maybe not that far,

but you get the idea that is that the further you can go Screwing so-and-so's wife? Pause. Maybe not that far, but you get the idea that is that the further you can go or the more times you have spoken to someone. So imagine a reporter trying to gain an edge, trying to get information for his, whatever sports media he works for, or he or she works for, and trying to gain the trust

of this one particular person, the coach, a player, whatever it whatever it is you've got to visit them you've got to see them every day you've got to cultivate this relationship to the point where now the time comes where i got to start getting some some good information from this person right but that's something that takes time you can't you don't have that today in sports reporting. You just don't. Quick question from Gare Joyce, who's now calling himself Kingston Gare. Yeah, I read his stuff all the time. Yeah, well, he's great. Great sports writer.

I haven't upgraded to premium, though, and I'm sorry, Gare. I think I had the first year or whatever, and I missed, I don't know, whatever it was. Good writer, though, that Gare Joyce. Did Hebsey work with Mark Askin? Here's a great Mark Askin story. So when McCallum had his show, a lot of times it was after the game,

because we had the rights to the Leafs and the Blue Jays. So after the game, so, you know, let's say 10 o'clock, I think the games were at seven, seven or whatever. Let's say it was 10 to midnight. But if the game went to 10, 35 or 10, 40, whatever it was, they'd figure it out. And sometimes we'd go on for like an extra hour because Jimmy Swaggart was on at midnight or some, whatever show it was they'd figure it out and sometimes we go on for like an extra hour because jimmy swagger was on at midnight or some whatever show it was so so mccowan would this like the show was an open line show hey you know 870915 it's ckfh it's uh talking of sports with bob

mccowan and uh you know let's let's hear what you had to say did you did you listen to the jays game because it wasn't on tv they weren't you know games there was only a couple games a week on tv uh you know do you want to talk about what was on wide world of sports last week or hey you get the latest sports illustrated magazine you know stuff like that uh and so the you know phone lines are open so i'm manning the phones right the producer mans the phones the call screener so the phones are you know sometimes they would light up and sometimes you know you get a few calls right so sure enough on a nightly basis there were some regulars that we would have. And the best of them all was this kid named Mark.

Okay. He worked in the stock room at Eaton's, College Street, I do believe. Right. And he was a young guy, about my age, maybe a couple of years younger. And he knew sports like you have no idea like mccown and me are like jesus we thought we were freaking know this kid boy does he ever know his stuff what's he do he works in the like he works at eaton's okay i think he had just lost his father what anyway but boy was he good and what a great caller because if you had time to fill this is the kind of guy you want on

the air with you he wants to know about the cleveland browns and he's got some opinions on that the toronto maple leafs the defense should punch him like make a deal oh the argonauts the cf like he really knew his stuff so i wanted to be a sportscaster like i you know i liked doing it but that was my foot in the door but i wanted to be an announcer and so you know i had an opportunity i think bill hughes said you know you want to do the 4 p.m sports uh four o'clock sportscaster and maybe the noon sports or something like that it evolved to that and i said to bob i want to be able to do this well you can't produce the show and do this i said i want to like i want to be a sportscaster and he was like well geez you can't just you know we got to find somebody to take your place so i think as i recall it was like well this guy this kid mark that we talked to i got his phone number wow right and you know he's oh that guy's great i wonder if does he know anything about radio what does

he have to know what does he have to know here's how you answer the phone and he knows everything about sports so he knows who you're talking to and all that type of thing you don't have to worry about that the other thing is this mark's the kind of a guy who let's say let's say you're struggling to come up with something or whatever mark's the kind of a guy who if you can't fill in the blanks he just gets on the intercom and goes uh 1974 it was pete rose he had 333 and had a 44 game hitting streak like that and bob and then before you knew it bob would like repeat verbatim you know what he had gotten in his ear that's good production that's a good producer helping you out so that's how we just we discovered mark that's an amazing origin that's how we discovered mark i gotta get mark asking on yeah yeah yeah and mark like let me tell you man he was he ran that show i mean he was a fantastic

he was the original what i think sports producer he could produce a radio show he could produce a live broadcast he could produce a live to tape. He produced Sportsline for years, right? He could put a show together, an opening together, an intermission together, a segment together, like nobody else when it comes to sports. And, you know, I mean, look, you talk about guys like Ralph Mellenby, who's a spectacular producer, multi-Emmy award winner. You know, he did the Olympics.

He did Hockey Night in Canada, stuff like that. And I'm sure he did other things as well, television shows. But, geez, the depth of what Mark could do in any situation, live situation, when it came to a sports program was remarkable. And that's why when Sportsline began, you know, the first thing Bob said was like, Bob had never done TV either. He was like, come on, let's go, man. We got to do this show.

Amazing. By the way, fact check, shout had never done TV either. He's like, come on, let's go, man. We got to do this show. Amazing. By the way, fact check, a shout out to Robert Lawson, although this comes from Gare. He says it wasn't Swaggart on after, it was Huntley Street. That's right. I'm sorry. You're right. It was Huntley Street.

It was Huntley Street. Hey, listen, they used to run, they made a lot of money from those syndicated shows. The shows would come in on reel-to-reel tape, those big metal reel-to-reel tape those big metal reel-to-reel tape reels the big mothers i think they were 12 inch metal reels right the shows were pre-taped you know everything from jimmy swagger to huntsley street and all that all those shows were pre-taped and they would show up at the station and then the operator would just put them on spool them

through the big anpex hit play when the time came go to the bathroom go for a smoke whatever it was those were the moneymakers on that station. Amazing. So here we are. We're half an hour deep and now we're going to kind of reset so we can move forward here, Mr. Hebzier. So May 5th, Cinco de Mayo, as you said, 2023, hard to believe that long ago. That was the day we recorded the final episode of Hebsey on Sports.

It was like about five years, would you say? Five years of Hebsey on Sports? Oh, my God. Around there. I feel like it was like 2018 to 2020. I think we did close to 300 episodes. But I remember, did we not do two a week to start? Yeah, yeah.

No, there was definitely two a week to start, and then it became every Friday. But it was at least five years. Now, I warned you there was a clip, so you can go, well, it's just because I know for your show, these clips have to be short. You like a short clip, I feel.

And I personally typically try to keep my clips under two minutes. It's not a clip if it's that long. Well, it's five minutes. Is that a clip? That's a whole segment on its own. Yeah, a clip is up to 45 seconds. Okay, but the problem with you is there's no word.

You can't cut this. So basically, we're going to go through this exercise. I'm dying to hear this already. So May 5th, everybody, 2023, just to paint the picture, this is like a Friday morning at about 8.50 a.m. Eastern. I come down. At this time, we were doing it via Zoom. I log into Zoom. You're in

Markham, I guess, and you're logging into Zoom. Gateway to Stouffville. Shout out to Jeff Merrick. And Rod Black, right? Is Rod Black a Stouffville guy? I think he is a Stouffvillian. He might be a Unionvillian. Okay. You see what I'm saying? And that's north? No. No, no, no. Unionville is

no. You don't know your region. You don't know your region. I'm lost.- I'm lost. You don't know your region. I'm lost. But he did send me a Christmas card, Rod Black. So, shout out to Rod Black. His son, eh, his son Tyler is going to- He's going to be okay, this kid, eh? And he's two sons that are pretty damn good, as I understand.

Isn't it great watching Canadian athletes, like sons of people that you know, too? Oh, yeah, yeah. Like R.J. Barrett, like Rowan Barrett's son. Yeah, Morgan Frost. But R.J. Barrett's favorite team was the was the the raptors growing up right his old man was like you know team canada got so it's i love seeing these like these youngsters who are you know like like even we even wiggins like you know right you know like it's just great to see you know canada has so many fabulous athletes it's wonderful love it so may 5th 2023

here's the uh how we started and again we didn't talk too much beforehand i think this is what i remember every episode of hebsey on sports i would get show notes so i knew where you were going so uh i would try not to steal your thunder although i rarely read them ahead of time i should have read them more often okay so there was no show notes this morning, this Cinco de Mayo 2023. And I think I said something, Hebsey, you forgot to send me show notes. And you mumbled something to the effect of, no notes today, this is the last show.

And then we started recording. So this is when we started. I pressed record, and this is what we all heard. Los Lobos, everybody. Do the Murray. Hey, sports fans, welcome to hebsey on sports episode 332 my favorite number a number i've already aspired to you know sort of like 500 home runs right 332 podcasts mark kept here alongside toronto mike on a very sad day for some very happy day

for others especially this guy, your humble reporter. I don't have a script for today's show. I didn't want to do today's show because it's just been too painful lately. This is sort of, not like a mental illness, but I don't know, it's just been really painful. Because as a lifelong follower of sports, and especially Toronto teams,

I am at my witits' end right now. The daily discussions about our teams and certain players and managers and broadcasters and executives and what they're doing wrong and referees and what the betting odds are. And how the refs and umps are screwing us and how Rodgers and Bell are fucking cheapskates and all this is just driving me nuts. I can't go anywhere without someone asking me about what happened to O'Donovan? All this shit. Sorry, sorry.

So, hey, we've got fans that are spending thousands of dollars to buy jerseys of the opposing teams so they can sit in Toronto and root against the Toronto Maple Leafs, and we're trying to make cult heroes out of these fuckers. This is what I'm dealing with on a daily basis. I don't want to have to deal with this. All right?

We've got some of the most ridiculous accusations and conspiracy theories and sports history going on out there. We've got investigative reporters doing investigative reporting. We've got other people doing no reporting at all. None whatsoever. Every day, it's a new investigation concerning some of the biggest names and teams and brands in all of sports. Oh yeah, Messi suspended, went to Saudi Arabia. Oh, the lift. Fucking nothing but controversy. Do I really care that Aaron Rodgers is a New York jet? No. Or Tom Brady might come out of retirement or, I don't know, might date another supermodel.

Or that Tiger Woods is recovering nicely from plantar fasciitis after he almost had his leg amputated. No, no, no, not anymore. I couldn't care less. I really couldn't care less. And that's another thing. If I hear anyone else say they could care less, that doesn't mean the same as I couldn't care less. i got the gardener i think outside in the backyard who doesn't know that i do friday

podcast but it's okay and the kentucky derby is this saturday and the indianapolis 500 and all these major events that i used to watch them because i love them and because it was part of my job but you know what no longer it's not part of my job i don't know what? No longer. It's not part of my job. I don't have to see the Kentucky Derby. I don't have to make a prediction on the Indianapolis 500. I don't have to anymore. Tell you what I think the odds are of the Maple Leafs beating another team from Florida and how they'll do in the third period of game five. Because in the past, they had blown three goal leads in their past six games.

Really? They had blown three goal leads in their past six games. Really? And I just, you know, and how someone did in their last 11 games versus Hall of Famers in their final 11 games at age 40 plus, my brain hurts. It does. It's not my job anymore. I'm here to announce, I guess at my own press conference

or my own podcast, that I am retiring from podcasting and any other form of verbal sports communication. I'm no longer am I the guy to go to. Let's hear what happens. You had to say about whatever. It's a lot of responsibility, folks. I can't I can't do it anymore. I'm too old for this. So, you know, the idea of retirement is like real retirement.

All right. Is that you can do anything you want, anything. You have the means to do it. You don't have no responsibility to any boss. And I was my own boss. No work obligations at all. That's what I want. I want real retirement.

So on Friday mornings and every morning from now on, I just want to get up when I want and I want to go play golf. That was my goal when I was in my thirties, when I took up golf, I thought, oh man, I'd like to make enough money that I can retire and be able to play golf every day. And so that's where I'm at now. No work, golf every day. Pretty simple, right? But the last couple of weeks, putting the podcast together and getting enthused about it, knowing that golf season was starting and that I couldn't go out every Friday morning and play in a men's league because I had responsibilities and I couldn't do anything for Fridays. And Thursday nights, I couldn't sleep well because I had to make sure I had watched all the games like last night when I watched the Kraken and the Stars and the Lakers and the Warriors after watching the Leafs get beat, after watching the Blue Jays get beat. It's just too much. And I saw none of the NFL draft, so I can't report on it.

I saw none of the CFL draft, so I can't report on it. And I used to know more about sports than 99.99% of the populations. This is fact. I did. I was once that person. But now, no. I don't know half as much as the average tweeter out there. It's exhausting to keep up.

It's hard. And I don't have inside sources like I used to. I just don't. Most of them have been fired or they just can't talk for fear of losing their jobs. And you know who you are. And I don't blame you at all. Why would you want to tell me something? What if the word gets out and it gets back to you

and you get fired from your job or demoted or your contract isn't renewed? I'd feel terrible. I don't like having to report that this person's been fired from their job or this person after a number of years is no longer with the company or this person can't travel to go to games. Right? That whole Joe Bowen thing was just

fuck he wasn't at the game why wasn't he at the game ridiculous i don't have to go through this at all nothing so mike when i say like when you say for example i can hardly wait to hear what hebs he has to say about so and so i panic because I may not have an opinion on that subject or I hadn't read the story on Twitter or I hadn't formulated an opinion, but I have to have an opinion because you're going to ask me about it. People are going to want to know.

What happened to O-Dog last week? That's what they're going to ask me. That's a lot to cover. Can't do it anymore. Here's the deal. This is the last Hebsey on Sports podcast. And Mike, I'm sorry to say this, like sort of, like you're fired.

I'm fired. I'm firing both of us. The board of directors, executives said that's it. No more. Not good for your health. So you're going to have to tell Mike. So I'm sorry. Wow. Okay, that's why I had to,

I couldn't cut that. Like I just needed, this is the, the five plus minutes that opened that episode three 32 on May 5th, 2023. So the first question for you, Hebsey is how's retirement. You enjoying yourself? What's happened since that day?

You just been golfing. What's going on? I missed the podcast. Do you? No, no, there are times. No,

no, absolutely. There are times where it's like oh man it would be good but like here's the thing mike it was yeah i think the last part was you know the responsibility that i felt because yeah if you go back and you don't have to but if you go back and say you know i wonder what hebsey thinks about this and if you took everyone else on social media who posted something like that, I wonder what happens to you. I can't wait for Hebsey's take on this one.

Mike, that's the way it's been with me for 45 years, right? So when I first started in the business and I had a talk show, it was the same thing. What is he going to say? And what happened was people would report stuff. I don't know if you heard this, Mark, because I was at the Jays game and a guy behind me. Right?

This was before the internet. The internet changed everything. But when you heard that stuff, the only way for people to get that off their chest was to call in the talk show. Right? You weren't going to be writing in the news. Maybe your letter to the editor might get published.

Maybe. Maybe. But also, it can only be like you know 100 words or whatever man you got a chance to get on a talk show and say yeah i mean that was beautiful i mean that's vox populi that's what sports is about especially the local team sports is local and so to me on twitter now right that's it's like having a talk show except there's no host it's all everybody's going back and forth. And there might be a couple of little arguments and back and forth.

Oh, that's pretty good. I want to listen to those two. But really, it's just, you know, I don't want to say it's a cesspool. It's not. I'm part of it too. Mike's part. But it's just, it's just everybody is a talk show host. It's a lot of noise.

Yeah. You're all talk show hosts. You're all trying to do the same thing that I did in a controlled environment, structured. Here's the topic. Let's hear what you have to say about this. Now, the best part of it, I think, was you would get a good call. Like when Mark Askin would come on the show when he was a caller,

he'd make a real cogent point. And from there, that was a jumping off point. Now people would call in and go, hey, you know what he said about blah? I got something. So you allow the listener to actually carry the ball for a while if someone's got a really interesting point,

different from, or just something you hadn't thought of, right? And then everyone else goes, yeah, I'm glad someone's talking about that. And now it starts to snowball. And now you've got yourself a topic that didn't exist when the show began but is really interesting to hear people's opinions on especially if they're different from yours you're going i thought everybody thought that jesse barfield had the strongest arm in baseball and you're telling me that so-and-so did like that kind of a thing so i ended up becoming

a natural contrarian because i needed to get to say to someone i don't know if that's correct or not and unfortunately that became like that's in my dna now like it's like you know i just naturally you know do you want to go to us you know what do you think of that and my natural response is to go well hang on a second let's all not jump in on it you know know, people can get really enthusiastic saying, he's the best player I ever saw. Hang on a second. Literally? Really?

The best player I ever saw? Or maybe for that moment. Right. And so that's when I think I started to become that guy who I want to get a good discussion started. I love a good discussion. And if voices happen to be raised, okay, as long as it's not the intimidating time as

long as you're making sense and you're not you know you know call getting into name calling and stuff like that that to me is sports is fans talking about stuff right and everyone's entitled to an opinion and just because you're the talk show it doesn't mean that you're right but you've got to direct things a certain way okay but that that uh those opening remarks on may 5th 2023 the the final episode of hebsey on sports any regrets hebsey like no no because that's how i was feeling mike that's how i was feeling because it's been eight i just did the math real quick you saw me counting my fingers that's how i had to do it but there's it's been eight months yeah that's all but at that time the whole build-up like i said you know it culminated with i wonder what hebsey thinks i'm going geez do i have an opinion on that i better i better have one i had better formulate

an opinion on that because everyone's talking about it and that's not the way i work i'm the one control i'm the one who's saying this is what we're talking about and only these things but mike you would come on and say, I got to ask you. Or Brian Gerstein's got to ask you. Or Kev, I got to ask. Right. So once you open it up, it becomes like, it's like a talk show. And it's like, well, I don't know.

Whereas when I had a real talk show, I knew. You could ask me anything about sports. I would have an opinion on it. Right? Because I was informed because I knew. But now you expect me to know about the pwhl geez the league just started now i don't i don't have the watch yesterday yes of course i did i don't have to enjoy it yes i don't have the mental capacity i don't have enough files a file system

right that i can fit in the pwhl into everything else that i've got you know that yesterday yeah new year's day my birthday i got up at 6 30 in the morning because i have to feed the cat anyway i'm watching soccer from england then i'm watching pwhl then i'm watching the winter classic and i'm watching the rose bowl then i'm watching the raptors nice win right and then I'm watching the Sugar Bowl. And then I'm watching, I think I forgot. Anyway, I watch sports all day long. If I would have had a Hebsie on Sports show today, for example, I got lots because I watched it.

But it's because I wanted to, not because I wanted to. But I don't say Hebsie. Hebsie on Sports was not a Rogers Communications production or a Bell Media. If you don't want to talk about something or you don't Media. Like, if you don't want to talk about something or you don't care about something, then you don't have to talk about it. No, but I can't, I couldn't say that on the show,

especially if you came up with a question. But that would be pure Hebsey, and people just want you to be as Hebsey as you can be. Right, so if someone came up with a question, if one of our viewers, listeners came up with a question. I have questions for you. No, no, I'm saying on those shows. Right.

I would, you know, and you would say, I couldn't say, well, I don't give a shit about that because that's not fair. The person asking the question no no i'm saying on those shows right i would you know and you would say you would say i couldn't say well i don't give a shit about that because that's not fair the person asking the question going wait a minute i mean he doesn't have an opinion on it or he doesn't have to do with it because i didn't want to have to have that capacity of of being the guy the go-to guy on every single sport you could ask me about the collective bargaining agreement that the pwhl has mike i'll tell you everything about it i do i know everything about it how much are these fucking remarkable up to eighty thousand dollars a year that's good uh i think five players on each roster have to be making a minimum of fifty five thousand dollars that's good they get eighty one dollars a

day in per diem all right twenty dollars for breakfast twenty five, $25 for lunch. Were you part of the negotiation team? No, no, no. But what I'm saying to you is that the structure of the league, the way it's set up, and they're going to lose a lot of money the first year and a lot of money the second year and probably close to break-even. This is their business plan. It's like an eight-year plan. Okay.

And they've got everything covered. The officiating is top-notch, okay? From the same feeder system, NHL, AHL, all that, right? Hybrid rules. One of the rules, by the way, Mike, is we want to talk From the same feeder system, NHL, AHL, all that, right? Hybrid rules. One of the rules, by the way, Mike, is we want to talk about the PWHL, which I don't think I like, but I could get to like it is, if you score a shorthanded goal, your penalty comes off the board. So I don't know if a team would take risks knowing that if they gave up

a shorthanded goal, now their power play is doomed as well. I think it might change. But anyway, interesting. It went to a vote, I guess, committee their power play is doomed as well. I think it might change. But anyway, interesting. It went to a vote, I guess, committee. So let's try it. Let's try it. Let's make it a little bit different. Get people interested.

Because there's no body checking. So there's no hitting. But I did see hitting. So they just let it go. Yeah, but it's incremental. It's, yeah, you're not. I saw some hip checks out there. Yeah, but not really.

It's more, you know, it's not, yeah. It's not the same. Right. And you're not going to get brawls and you're not going to get a lot of stick swinging and stuff like that. It's more, you know, it's not, yeah, it's not the same. Right. And you're not going to get brawls, and you're not going to get a lot of stick swinging and stuff like that. It's a different game. But having said that, you know, I think it's fantastic. And I think the fact that there are broadcast outlets

and many platforms where you can watch. You know that yesterday's game was on CBC, TSN, and Sportsnet One. So all your own different crews? Because I only saw the CBC. No, no, same crew. the cbc okay same crew okay no it's the same andy patrillo and yeah my other question by the way is are there going to ever be any men um on camera or is it all going to be women and are all the producers and the technicians and audio and camera operators are is it all women we'll'll find out. But speaking of that, so I do want to get in a question for Edmonton Matt.

Okay. Edmonton Matt wants to know what you think of the fact that Cassie Campbell apparently quit her gig at. Not apparently. Okay. Well, she quit her gig at Sportsnet to be an advisor with. So what are your thoughts on that?

That's good for her. I mean, what does she do? She's got to wait around to do one hockey game or two hockey games a week and all that? You know, I don't know what the money was like, but obviously if you want to be a part of something, and look, she's a smart girl, all right? Woman. Right.

She saw the business plan. She knows the people who are involved, right? Knows them, some of them intimately, right? You know, being teammates and whatever. And there's some deep pockets behind this. And there's huge, Mike, huge deep pockets. What's the guy's name? Mark, I'm trying to think of the investor, but Billie Jean King approached the guy, you know, hedge fund manager and like, you know, venture capitalist, the whole deal. And Billie Jean King, Billie

Jean King said, look, this is going to go and we need your support. And they were like, oh yeah, we're in. Because Billie Jean King is the grand dame of equality when it comes to sports. Like she was the one who said, look, I'm going to beat Bobby Riggs and then we're going to start a tennis tour. And if you don't like it, we'll carry it. We'll look after it. I mean, the Battle of the Sexes was more than just a tennis event. It was huge.

It was also uh it paved the way for title nine in the united states which means that all scholarships from any federally funded school have to be split equally between males and females for that there'd be 95 scholarships for football for men and like three scholarships for women right right so it's a huge thing and so billy jean king for her to be behind this that's massive you have daughters i mean come on you must think what great opportunity if my daughter wants to play professional hockey there's an opportunity for her absolutely no i was uh happy to see it now uh specific questions here so we we no regrets you walked away from hemsi on sports

remember too all this material mike is going to go into a book that you're going to want to read. Absolutely. Right, because it's about the same stuff that we talked about. It's all this kind of stuff here. No, I can't wait. When this book is coming out, I hope you drop by and we promote it. So one question is, because it's been eight months since we talked on Mike's, I talked at all really, because it's been just email stuff.

Nairb Yellet, I hope I'm saying that right, says, why so, why so long? Like eight months? You just, you just needed to golf. I feel like you needed to, to,

to enjoy retirement and now you're ready to kind of ease back into this kind of thing. Yeah. Eight months is, yeah. Also look, you know, there's a method to my madness here,

right? You know, I'm writing a book and I just signed a book deal. It like you know so when someone says well what's he doing now just playing golf is no the beauty is that you play golf to a certain time at this time of year and then you go and hibernate in the basement with your laptop and you know crank out 90 000 words and so i have accumulated i mean i have accumulated so many stories just not accumulated i mean experienced being a sports reporter for all those years and the opinions that go with it. But there's more to it than that because, you know, I'm through several eras.

I started in the 70s when it was newspapers, radio and TV and not cable TV and not all sports TV. It was like three, four stations and the Buffalo stations. It was like three, four stations and the Buffalo stations. Like it was CBC, CFTO, CHCH in Hamilton, City TV, Channel 79, I think it might have been at the time. There was Barry CKVR, but they were a CBC affiliate. And then your Buffalo stations, which were Channel 2, NBC, Channel 4, CBS, and Channel 7, ABC, and then later WUTV,

which was an independent station, fox many years later right that's different from a lot of people growing up they didn't have southern ontario had it was a rich is a it's the fourth largest market in north america tv market it's the rich i mean think about all the different stuff if you lived somewhere in the states you wouldn't get canadian television so you had no way of you know seeing that and making comparisons between the way they do hockey and we do hockey do you remember the first time you wouldn't get Canadian television. So you had no way of seeing that and making comparisons between the way they do hockey and we do hockey. Do you remember the first time you heard a Buffalo Sabres broadcast? You went, what the hell? What fucking homers these guys are?

Holy shit, Ted Darling and Pat Hannigan. What homers? Because our guys weren't like that, right? Bill Hewitt and Brian McFerrin. Although people thought, Montreal fans thought that they were Leaf fans, and we thought Danny Gallivan and Dick Irvin were Habs fans because they did all the games.

They tried to be impartial, but when you're a fan, you're blind to that. But to hear the Buffalo announcers and go, oh my God, are they ever fucking homers? They can't see the forest from the trees. Everything goes against Buffalo. That's when i first realized that hometown bias is remarkable but at the same time if the team isn't doing well then everybody just

shits on them like trade this guy get rid of that guy it's the same in every city it's not exclusive to toronto i realize that it's not my my cousins in detroit same thing in detroit okay same thing in los angeles team's not playing well ownership is shit, whatever it is, you know, beefs. Yeah. They all come out. Trust me. And Toronto is no more difficult a market to play in than any of these

other places. That's another thing. Oh, it's so tough in Toronto. It's so hard to play in Toronto. Come on. It's going to be a long book, Hepsey. This could be a very thick book here. Okay.

I have an editor. Amazing. I love it. you this could be a very thick book here okay so i have an editor amazing i love that and a nice comment in the live stream people who loved your first book uh because you've already written a book and now you're writing a new book oh this is going to be way better the first book was different first book was a biography of someone i'd never met before greatest athlete you've never heard of no one had ever heard of before it was like a mystery kind of a you know thing like you're going on a like an easter egg hunt for someone have you ever heard of this person before so that was very different this is from obviously from personal experience but just sort of like where's media going mike like where is it going but it could be dramatically changed in the next

two years like we have to wait almost two years to read this thing uh i can't imagine how different the landscape will be in two years compared to right now. Well, that's the other thing is that the editing process is going to have to be as close to the publication of the book as possible. You're going to have to update something, right? Like, for example, when the PWHL season is over, or next season's over,

where is it going to be compared to how it is today? Should I be writing about it today or should I wait? So you're right. Yeah, but I think that it's heading in a certain direction whereby if players are live tweeting during a game like during a game if you can actually talk to a player while the game is going on how much further inside can you get than that it's wild mike not me by the way a different mike mike wants to know uh how much do you miss podcasting and or Toronto Mike? Oh, I miss Toronto Mike. Well, I don't miss Toronto Mike because I listen to your shows.

Like, you know, 1,403, I've probably, I'm going to say I've probably heard 500, 600. Did you hear Fergie Oliver's show? I loved it. He's great. Am I wild? Yeah. Like, I knew Fergie, I've known Fergie for years. Like, for the longest time.

Fergie's a great guy. Do you know that Fergie Oliver got me passes to Disneyland, right? Went to California. He had that deal, yeah. He had a deal at Disneyland, right? He showed it to Paul Burford. And I never forgot, I ran into him and he's like, you're going to California?

He says, if you want to go to Disneyland? I said, yeah. And he set us up. He was awesome, yeah, great guy. And every year in spring training training like i loved hanging out with fergie he's an easygoing guy people would give him such a hard time i don't know what he's talking about maybe he wasn't the most well-versed in baseball when he got the gigs right but man he was who he was and he was a character and he was a personality and you know what good guy good guy

how is your dad doing my dad's great we took him out for Chinese food the other day. He just got over COVID. So he's 91, 92 in June, and he got COVID. He's like, ah, there's COVID. You know, like that kind of thing. I said, hang in there. He goes, I don't know. I don't know about this COVID thing, right?

And then, so he's 10 days in isolation. He comes out of it. We take him out. As soon as we bring him back the other day, he calls me. He says, the whole place is shut down. There's an outbreak well listen i'm glad he's doing well that's that i saw that photo actually i saw that photo uh daryl wants just wants you to know that he misses hearing you i miss hearing from hebsey so that's daryl thanks daryl brian i mentioned a few questions but one is that uh he says uh with Hebsey clearly pulling an Elliot Price,

though not fortunate enough to be in British Columbia with a milder climate to play. You've got to explain that. That's like a sub-genre of Montreal. Well, Elliot, I guess the deal there is that Elliot Price was retired, right? He was retired from radio, and I guess he went to BC and golf still? Because the question from Brian is, right like he was retired from radio and i guess he went to bc in golfs now because the big the question from brian is how much improved is your handicap hebsey and will you shoot your age

no never no never no no no i'll never shoot my age no no that's not gonna happen i was i think this year well maybe in 10 years no no no no no chance yeah no chance but the only chance i might have maybe is when i'm 95 i might shoot but probably not probably i then you, I don't know. No chance. The only chance I might have, maybe, is when I'm 95. I might shoot, but probably not. Probably. Then, you know, I don't know. Oh, you know what? I just remembered.

Anyway, go on. I just remembered that, because we referenced that Ken Reed dropped by, and I remember opening the Ken Reed episode. He's from the Maritimes, as you know. Yep. And he's a big April Wine fan. Yep. I'm wondering, were you a big April Wine fan?

I saw him. That's the last concert I was at, was April Wine. I saw them at the markham uh theater awesome man yeah i see it feels sudden to me i guess maybe because i just talked to him like two years earlier and he seemed sharp and active and everything but it just felt very sudden i mean miles yeah he wasn't well he wasn't well and what happened was he knew he wasn't well so he retired from april wine and um and i can't think of his successor's name now, but he's fabulous. And they were really great.

And, um, I'd seen April Wine, oh man, probably starting in 72, something like that. Yeah. Awesome. And, and also one of the best shows I ever saw was I was doing a corporate gig for Telus up at Deerhurst Resort. Yeah. So I'm emceeing and I'm, you know, I'm here now for the salesman of the year and stuff like that.

And they had a band that was going to perform after the, you know, the ceremonies, after the sales thing and whatever. Right. And so what happened was no one knew who the band was going to be. All their equipment was out on stage. There was something taped,

like a piece of paper taped to the bass drum that said like, you know, a great band or something like that right and then april wine comes out and just blew everybody away their first song was 21st century schizoid man and they rocked the place out they were so good so yeah we saw them uh yeah a few months back they were really good uh again i'm just now checking i'm doing multiple i have my own notes i'm checking into the live you produce So you produce your own show in real time. Well, I like the real-time feedback.

For example, we talked about Cassie Campbell leaving Sportsnet, now consulting with the PWHL. And Kingston Gare just points out that she had a conflict of interest covering the NHL, he says, because her husband is the assistant GM of, yeah, Brad Paschal of the Calgary Flames. And he always found it interesting. But he has been for a while though. But he found it interesting how she was never critical of the Flames and that maybe that

became like, you know, too much a conflict to sustain possibly. And it was best to do something else. I think if you were to have monitored, I mean, every broadcast that she was on, and I'm not sure, I don't know if we're privy to every type, you know, broadcast she was on and I'm not sure I was don't know for privy to every time you know broadcast she's on and she might be on a western um you know an Edmonton broadcaster or whatever right but the point is is that yeah I mean you have to she should have recused herself when Brad um by the way Brad Paschal's father Bernie Paschal one of the and great Canadian sportscasters of all time out of BC did did canada cup stuff okay awesome man birdie

pascal was great a lot of the ctv stuff you know with johnny esau stuff like that yeah birdie so that's his son brad and yeah he should she should have recused herself uh once he got the job as the assistant gm um i think not being on calgary Flames broadcast wouldn't be enough because if the situation came up you're right if there wasn't a conflict of interest not perceived right but you know could she say

the Flames really need to make a deal for a defenseman out there what the hell is like what's taking so long you'd be restricted because of that so you know yeah she should so she had an opportunity and that might have led to her decision

her decision to go to the PWHL? Yeah, like if you have an opportunity. Oh, for sure. For sure. Look, what if Brad ends up being the GM of the team? I don't know. Yeah, it's definitely a conflict of interest. And Gara's correct.

I have been waiting, well, weeks now. So TMLX14 was at Palmas Kitchen. Missed you there, Hebsey. I hope I can get you to a future. That was in early December, wasn't it? Because I was going to come, but we were away. Yeah, I'm going to remember exactly because we were away. Okay, so I should tell you.

So I am sending you home with a large meat lasagna from Palma Pasta. All right, fabulous. Well, you know you love your Palma Pasta. We love Palma Pasta on this show. But we had, that was, Stephen Brunt was there for TMLX 14. So I threw him on the mic early because it happened to be the day after the fictional flight. I guess there was a dragon or what do you call that? A shark tank.

What's his name? Kevin O'Leary. No. Oh, the other guy. Robert. Yeah. Whatever. Yeah.

Him. Okay. He was on the flight. But it was like we were... I want to ask you your thoughts on that Friday. Oh, there's a chapter. I've got a chapter already written in the book. Shohei Ohtani was not coming to Toronto,

but Morosi said he was. And then what's our, why can't I remember his name? The guy who you had on Hebsey on Sports who kind of covers sports media in terms of ratings and stuff. Oh, Adam Seaborn. Right.

Okay, Adam Seaborn tweets that at six o'clock, Rogers has a press conference. And this is right after. So I have so many things here. of ratings and stuff oh adam seaborne right okay adam seaborne tweets that at six o'clock rogers has a press conference and this is right after so i have so many things here but one is i know that's his like he retires from reporting because you know he pulled a big boner there who retires from reporting adam seaborne well seaborne retired from the reporting but he doesn't report right he isn't no he's not but he did we he gained enough trust that he fooled a lot of us right you believe when adam seaborne, there's a. Unfortunately, no.

And I hate to say this. Adam hasn't gotten there yet because he's not a reporter. Well, he'll never get there now. No, no. He's not a reporter because a reporter has to have two independent sources before he goes. You know, a real reporter. But you can build up trust as a reporter.

That's fine. The thing is that you try. Look, Hazel May trusted her source and said that the Jays were getting Michael Brantley. Right. The source was wrong. Right. Okay.

Lesson learned. So what happens is that you better be damn sure. So, you know, as well as I do, Mike, that nevermind that part, there's an entire chapter in my book that's already written about this.

First of all, I can't wait to read this book. Do you know what pulling them or posting a Morosi is? Posting a Morosi is when you tweet that, tweet that Otani is on his way to Toronto. Posting a morosi is when you're in the position where people trust you. When you tweet something that you haven't gotten confirmation of, but you put it out there as absolute truth. Not like, how about this?

Hearing that Shohei Otani is on a plane to Toronto isn't the same as Shohei Ohtani is on the plane to Toronto. Right. Name, John Marossi. Number of followers, blah. Right. Okay. Not, we're hoping, we're thinking, whatever.

So you know as well as I do that a good reporter that doesn't have to get it first, whose people aren't going, you better get it before anyone else, better get it before Rosenthal, better get it before the Blue Jay media, who will never, ever break a story about the Blue Jays because the Jays won't allow it. Atkins isn't going to give it to them. He's going to give it to Bob Nightingale. He's going to give it to Ken Rosenthal.

He's going to whatever. You're right. So unfortunately, all those who cover the blue jays for rogers will never get it first right they won't why maybe i don't know they can't be trusted or you know whatever it is a good reporter goes okay hang on a second otani's on the plane who confirmed this get a copy of the flight manifest it's available you have to know the the names of the passengers have to be on the flight manifest in case god forbid the plane goes down you got to identify people who was on there it has to be reported a good reporter can get the

plane manifest but hefty man but no no no no we got to get it first we got to get it first okay who had it first let's check the timelines. Mike, let's go to... Oh, he posted it at 431.18 seconds. He beats... Like, you know, in my feed, when there's a trade or somebody... Like when Samsonov went on waivers, within three minutes,

I had 75 people posting, Samsonov on waivers, Samsonov on... Freedom and altar, everybody. Everybody. Samsonov on waivers, Samsonov on waivers, Samsonov on waivers.

I know that. Hold on. Let me break it down real... Come here. So there of a Weaver. Samson of a Weaver. Samson of a Weaver. I know that. Hold on. Let me break it down real. Come here. So there's a nobody. We'll call him a nobody because he has no integrity with us. But a nobody starts tweeting

about a flight that has left, I don't know, somewhere in California. Yeah, Orange County. John Wayne Airport. Yeah. So we don't know who's on the flight, but speculation,

pure speculation based on this nobody starts to rumble on Twitter particularly, which is not called Twitter anymore, but I'm going to call Twitter. But anyway, so there's rumblings of this flight, but that unto itself, it's exciting, but you don't put in, I don't personally put any faith in a nobody telling me he's on a flight.

This means not much to me, but it's fun. Who's the source? But then the John Marossi, who we should point out, you know, Sportsnet's fan 590 has him on as an MLB expert. Like this guy is regarded as like an insider MLB expert. He's gained enough trust that he has several hundred thousand followers.

Yeah. And is seen in many, many different, you know, media markets. Yeah. So his tweet, so after this nobody rumbling about the plane now we got john morosi saying shohei otani is on his way to toronto okay so people like me who i consider myself pretty pretty good at what should i believe in skeptical at that point with morosi's tweet i start buying in okay this is friday right so i'd start buying in of morosi's tweet did you check any other sources or do you just went no thatosi? No, that's all I had. You've got to be correct, right?

I had, because on the heels of there is a fight. Did you see if there was a Ken Rosenthal or a John Heyman or any of these other Bob Nightingale? When you saw the Morosi tweet, did you start to believe or did you? No. So that wasn't enough for you to believe? No, no. And I'll tell you why, Mike, quite simply. It's that even if he was going to sign, okay, you got to go through a medical, all that

type of stuff. The idea that he would jump on a plane so that he would go to Toronto in person to what? The contract's waiting for him? But remember, there was also the rumor about the Kikuchi reservations, right?

Well, no, that was nonsense. Yes, but that is nonsense. I laughed when I saw that. I laughed when I saw that. I thought, oh my God, here's these amateur sleuths going, wait a second, somebody just made a reservation.

Here, here's my problem. Here's my problem. That on itself, you're right, we can laugh. And we can laugh at the flight because we don't know who's on that fucking flight

and we found out it was Robert, whatever, Hersheybeck or whatever. But the Morosi, which we do have, has some integrity. So on the heels of all this, had some integrity.

But then in the heels of all this, our friend, because he was on an episode of Hebsey on Sports Service, Adam Seaborn tweeting, Rogers has a conference schedule, some conference thing scheduled for 6 p.m. Okay. So we, there's a flight in the air.

It's going to, we think it probably, we think it must have Shoei Ohtani on it because Marosi has tweeted Ohtani's on his way. And then Adam Seaborn says Rogers has a thing. Meanwhile, by the way, 590 has decided to go with an unscheduled. I know. Did they get caught with their pants? The whole thing was a clusterfuck. A clusterfuck.

Started by somebody. Still angry. Hey, there's an app, you know, that you can follow the plane. And as soon as I thought of it, I was like, this is, what's his name? Kawhi Leonard all over. The first thing I thought of was, did we not do this three years ago? It was like the exact same thing. And earlier in the meetings, if you recall, there was this,

oh, there was a flight that went from John Wayne Airport to Clearwater, Florida, and it must have been them going to Dunedin to look at the new thing, but there's no pictures and nobody can say anything. And that whole thing, that whole thing of you can't say anything if you do, he's not going to sign with you. And then Dave Roberts, the manager of the Dodgers, oh, my God, he started talking about, yes, we met with him, and oh, you can't say that. What a bunch of shit. And it's all drama and and all the fans get sucked into this stuff why can't we wait

for it to happen why can't we wait for it to be official why do we have to why do we have to have all and hazel may just tweeted that we're getting michael brantley because the week a couple days earlier george spring we found out george Springer signed from some guy sitting in a barber chair. Right. In a barber chair. The guy was sitting in a barber chair and sitting next to the agent who was on the phone, whatever it was. He was right. He was correct.

They signed George Springer. Everybody went, oh, my God. Why am I waiting to hear from my baseball expert? Why am I waiting to hear from this guy or that guy or that guy or that guy when when i've got i can just open myself up to to twitter and somebody will have the truth out there okay so unbelievable what's happened this is the decline this is the book is called madness mike the rise and fall of sports media it's in a fall now it's a free fall now. It's a free fall now. You're right. A year, two years from now, who knows? Who knows? Oh my God.

What's going to be going on? Will you send me chapters as they're written? You need somebody to bounce this off of, right? You know what? Listen to this. If I send you

just the first page alone. Wow. We should share that with the world to get whets and appetites. The first page alone is about Wayne Gretzky. Wow. It's fucking amazing okay and

no unless you're an insider or you interviewed this guy or you're like you knew what was going on it is like you're gonna go holy really that's what it's like

and the lawyers are the lawyers and you were in this business for how many years yeah oh the number yeah the number one thing that people are worried about is if

you mention names are you gonna get in trouble well yeah like it's like John Gallagher you're gonna name names right I'm gonna yeah I'm gonna name names you're gonna you're gonna So the number one thing that people are worried about is, if you mention names, are you going to get in trouble? Well, yeah, that's the John Gallagher thing. You're going to name names, right? I'm going, yeah, I'm going to name names. You're going to name names? Yeah, yeah, I'm going to name names.

So immediately it's like, oh, you're going to say, this guy was fucking that guy's. No, no, that's bullshit. That's TMZ nonsense. That's nonsense. I'm going to name names. This happened, that person was involved. I'm not going to, you know, there might be some situation where I say, you know, I may

hint as to who the person was and it's pretty obvious. I don't want, but I'm not worried about stuff like that because if it's true, if it's true, then there's no liable. Oh yeah. Yeah. That's a, that's a, well, this is what Lorne Honigman always tells me. If it's true, you can say it. Yep. That's right. lauren always tells me you can't if you if it's true you can say it yep that's right if it's true you can say it that's right right wow okay so show

you tony just a quick question from brian where the jays played to drive up his price no no no no no no see here's the other thing is i think that we become insulated we think that it's all about like toronto's in the running like i heard the other day that toronto is in the lead what was the expression i'm like toronto has taken the lead in the so-and-so sweepstakes right this other picture i can't remember or or or it's been reported that toronto now is out in front i'm like what is this a fucking horse what are you talking about like you know when secretaria won by, you know, he didn't have the lead at the front. Oh, so-and-so's got the lead,

right? It's like when someone says he's on pace to score 147 goals. Like, you hear this stuff and I'm sorry it goes in one ear and out the other. It's not relevant. It's not context.

It's got nothing to do with it. It's funny, a comment from Wawizi Gord is apparently Hebsey has a backlog of opinions. Seems like a regular podcast is required. No, why do you think I'm writing a book? I have all this stuff.

I have all this stuff. Oh, and the other one is, did I tell this story on Toronto Mike? Did I tell this story on Hebsey on Sports? Greatest hits. And if I have, and people liked it, well, maybe I should just put it in print.

Greatest hits. I call it the greatest hits. Sometimes I'll go, Tom Wilson will drop by and I'm like, tell me more about Bruce Springsteen's tits. I like the greatest hits. Sometimes I'll go, Tom Wilson will drop by and I'm like, tell me more about Bruce Springsteen's tits. I like the greatest hits. All right,

because it's Blue Jays. Okay, so let's move on from LA Dodgers, Shohei Otani, who was never fucking coming. By the way, that is a day in infamy,

in sports media infamy. That day, the Friday, the Friday is a Saturday, I guess, right? The Saturday was- Well, the guess, right? The Saturday was. Well, the Friday was the flight. But the fact.

Saturday was TMLX 14 when he announced on Instagram he was going to be a doctor. See, there you go. You just hit the nail on the head right there. This could have all been avoided. And even Otani apologized for not making his decision known on Instagram early enough. But couldn't Rogers have cleared this up? Like, didn't Rogers know on Friday or they didn't know Friday? Rogers, they don't fucking know

how to communicate. This is the problem. This is a company that doesn't send their guy on the road and he ends up, and then they say, sorry, Ben Wagner,

but there's no, you know. What are your thoughts on that? Have you got a backlog of questions? You know. Ben Wagner was let go. You know how I think about that. You know how I think. You have to be traveling.

You think Shulman's son is coming in there. You have to be traveling. Two different things though. The traveling, yes, you've got to be traveling. We know your thoughts on that. But what did you think about the fact

they didn't renew Ben Wagner's contract? Well, I think Ben, probably it's best for Ben anyway, because if you want to flourish as an announcer, you've got to be able to go to all the games. You've got to be able to go. But he also wants to work. I know he might have other opportunities. Oh, I think he will get opportunities,

but he'll get opportunities to work and do all 162 games if he's doing radio i mean i hope so i wish him the best but you thought he was good right yeah but you can't but also here's the other thing mike he did it by himself then he had you know i'd be listening to games and i told you mike i'm very good at picking out names voices whatever i'm excellent at it and i'm like who's who's on the air with him who is this person like i'm trying my ears like like and then'm like, who's on the air with him? Who is this person? Like, I'm trying, my ears, like, and then a week later, he's on with someone else. So, you know, you got to have consistency, right?

And they never gave him that. They never gave Ben Wagner a chance. So I don't trust their decision. Who's going to take over the radio broadcast of the Blue Jay Games? No idea. I mean, Sam Cosentino, it could be. I mean, yeah, everything points to Shulman's son. Has he done enough baseball where, I don't know. And the other thing too is that what is Rodgers,

what are the Blue Jays looking for in their radio play-by-play voice? What do they want? But is there any concern for us fans that we could end up with a television simulcast? Sure there is. Of course there is because worst case scenario because mike the biggest problem with sports media is it's not being run

by people who know sports or media really it's bean counters it's people that have no idea they're not sports fans right this guy and you know the names i'm thinking i could give you names of the last three or four sports net presidents or whatever. We never heard of these dudes before. We won't hear from them again. They were bean counters. Right. Bart, whatever his name was. And before that, some other dude that got sent out the door with Keith Pelley and Scott Moore.

And before that, somebody else. And somebody else before that. And when I was there, it was Doug B. Forth was there. Like, yeah, it's just who do we got now? Who do we got now? Stability. And now they've got a baseball season coming up where they got we got a new stadium now and all the seats face home played and right and by the way

and i think i told you did i mention the story to you about you know my buddy had you know second row since they the jays began second row even with third base phenomenal seats fantastic seats so i think it was like let's say it was eight thousand dollars a year right whatever it was now it's 27 000 for the same seats because now they're they've designated to be a different section and it's it's the second row and their premium seats and so they were given the option it's either okay it's 27 000 or bye yeah it's rich man's how about that eh that's wild okay now so you talked about you know uh what does hebsey think i should wear like a wristband what does hebsey think the the biggest uh missing of hebsey on sports i think was after berrios was pulled in the fourth inning for kikuchi oh like so that was then since since

your last episode in the book okay since your last that's that's a very nick kiprios thing to say by the way i had him on for episode 700 and every time i asked nick kiprios an interesting question yeah he said it's in the book and i wanted yeah but his book's already been published Nick Kiprios thing to say, by the way. I had him on for episode 700. What is it? And every time I asked Nick Kiprios an interesting question, he said, it's in the book. And I wondered. Yeah, but his book's already been published.

I'm kidding here, right? I know you're kidding. I'm teasing. I know you're kidding here. It's just referencing in the book. A lot of people do that. So, yeah, which is.

Oh, by the way, didn't you read my book? You would have known the answer to that question. Right, it's in the book. Yeah, but all the listeners may not have. So could you please

repeat it for us? Would you mind? But Berrios, polled, fourth inning. He was dealing, as they say what were your thoughts as it was happening and what would you like to share with us we've waited months for this i think i tweeted out that um if i were barrios i would have strangled i would have strangled the manager i just would have strangled him um because there's no way like even though it's not john schneider's call no i would have strangled him because man the guy like you say he was dealing he was dealing if

you're gonna go down go down with your best like if you're gonna lose the game say you know we had our best guy there the pitch count wasn't a problem he was dealing now you're thinking too much ahead and of course hindsight's 2020, I mean, it would be like, Mike, you're the top salesman this month. And by the way, you're being demoted. You're going to Davenport, Iowa. Sorry. But, but I just, but I just, yeah.

But you know what? Next week, you know, you're not really great on Tuesdays and Thursdays. It's going to snow on those days. We've got so-and-so. He's got snow tires in his car. We're going to make a change. Like that's, it's like that.

Like what? What? And it sounded like Atkins threw Schneider under the bus on this one. He suggested it wasn't his call. But we, I mean, what do I know? Except I just assumed that Schneider was ordered to do this. Right. Do you remember I told you about the radio station program director,

a friend of mine who had told me that he was worried that every time he went to work, he was afraid his pass card wouldn't work? Yes. Okay. Is that John Schneider? This is sort of like what Schneider, yeah. This is, I believe, like what Schneider. It's like, look, John, you know, you got this job, you're on a short leash, you've, you know, you've really don't, you haven't got any experience, you're coming to be at the right place at the right time, you're a Charlie Montoyo's right hand man. We didn't have to go outside the organization. Time's running out. So let's see what kind of a manager you are. And ultimately you're going to make the call. But if it's the wrong call,

we can't help you there, John. If it's the right call, Oh, we'll take some credit. You know, if I remember correctly, so Kikuchi comes in and they allow two runs.

We lost that game to nothing. Right. And I think the spin, which I fucking almost threw a rock into my television was like, I remember correct so Kikuchi comes in and they allow two runs we lost that game to nothing right and I think the spin which I fucking almost threw rock into my television right was like oh we only allowed two runs

we did that's our job like the bats have to give us more than two runs like somehow the spin was that yeah or strategy worked because we only allowed two runs which is almost

like if you were getting like if you didn't actually watch the game yeah I know it was that the Blue Jays have a problem with communications. It's only going to get worse. This is part of the downfall of sports media is that you can't question them.

You can't hold their feet to the fire because they control the media. The team controls the media. Rich Griffin's not there anymore, right? He can't say, well, you're trying this. He's a journalist. Right? But it's like, no, no, no.

This is the way it is. We'll come out with our own statement. You don't have to answer your questions. And you'll tell us what you're, we'll tell you what your question is to us. It's like that poster, right? If I want your opinion, I'll give it to you. Right. Yes.

Right? The mafia Don. Right? If I want your opinion, I'll give it to you. So when you're watching this game and they pull Berrios in the fourth inning. Oh, I was going out of my mind. But was there a moment there where you're like,

I wish I had my Friday pulpit, like my head's on sports. No, no, I hate to say it, Mike. No, in that case, Twitter is good enough. Okay. Right? I mean, I got my statement out there. There was a fair bit of response to it.

Yeah, there were a few people that said, would have love to heard you say that on hep c on emergency emergency episode because you still have the feed and like yeah but again you can do it with you know i could i i can i can articulate it almost as well in print right especially if i actually which i've done into the microphone say, you know, this is the way. And then when you see it come out in script form, you go, oh, that looks pretty good. It's pretty powerful. Those are my actual words that came out of my mouth and here they are on the page. Now they're going to Twitter.

Okay? And so I think people get the gist in that case there. Quick love for Great Lakes Brewery, who are going to host us for TMLX 15 on June 27, 99.9% sure, I hope in the next couple of weeks, to make that 100%. And maybe if Hebsey's around, he'll show up maybe.

Well, I tried to last time, but again, I wasn't in town on December the 9th. Right. That's a very good excuse. So much love to Great Lakes Brewery. I'll send you home with some fresh craft beer from GLB, Mr. Hebsey. Nice. To go with your Palma pasta lasagna. You already played with your measuring tape. to Great Lakes Brewery. I'll send you home with some fresh craft beer from GLB, Mr. Hebbshire.

Nice. To go with your Palma Pasta lasagna. You already played with your measuring tape that was courtesy of Ridley Funeral Home Pillars of the Community since 1921.

Thanks for that because this comes in very handy. Yeah. You know, I know guys that have like a measuring tape like, you know, attached to their belt buckle.

Like Schneider. Yeah. Like not John Schneider, but Schneider from one day to time. I always thought, you know, whenever, oh man, where's the measuring tape? I don't know, six point, like, you know, attached to their belt buckle. Like Schneider. Yeah. Like not John Schneider, but Schneider from one day to time. I always thought, you know, whenever, oh man, where's the measuring tape? I don't know. So thank you for that. You always need a measuring tape and recycle my electronics.ca.

Hebsey, that's where you go. If you have some old electronics cables that you need to get rid of, don't throw it in the garbage. Go to recycle my electronics.ca. Find out a place near you. You can drop it off to be properly recycled. so the chemicals do not end up in our landfill or on the subway system where they could catch fire and you know like that you see that e-battery from the b-bike oh my god i did i did here you got to be careful folks you got to be careful with the electronic stuff especially

if it's got those batteries yeah okay yeah ion batteries right more reason to go to recycle my electronics yeah okay if you first of all are you go to recycle my electronics yeah okay a few place first are you listening to any radio these days like the fan or tsn radio yeah yeah i am okay what i'm just curious because you got your start in am radio but like what do you see as the future of am radio and what do you think of what you hear on the fan and tsn radio these days i think it's uh very inconsistent i mean i listen to overdrive as often as i can if i'm not listening to it on the radio i'm watching the tv feed but it's the it's the content that's coming out of there um so that i try to listen to as often as i can in the car

in the morning you know i mean it's the new year so we're hearing and we're not hearing the uh the old crews the uh the the christmas crews right to fill in people and stuff like you know roger lejoie does a lot of shows during the holidays that kind of thing right so and i like roger he's you know he's solid he's been doing it for years right but he's not controversial and you know middle of the road that's cool um so um the alice and um um cuffbird show is no longer in the mornings it's a pre-game show prior to leaf games i think at like five o'clock something like that so this is now where i'm confused because it's hockey season so the hockey specific shows are on and the baseball specific shows aren't on unless it's a flight

in the air unless yeah right there you go so you really have to fire you really have to kind of monitor the station to find out what their programming is. I like the consistency of this is the morning show, then this is the midday show, this is the early afternoon show, this is the drive home show, you know, that kind of thing. So this idea was sort of like to podcast on the radio, right? Wasn't that the guy from Yahoo, I think? Like the idea was to have these,

you're basically recording your Raptors podcast on the air. Sorry. Yeah, yeah, it's exactly right. Where, you know, if you don'tors podcast on the air. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah. It's exactly right. Where, you know, if you,

if you don't catch us on the air, it just like the YouTube, like if you didn't catch Hebsey on sports live at, you know, when they were nine o'clock in the morning, you know, anytime you want. Right.

So it's that idea. And that's fine. I think the problem, Mike, is it's that the, the youngest sports fans now, Gen X, correct? No, no, no, no. Gen Z. Yeah. It's Gen Z. The young, the young. fans now, Gen X, correct?

No, no, no. Gen Z. Yeah. It's Gen Z. The youngsters are Gen Z, right? Right. The problem now is finding something that they're going to be able to consume

in the way that they consume media now. They're different from us. On demand on your phone. But even more, even more than that. Are they really into into do they watch full full games right or is it just clips how long are those clips um you know are you infusing you know um humor with them that kind of a thing because everything is in real time now right and you know think about it mike i mean i'm staying up to watch you know sports center i don't know it's available so um i think what's happening is that how do you get this newest

young youngest group of sports fans to start following sports the way your um generation my generation other generations have followed them are they following sports differently and how do we get them because are they if they're gambling on games well there's that if they're real sports fans it's not so much the gambling they just love sports how do we find those people and are they watching professional women's hockey um are there other reasons to logos can you bet on those games are there prop bets are the gambling sites going to be involved talk to me about the gambling i'm really? Are the gambling sites going to be involved? Talk to me about the gambling. I'm really worried about the gambling thing. I'm really worried about it. Because when I hear on a radio,

people getting super deep into a betting line for a game that's that night, to me, that's not sports. Because any person can make a prediction and come up with stats to back up why they're making that bet. And then the next day, talk about the great parlay that they hit,

but that's a pretty limited audience to me. And I don't think that audience really wants the whole scope of the sport, just sort of the betting line. So they can, you know, have a bet down. The speaking of sports media, sports radio,

Brian says the closest sports personality that he has found to you, Hebsey, though there will only ever be one Hebsey, he wants you to know, is JD Bunkus. Curious if you have any thoughts on his style of broadcasting. He has many takes like Sid used to, but not as over the top as Sid. What do you think of JD Bunkus? I'm not sure JD Bunkus has ever been in a locker room addressing him. I'm not sure he's ever been a reporter before.

I think he's probably been on the outside as a commentator, a pundit, if you will, an observer of sports. I actually, you know, I think he knows his stuff, man, and he's a fan and, you know, he's very well informed. But again, I, you know, but again, he's not the type of a guy that's breaking stories so it's not like you know i listen to him because he's going to break a story so i get that so he you know he he's doing what he's being paid to do he's got an opinion it's over the top he's got passion and all that but he you know unless you've been in the trenches, I'm really sorry, but I don't have the same respect for you as I do for someone that's been in the trenches. So anyone that I see on television or listen to on the radio

or whatever the platform is, if they're giving an informed opinion, I need to know where that comes from. Were you a player? Do you have that in your background? That's fine. When I played, blah, blah, when i played okay that's good um if you're just a commentator and you your background is well i was a commentator did you you know do you have interviewing skills do you have reporting skills do you uh go to different sources do you break stories that type of thing are you a journalist

and unfortunately like i say a lot of people that i see now they're not they're not journalists they're presenters but they don't have the background the journalistic background to give me the information that i need presented in a certain way instead it's just opinion it's not look i was in the locker room i saw what this guy went through or i've developed a relationship i've cultivated a relationship with this player with this team i've been i have some inside knowledge that you don't have versus i have an opinion just like you i look my next door neighbor watches as much sports as anybody but he doesn't go out there and say you know but the guy next door to him might be on social media all the time and might one day get his own radio show.

I don't know. When your book comes out in a couple, almost two years, will we still have two sports radio stations in this market? Well, that's a good question. Yeah, probably, yeah. Because Bell, you know, it's like a loss leader for them, I guess. I don't know. They've got lots of dough.

They may as well have a presence there. Plus, they've got a contract to broadcast Leaf games and Raptor games for I don't know how They got lots of dough. They may as well have a presence there. Plus, they've got a contract to broadcast Leaf games and Raptor games for I don't know how many years it is. So I guess they're – they got the 50-50 split with those. Right. So they'll probably be okay. I don't think they're spending a heck of a lot of money on talent. Do you?

No. I don't think – I don't – no. No, I don't. Like, oh, jeez. I think O-Dog took all the money. I mean, Matt Cause is breaking the bank for us, right? And I love Matty Cause. You know, Matty's got, you know, he's back.

He was, I think they let him go. Then they brought him back. They let him go. You know, they had this whole kerfuffle. Loves his wine, that man. Yeah, they had the whole kerfuffle with, you know, Scott MacArthur. They had him. He didn't have him.

So there's been a lot of kind of movement. Oh, yeah. Did you listen to his episode, his return, when he talked about, you know, while he basically realized he couldn't be on 1010 anymore. He hated being on afternoon drive and he just walked away. Like it's kind of an interesting story. I saw that. Sold his loft, moved out.

Yeah, I saw that. Well, he does a podcast with Richard Griffin. Yeah, he does a podcast with Richard Griffin. So, you know, just all the movement of people. And you know, I thought movement was fairly restricted in Canadian media, especially sports media, because it's like, okay, TSN, you're either there or you're at Sportsnet.

You're not going back and forth. They don't have that. There's not this, oh, if you don't like them over there, they'll pick them up. They'll grab them over there. That's evident because when they lost the rights to TSN, they maintained all of their key people. Right. They signed all of them. Well, they only wanted Duthie.

Yeah. Well, I think there might have been some other people that they might have wanted at Rogers. You never know. But the point of the matter is, is that they made it comfortable enough that if you look at the talent at TSN, they've all been there for a long time. And if you look at talent at Sportsnet, it's like, oh, some of them have been there for a short time and, you know, may bounce back forth or you don't see much of them, stuff like that. I don't know.

I'll say this about the World Junior Championship, because just before you arrived, I was watching us lose. I don't know, seconds left, and then Czechia scores, and we lose the game. And I realized, oh, the tournament's over for me now. Like, I have zero interest in watching a minute of the World Juniors if Canada's not playing. So here we are, quarterfinals, this tournament, it's done.

Yep. It's the time of year, too. I mean, you've got the time to watch the World Juniors every year because people are on holidays. Right. And then when the real running starts after New Year's, and year school's off until like another week yeah so it's that first week of january and a lot of times you're back uh you know third of january but now it's like the whole week so this was the week that

we were going to watch canada win the quarterfinals semifinals and win the gold like last year big gold we're gonna win the gold like last year beautiful now it's like oh that's it okay back to the leafs yeah we were missing a uh the conor bernard uh type player okay so i know you've been amazing uh it's been great having you back thank you great so i'm gonna train this real quick here mystery fan just should the leafs fire sheldon keith is mystery fans question for you uh my question would be who are you going to get to take his place that's going to be a better coach? Tell me. You want Craig Berube?

He's available. He might want to take the rest of the year off. Do you really think that it's not the players? Like it's Sheldon Keefe's system or he's playing the wrong guys? I mean, go to the general manager, the new guy, Brad Treliving, and say, hey, what are you going to do for this team? How are you going to improve this hockey team? It's not Sheldon K keith's fault that elia samsonoff couldn't stop a beach ball it's not sheldon keith's fault that uh that um joseph wall got hurt and isn't going to be back till when and not his fault right i mean austin matthews is doing all he can

right what are you gonna do you're gonna go trade mitch Marner? So it's up to the GM to supply the players, okay? I haven't, I mean, look, Sheldon Keefe has been outcoached before, but I can't see anything in his coaching this year that justifies him being fired. What did you think of the big Raptors trade the other day? I liked it. Because to me, I didn't like, I haven't liked OG for a couple years. He's too injury prone.

He'll look great for a while, great, then he'll'll get hurt and he'll come back and he'll get hurt again so i never thought that og was the guy like jesus we don't have him we have no chance right he's a good player solid player he'll be fine on the knicks but i do like what we got back in return right i like i mean rj yeah i like quickly though he's awesome right he's awesome so you know they look pretty good last night considering they hadn't like well they have one practice or something like half a practice so yeah i'm excited for the team and i think that they will trade pascal siakam well that was my next question he's a great player but you know like so many else he's got to go somewhere else you know like like tracy mcgrady had to go like vince carter had to go i guess you know i know you grew up a big uh well grew up and to adulthood you were a

big toronto argonaut fan and i was the biggest argonaut fan i did play by play for the argos for two years i was the biggest argonaut fan and then once the blue jays came and the argo games weren't all on television, they should have been, but the blackout rule, they lost a generation of fans. They did. But they already had you. But they lost the next generation.

That's your generation. And my kids' generation as well. They did. Now, for a while, they came back there in the early 90s, Rocket Ismael and Matt Dunnigan, and when Candy and Gretzky and McNall owned the team, stuff like, but it wasn't sustainable because the league, it's the league. It all stems from the league, the ownership.

They should have had a team in Atlantic Canada years ago. I don't care if the stadium out there only seats 15. It doesn't matter. You call yourself the Canadian Football League, you don't have a team in Atlantic Canada. Every year you go out there and you do your fucking Atlantic schooner shit and all that, get people excited. Come on.

It can't be that tough all you need to do is have what five six home games seven home games whatever it is fine two of them in monkton and five and how it doesn't matter in halifax fredericton what the fucking difference is it canadian football league so that and the other one was they never took advantage of canadian college football weekends and made a weekend of football a weekend of let's go up to ottawa ggs against carlton in the panda game next day it's the ottawa what are they called renegades rough riders whatever they are aloe uh ottawa uh red blacks yeah red blacks there you go i forgot but you know what i mean and then and then so now you would have forget you would have carlton or you'd have University of Ottawa against University of Montreal.

Right. Right. No, they're not in the same league, are they? Whatever it was, you'd have a college game, right? You have a CFL game on the Friday night and you'd have a college game on the Saturday afternoon. People would come, they'd, you know, tailgate, whatever it was. You could do that in every single town.

McMaster and the Hamilton Ticats, right? Ottawa, they got lots of the two universities there and the red blacks montreal you got mcgill you got concordia you got the alouettes okay i don't have to tell you the university of manitoba university saskatchewan alberta golden bears right you got lots calgary dinosaurs all these schools have football teams and they have cfl teams how tough can it be if you're marketing but they never had the marketing they never had the sense they also never had the sense during the baseball all-star game to schedule a couple of cfl games because the only thing you're

going up against is the home run derby come on you idiots oh no i remember they said oh no we would never have a cfl game on a monday night why not why the hell in July? Why not? Right. School's out. What's the difference? What night of the week it is? Dumb dumps. Right.

And this, I mean, by all, you know, I didn't watch a lot of the regular season Argos, but I was told it was the best team ever. Like, this is the best CFL team ever.

And then they flamed out against the Alouettes in, in front of the biggest BMO field crowd they'd ever had. It was a perfect shit storm actually actually, for the Port Argos. But were you watching that game against the Alouettes? No, I wasn't. You can't even know? No, no, I haven't followed the league, and I haven't followed the team.

I haven't. And remember, I did play-by-play for this team. I just saw a steady decline, and you can tell. I mean, they're going, oh, come on, let's see if we can draw more than 11,000 fans. They're pulling teeth. They have to have a franchise in Toronto for the league, but they haven't looked beyond that.

They haven't really, you know, they don't have the leadership. They just don't. Name all the CFL commissioners since Jake Goddard. Go. Right? John Tory. John Tory, Donald Crump, Randy Amorosi. What's his name?

The CEO of Kohan, right? Right. Right. Okay. So move on from the CFL here. I know you're not a big guy, but Corey says, bring back Rock and Mark Hebdude next Halloween.

That's a good one, eh? So for those who don't know, what is this referencing? Rock and Mark Hebdude. Okay. So I'm trying to think what year it was. I'm going to say it was probably in the late 80s. It was a Friday night and Halloween happened to be on a Friday night.

Jim Taddy took the night off. He had scheduled it before. I don't know, took his kids out trick-or-treating, whatever it was. He was off that night. I was solo anchoring that night. And, you know, I like to take chances. So I'm like, you know, Jim's not here. Now, Jim might have gone for it.

He might have said, yeah, excuse me, let's do something on Halloween. But he wasn't there. So I said, look, to the crew, I said, you know, let's dress up. I'll dress up. And let's get some scary sound effects. And let's decorate the set with goblins and goose. And let's get the really great sound effects. And let's do the whole show.

I'll do the whole show in character as Rockin' Mark Hebdude. You know, bandana, dark glasses, black long-haired wig you know uh studded um uh dog collar like the whole deal and i came out and you know hi welcome this is the rockin mark hebdude man and hey man you know hey man and did all the hockey highlights that way and then of course our you know audio guy would put in like spooky screaming sounds and all that over the highlights and all the graphics had like exploding pumpkins and witches flying by everybody had a really great time like it was a lot of fun it was totally a one-off it was for halloween you can get away with it on halloween and we did that and um i don't have the tape any i have have a portion of the tape, like a clip of it from somewhere.

But man, I would love to have seen that whole show because we were just having so much, like once you're into it, it's like, okay, it's like now that we're in character, let's just, we may as well go all the way with this thing. Love it. VP of sales, Tyler Campbell says, why was Luciano Borsato a friend of Sportsline?

Okay, Luciano Borsato was from Woodbridge, Ontario and one of our producers and I'm going to say it was Anthony Ciccione and him and Looch grew up together. They were pals together. So when Luciano Borsato debuted with the Winnipeg Jets, the old Winnipeg Jets, now the Phoenix Coyotes, Anthony was like, that's my buddy luch luchano

borsado like and he told he's just his friend so and i think he came to the station one day or something whatever it was so he immediately was friend of sports immediately i mean he was the first guy that was like related to or with that we knew like like that that grown up with that was like you know hey there he is and then pretty soon we would point out people that we had met or we had known them from junior, we had interviewed them before. The best of them all was Rem Murray, who was from Stratford, Ontario,

playing for the Edmonton Oilers. And one night he scores the winning goal. And I go, Rem Murray from Stratford, Ontario. I get back to my desk after the show. There's a phone message. It's from Rem Murray's uncle. And it says he's from Dublin, Ontario, not Stratford, Ontario. Get your facts straight, your facts straight right i was like okay people are listening and they're very very

protective of their hometown speaking of listening real quick uh hit from edmonton matt layden who says are you guys going to talk about the absence of jeff merrick on hockey night in canada and the departure of dave pool and pool and from from TSN to the Ottawa Senators. First, I got to say, I didn't even know Jeff was absent from the hockey day. Well, Jeff does a show every day. He's got his own show. He does a radio show. He's got his own show.

No, no, he's on Sportsnet 360 also. Yeah, but yeah, it's a simulcast show. So maybe he's got enough going on. He's got tons going on. He does a show every day from noon to one or noon to two. So he's on every day. Well, Matt wants him everywhere. And he's on 32 Thoughts with Elliott Friedman.

So there's your answer, Matt. The guy only has so many hours in the day. And the other one was Dave Poulin? Yeah. Yeah, fabulous. Great. Listen, fabulous break for Frankie Corrado. Tremendous break.

Frankie is fabulous. I heard that show. He's really good. And you know what? They'll utilize him more now that Dave is back doing what he, I think, really loves to do. And that is, I mean, he's an administrator. He's a hockey guy. And being on the outside looking in and commenting on games and sitting on the panel is one thing.

Being involved in the day-to-day operations of a National Hockey League team, that's a whole other story. Good luck to him. Well, good luck to you, Hebsey. Thanks, Mike. I hope you continue to enjoy retirement. And I hope that you have good success of writing this book. And I can't wait to read it. Thank you, Mike.

Thanks for having me. And thanks for indulging me. It's been a long time. There's nothing that you say, oh, I want to mention this. And you don't have anything you forgot to say that you need to share with the listenership here. Well, I miss all of you. And I'm glad that you are still interested in what I have to say about sports. Oh, yeah.

You kidding me? I'm going to keep a list of things that I think, what would Hebsey think, and I'll just collect them all. And then maybe, I don't know, every six months, if you come over, I'll just drain the swamp and get your takes on everything. Sure. Even if you have no take. Listen, it can be as often as you want to. The sports media stuff we did, I always enjoyed talking about sports media. Well, I would love to do that.

Even Ken Reed misses that. Plus you give me some great ideas for the book. It's terrific. You'll get a credit. Don't worry about it. Oh, wow. Are you going to catch any Toronto Maple Leafs baseball games at Christie Pits this coming summer? You know, I don't live there down in that neighborhood anymore, so

I would say it's probably unlikely. Yeah, I'm sorry about that. I might have to see, I don't know, I feel like, well, more to come, but I might have an in there, and we'll see if we can entice you to get back for at least a game or two. I'm going to work on that. You probably can. I certainly like the area, and there's some really great restaurants

around there, so I can be, oh, we can invite Bill King to come. Love Bill King. He lives right up the street. Okay. Okay. Done deal. And that brings us to the end of our 1403rd

show you can follow me on Twitter I'm at and I'm on Blue Sky by the way at Toronto Mike Hebzy is at

Hebzy Man much love to all who made this possible and there's always room for more but I'd love to shout out Great Lakes Brewery

Palma Pasta Recycle My Electronics, and Ridley Funeral Home. Thank you, Hebsey, for my new Sportsline t-shirt. I'm going to wear it for our photo right now. See you all. Quickly going to my calendar

because I do not know who's next. Hold on here. Who's next? It might be an FOTM, KOTJ. Oh, it's Ed Keenan. Nice. From the Toronto Star. See you all then. Cause everything is rosy and green Well, I've been told that there's a sucker for you