Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Roger Lajoie: Toronto Mike'd Podcast Episode 1551

Episode Date: September 16, 2024

In this 1551st episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with Roger Lajoie about his 4073 shifts on The Fan 590's airwaves. We also talk Jays, Leafs, CFL, tennis and recent Sportsnet departures. 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 RecycleMyElectronics.ca. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

Flight 209er you are cleared for takeoff. Roger. Huh? LA departure frequency 123.9er. Roger. Huh? Request vector over. What? Flight 209er clear for vector 324. We have clearance Clarence. Roger Roger. What's our vector Victor? Now we're radio clearance over. That's Clarence over.. Over. Roger. Roger, over. What? Hey! Who? What up, man? Toronto.

VK on the beat. Check. I'm in Toronto where you wanna get the city love. I'm from Toronto where you wanna get the city love. I'm in Toronto where you wanna get the city love. My city love me back, but my city love mine. Welcome to episode 1,000. Five minutes to the end of the show.

I'm in Toronto where you wanna get the city love. I'm from Toronto where you wanna get the city love. I'm in Toronto where you wanna get the city love. I'm in Toronto where you wanna get the city love. I'm in Toronto where you wanna get the city love. My city love me back, but my city love mine. Welcome to episode 1551 of Toronto Mic'd, proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who bleeds 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. The Advantage Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada. Learn how to plan, invest, and live smarter. Recyclemyelectronics.ca, committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the fan.

It's Roger Lajoie. Welcome back, Roger. My pleasure to be here, Mike. I like, hey, 1551, you only got 2,500 more to go. And you'll be in the 4,000 club. You know what? That's my goal. I want to get to the 4,000 club. You are in be in the 4000 Club. You know what? That's my goal. I want to get to the 4000 Club. You are in the 4000 Club.

No one in Canadian sports radio history has ever got close to the 4000 Club. I'm going to correct you on that. I would think, I would think, here's the thing, Mike, I only count my own shows. I don't count anybody else's and it's not an official thing. It's like- Did Bobcat get up there? Oh, I betcha Bob beat me. And he did take a lot of time off. But that's the thing, you know, 20 years, it just shows you how long you have to be

around and how many shows you have to be doing on a regular basis to hit that mark. I would suspect, I would expect Gord Stalek is probably had done more shows than I have just because of again number of years and a full-timer at the station. The fan has never been my full-time gig so it's like to get to 4073 is pretty impressive but your numbers are coming up there so congrats too buddy. I got a lot of work to do to get to the 4000 club. You know who else was in the 4000 club? The great Tom Cheek. His game streak was 4,306. Yeah, and that's consecutive.

Yeah. At the ballpark. And he doesn't work in the winter. That was a pretty impressive run for sure. 100%. So when they have the fans level of excellence, we're going to see the Raj, Roger LeJoy, right up there. Well, I, that's very flattering of you to say, but we've had a lot of great talent on

our station, Mike, over the years, but I appreciate that comment. But you know what? You're like a cockroach. You can't kill the roach. Thank you. Really, of all the compliments I've received in my life, being called a cockroach is probably the best. So listen, I'm gonna really say thank you, sir,

and I am out of here. Remarkable species, the cockroach, though. You can't kill the cockroach, right? They'll be around long after human beings are there'll be cockroaches I'm working on my analogies here, but what year was your first shift and it was the fan 1430 We're a fan 1430 on November the 30th 1992 the station went on air first week of September of 1992 I was a regular guest because at that time I was doing work, Mike, for United Press International.

I was covering the Blue Jays and as we remember they were in a pretty interesting run. So they reached out to me to be a guest on a lot of shows. What host wanted you on? Storm and Norman Rumack, of course, my great friend. Hammer head alert. Hammer head alert. There's another guy. There's another guy who's probably got 5,000 shows. Norman Rumack, terrific guy. So yes, started there. Mike Hogan had me, a couple of

guests had me on, okay, and they started and program director Alan Davis was reaching out, you know, trying, they're building the station, getting more hosts and you know, he'd heard me so many times on other people's shows, he thought, hey what about this guy? This guy sounds like he could do a sports talk show. And I was also working at a weekly newspaper in Oshawa. So I had a sports background and one thing led to another. November the 30th, 1992 was number one and tonight, as we speak here, on Monday September the 16th, 7 to 10 will be 4074 for so yeah that's quite a run 407 for

soon you'll be mash 407 and listen I could be in your market well not with cockroach comment you can't be in my marketing sorry pal yeah but you got a you're looking at cockroaches all wrong man I think that's a remarkable species nothing can kill okay okay did you listen, it was the 30th anniversary. I did a retrospective on the fan 1430 slash 590 with the aforementioned Allen Davis and Nelson Millman was on the show. Scott Metcalf was on the show.

It's a great show, I did hear that, yes. Dan Schulman and we of course shouted out Roger Lajoie. It's quite a run for the fan. Do you think that 590, always a sports station, it's not gonna become a country music station or anything like that man I sure hope so because I'm not really into the country tunes and I don't want to be spinning any of that stuff radio station radio station Mike and all radio stations face challenges we know that that's no secret same thing with

newspaper any traditional media has the same difficulties I am I'm confident we're gonna find a way as a station to stay relevant and and stay involved. It's, it's, it's tough. There's competition. You can get your information anywhere. Radio as a medium is difficult, but I remain pretty confident in the brand and I look at it this way. If there's only going to be one sports radio station anywhere, it'll be ours. Your best friend at a terrestrial radio station like the fan 590 would be a traffic jam, right?

Like long live traffic jam. So long as there's traffic, there's gonna be people tuning in to hear what they have to say about the Leafs, the Raptors, what not on the fan 590. Well, you can imagine in that case, Mike, cause that's true. You can imagine what it was like during COVID

for a sports radio station when nobody was working, everybody was at home. You're in you have all now you're distracted. Now you've got Spotify. You've got your podcasts. You know, you're just going on the TV because the boss can't see you. Right. Exactly. So 100 percent. So that was that was a tough but we survived like we all did. And here we are today. And that's why I called you a cockroach. You survive, right?

If you could really move on from the cockroach, the rest of the interview, I would really be deeply. No more cockroach talk on this one. No more cockroach talk. But I do want to give you some nice notes to pump your tires after those unfortunate remarks. Ali Musa, do you know the name Ali Musa? Yes, Ali Musa does a podcast

and I've been on his podcast and he's an inspirational guy and I enjoy him very much. I was on his podcast too. Like yeah, it was quite something. He wrote me to say that you are his favorite. So I am not his favorite, that's for sure. Ali Musa wants you to know Roger Lajoie, you're his favorite. Well, that is very kind and I'll take that as a pretty high compliment.

And for people who don't know Ali, Ali is blind. He does his own podcast. He puts it together himself. And bless him. So Ali, that's very kind. Thank you. Bless the heck out of Ali Musa. We're on the same page there.

MidtownGord wrote me and said, say hi for me. MidtownGord was. I don't know if he still does. But he used to call in all the time. I think Gord Stellic gave him the Mid-town Gord was, I don't know if he still does, but he used to call in all the time. I think Gord Stalick gave him the nickname Midtown Gord. And he, I know him very well from Christie Pitts as well. I'm sure we're going to talk about that. But Midtown Gord is a big fan of the Unicounty Baseball League and comes there all the time. Thank you. Mike, I tell you, it is always gratifying to hear from

the great listeners and people you follow over the years and so nice very nice. Midtown Gord, a heck of a Lee Aaron fan. He does like the hard music you know he's a music junkie too. The number of restraining orders that Lee Aaron has had to put out for Midtown Gord is proof positive. Midtown Gord could be worse, could be a cockroach. He aspires could be a cockroach could be worse my Like Midtown Gordy's come to some Toronto Mike listener experience events tmlx's I'd love to see you Roger at a tmlx I have to make it Your stuff is great. Well, I'm so busy Mike. That's bad That that's a terrible thing because you have enough of them, but you know, I mean you well, there'll be a 16th

I'll be announcing soon the date there'll be a 16th, I'll be announcing soon the date and location of the 16th TML. Okay. All right. You know what? I'm going to make a point. I do follow you. And I know when they're on the show, I have no excuse not to, it's not, Oh Mike, I didn't hear about it. No, I heard about it. No excuses from you. Uh, that's an Alison Chainsong. No excuse. I, no excuses. I want to give you that book now and talk about Toronto Maple Leaf Space

Ball because this sponsorship is actually over. It ended at the end of August. So this is literally, I'm not, this is not something I'm obligated to do. I'm doing this because I know you know, you are an official scorer at Christie Pitts. This is half my material in this book from the years of Christie Pitts. So thank you. I actually have one. You have one, but I will take this very glad. Let me tell the listeners. I'm hey, I've given Roger a excellent book called, uh, yeah. And most people listen don't watch, but the Toronto made beliefs history. Do you know you're good at numbers? I feel like you're kind of like, uh, you can call a number and we're going to discuss many numbers and from Terry Fox money to like steps you've taken and kilometers you've walked. We have a lot of stuff to talk about. But how many games at Christie Pitts? 732. Did you, were you the official

scorer for it? 732. I know, I'm still going to finish the question. 732. So people know what the hell we're talking about Roger. 732 at Christie Pitts and at the moment 322 in Major League Baseball with the Blue Jays. Well we're going to talk about that because you were almost a part of history. We're going to get there. Twice? Oh yeah, twice in a very short period of time. Shout out to Dave Steeb, who hopefully is listening right now. We're going to talk about that.

But Toronto Maple Leafs Baseball, you were the official scorer. So how long has it been since you were an official scorer for an IBL game? So I started doing Inter County baseball in 1979 Mike. I was the official scorer of the Toronto Maple Leaf Baseball Club for 35 years. 35 seasons. What a run. 732 games ended in 2013 when Jack Domenico the late owner away in 2021, I guess it was, Damon Topley, who was running the team at that time, Ty Crawford running the team, asked me to come back and help out for one year, so I returned for one more year to help them in the transition. They have new owners now, as you all know, because

you're down at Kees-Stein and Mr. Godfrey, Rob Godfrey. Absolutely. So, yeah, 36 years total. So I've been scoring baseball games for, that's what, 45 years, and 1052 is my current count, 732 in the inner county and 323 in with the Jays. I love it. You know, you and I are cut from similar cloths, so I'm really the cockroach around here because I love the numbers too. Like I can tell you how many kilometers every I see that you post every yeah every month you count your shows Well, I count my shows for sure. You're what are you 15? 51? I count the kilometers I cycle So this is a big I have these targets and these these these milestones I know you do something similar with your walks We're gonna talk about later, but I for example example I know that I for a month like a September the minimum for me will be a

thousand kilometers of cycling this month and I'll blow I'll blow by that that target but I track every single run with an app and I record all this similar to what you're doing so I got numbers all over what gets measured gets done yeah that's that's why I look at you got to measure it you got to measure it. That's why I look at it. You got to measure it, you got to count it, and again, back to counting the shows, counting the official scoring, counting everything else. You're not counting anybody else's. It's not a comparison. Right.

You're not trying to be better than anybody else. You're just trying to measure to a higher standard and it gives you a number to shoot for. So good on you, brother. Right. The only person I'm competing with is myself. So it's like I want to do better. Likewise. And then you know sometimes I'm like I want to be I want to have my fastest 30k ride ever today and I'll just go hard

and then we'll see how I do. Has anybody ever interviewed you? You're doing it right now. I want to do it. Can we do it on the fan? I know on but you know what we could do that sometime that's an idea but you know what I would like. The fan or GTFO. You know what I would like? I would like to be the guy that interviews you for one of your Toronto Mike episodes. You introduce yourself as the guest, but I'm the guy asking the questions. Well here, okay, so we all, yeah, and-

Think it over, it's a good idea. Sure, I'm game. Oh, you don't like it, I can see it on the look on your face. This is like, okay, so I was, real quick, just to connect something here. I was invited to be on this show that was on the National CTV News Network. I was invited to be on this show that was on see the national CTV news network. I can't know what they call that CTV news net or something news channel

I don't know but I was invited to be on this debater show and I was happy to do it But I had a caveat I said I'm doing it but I'm doing it at 299 Queen Street West Like I don't have a particular passion for doing your show But I do want the experience of doing it at 299 Queen Street West. Long story short is they did a bait and switch and at the last minute they said, we have to move it to FaceTime. There's no one at 299 to receive you. I had already committed and I did it and it was no fun.

And then they asked me back and I said, well, again, I'm only doing it if you can promise me as a 299 Queen this time. And then it never happened because of course now the show is gone whatever whatever similar to you like I would love to talk to you but I would love I've never been on the fan radio station in my life never had this experience I want the experience of being on the fan before it turns country you leave that with me and it's not turning country all traffic that would be a cockroach move if it ever, ever turned off. You know what I say? I joke, but they're actually starting this month. There is now again a country music station in Toronto, but on the FM dial, the old flow,

which became something called Today Radio, which apparently had more cockroaches listening than humans, and now it's country. It's discouraging. And nothing against country music, okay? I know people like it. There's all kinds of... Who likes it?... taste out. discouraging and nothing against country music. Okay. I know people like it. There's all kinds of who like to taste out. A lot of people love country music, but but but end of the day, it's a tough you. You leave that with me.

All right, I will. I will see if we can make some beautiful music together. Okay. So I want to put a bow on the Toronto Maple Leafs thing, which is to tell you that I in 2025 next summer, I hope to be like live from Christie Pitts for at least one game a month, a home game for the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team. And I would love if for one of those, we arranged maybe one of those live recordings from Christie Pitts, you make an appearance at Christie Pitts and sit beside me and chat me up on

Toronto Mikes recorded from Christie Pitts. I'd be very happy to. And you can tell us memories, I don't know, like, I remember when Rob Butler went eight for eight. I can tell you memories of Christie Pitts and in the background, Mike, and I'm not going to give you a pile of them now, but I'll say this. So I am a second year university student at Ryerson University. At that point it was Ryerson Polytechnical Institute. I remember. In 1979, summer of 79, so my second year there just finishing up, part-time job, official scorer, a public address announcer, Inter County baseball.

I went down and met Jack and Lynn Domenico which was supposed to be a summer gig for a student and I stayed there 35 years. So I do have an affection for the place there. Would you love to have a role with the team again? That's not for me to say first of all, you know, Would you like that? I am busy enough, let me put it that way. And when I came back to help out Damon and Ty, I realized why I didn't want to say I don't want to. I realized why, I didn't want to say,

I don't want to say I realized why I left, Mike, but it's gotta be a passionate thing. So if they think I can help them, I would certainly help, because they reached out to me. I wasn't saying, hey, geez, I think I'd like to go back to Christie Pitts. I've been away nine years, after 35 years,

be fun to come back. I support the Inter County Baseball League, the Maple Leafs, it's all good. It's an all good thing and I'd love to go down there and chat with you, Christie Pitts, whenever you feel like it. It's worth noting I was there for a playoff game and it was great atmosphere and they were filling the hill and it was great times but we got swept in that series by the Barry Baycats.

Baycats. And they won it all. I want to report back that the Internet is champion. I know we're on TV here but I'm going to, not that many people watch apparently. Well to me it's a podcast. You can see it. I have my Inter County baseball ring here. You want to have a look at that. So this ring is kind of modeled like a championship ring except it was made uniquely for me after 35 years and it has 700 games on the side. It has the seven championships teams I was involved with and 19 pennants. And I'm going to say this, so Jack and Lynn Dominico were the owners of the team. Lynn Restersol, what a wonderful lady, passed away in 2008. The

Leafs have not won a pennant or a championship since. It's like the legend of Bill Burrow. It is kind of, that's the impact. You're still, still trying. She was the soul of the franchise and everyone talks about Jack Dominico. He's a bombastic guy and everything else. And Jack was a colorful guy and everything else. His wife was such a major part and in this, in this day and age would have received five times the recognition she did in the past.

Oh yeah, there's Jack's wife, works in the press box, getting the kids organized. She was the soul of the franchise. So yeah, we had some great things. And yeah, I was disappointed. I didn't make it down this year. I was disappointed to see that because it's tough. The league is good, man. It's a good league, really good league.

Yeah. High caliber baseball and a great atmosphere and the price is right, man. Free admission. Can't, man. Free admission. Can't beat it. Free admission. Can't beat it. Okay. Now I want to talk about the Terry Fox run that took place yesterday all across this

country of Canada. There were Terry Fox runs yesterday. I am wearing the shirt I bought at the High Park location yesterday when I did the walk. I want to thank, I wish I had the number in front of me. I think I'm a whisker under $2,000 raised. Fantastic. So I want to thank the listeners and the FOTMs out there, a few members of my family,

but mainly it was listeners who contributed and got us to $2,000. The High Park location set a record for the most money it's ever raised for the Terry Fox run yesterday. The first time they cleared 200,000. So it was a great day, perfect weather. So thank you to everybody. But kudos to you, Roger LeJoy. You, much like myself, you have been doing the Terry Fox run for decades. I've done 39 and 36 consecutive. This is the 44th and I still, I make it a big point, Mike,

it kind of bugs sometimes the organizers. I go up as soon as I get there and I still I make it a big point Mike it kind of bugs sometimes the organizers I go up as soon as I get there and I say excuse me could I have the sticker and they go well have you finished the race yet and I said no but you might have packed up by the time I finish here because I'm walking all over this thing. I get the sticker early, I grab the sticker before I do the walk. I want that sticker I don't want I figure what if they're all gone that's what it's weird all the things and I have all 36 consecutive posted and framed in in my home and there's four more empty spaces for 40 and once those three are done I'm gonna really fix it

up in a nice mat so yes you man absolutely marvelous I can't say enough about the people in Oshawa to echo your comments the people that contribute the organizers in particular that spend you know it, it's an all year thing. You know, you're arranging for the merchandise, you're arranging for vendors, you're looking after all the details. It's not an easy thing to pull off and maintain it after all these years. And you reach a certain stage with these things, Mike. A lot of them at the end of the day, you know, whether it's a golf tournament or any other

fundraiser, they fall off. You know, after a while it's like, well, Terry other fundraiser they they fall off you know after a while It's like well Terry Fox Yeah, but I was 44 years ago, but my goodness it resonates so much with so many people still yeah And thanks to the great people the Terry Fox Foundation. They did a marvelous job. We had a great run in Oshawa, too It was a beautiful day. You're right It doesn't get much better for a Terry Fox run that like to feel like there was like felt like 30 degrees out there It was unbelievable, but 39 good for you Roger. I'm at like 22 or something.

Much younger man. I am a younger man, but not much younger. How old are you? 66. I have no problem talking about my age. I'm just doing the math. Even if I did one for the next, I think we'd be right there next next. Like I said, we both, we both count things. Okay. We're cut from the same cloth, right? Because we're almost on pace for the same number of Terry Fox runs. Love it. And I'm proud of you for doing it. Now you also we talked about how you record your like your steps. So steps like that whole language of steps doesn't really mean like I'm not sure how to translate it, but I'm good at kilometers because I track

my rides in kilometers. How many kilometers did you walk yesterday? 83.04. Okay, let me digest that because that's a hell of a bike ride. Okay. 83 kilometers. If I do 83, that's a hell of a long ride for me because I typically don't go past like 70 walking. What can you explain? Where did you walk? First of all, 15 hours and 21 minutes it took. So give me the day break. You weren't biking 15, I'm sure you weren't biking 15 hours and 21 minutes. I start, I get up, Mike, about six o'clock. I get in 15,000 steps pretty quickly before I even go. Because that's the psychological part for me. How long does that take you?

See I don't even watch a time, it's about 8,000 steps. You're a step guy. I can do 8,000 steps Because that's a psychological part for me because I long does that take you? It's about 8,000 say you're your step guy I can do 8,000 steps a minute at a good pace Pardon me an hour. I'm gonna say yeah, that's like an incredible. Okay. Yeah, so you you did obviously the Terry Fox run Isn't that long? What is no no no 10k? Well 10k? Yeah, I did the tight park once I have that I did eight Terry Fox runs. That's incredible. Yeah, so I did the type Park once I have that I did eight Terry Fox runs. That's incredible Yeah, have you ever participated in like a marathon? No Because this is the only to the only I only walk I only walk I'd walk the marathon Yeah, the running for me is Mike, especially I just look at it I'm not and we're all different and how we approach, you know trying to look after ourselves sure for me personally

I'm not a big person on high- athletics, so I'm not a rec hockey league player. I don't want to have to have my hip replaced or knee replaced because of playing sports. I just don't. It's just not worth it for me. And I have a fear of concussions, to be honest with you. Walking. Anybody can walk.

It's low impact. However, take that length of time. 80 clicks, it's crazy. 83. 83, I'm shortchanging you. 83, 04 please. Don't forget the 04. Yeah, don't forget the 04.

83, 04. You started sounding like me at the rides. Yeah, I did 43.02. And the heart point tracker was tracker was a thousand and nineteen So you cardio must be incredible. Yes, there's no question I've really improved the walking has done that even though it is a low impact There's no question about that. I can tell you the distances you're going and you get a high five from your doctor You go your annual checkup gives you a high five doctor doctor doctor is very impressed

He said and to tell a story Mike, like a couple of years ago in particular is when I really, pardon the bad pun, stepped it up on this, is he told me your blood pressure is starting to get a little bit in the high range like a lot of people your age, so you know you're gonna have to be, you know, should I give you some medication? And I said no, you shouldn't give me any medication, how can I get that down without medication? Preferably, obviously, if you need it, you need it. And he said, well you you shouldn't give me any medication. How can I get that down without medication? I prefer Blaine, obviously, if you need it, you need it. And he said, well, you're the big walker and everything else, you know,

if you could take it to another level. So I took him up on it. And it's three years I've been tracking the steps. Now, this is an ultimate, yesterday was an ultimate, but I will do this year 10 million steps. Yeah, I do 28,000 a day. Good, that sounds, again, I'm having trouble, but if you 20 kilometers, there you, okay.

I walk 20 kilometers a day. 20 kilometers of walking a day is absolutely incredible. And I know you're busy with work. So even finding the time. Here's how I do it. Here's, here's, here's one way to do it. So your, your location here is 5,500 steps from the GO Train. So I plan the day, I take the GO Train, 5,500 steps. I'm going to walk back 5,500 steps. I'm going to get off at Union Station on the GO Train. I'm going to walk to the fan, which is 6,000 steps.

And at the end of my shift tonight, I'm going to walk back, which is another 6,000 steps. There's 24 right there. Excellent. I'm gonna walk back which is another six thousand steps. There's 24 right there. No excellent so Roger congrats on your your fitness and for Hitting these awesome milestones with my inspiration, but you know what? Well, that's the word. I'm glad you use Mike I listen I like that but be honest with you like it's to me. It's I'm not doing it to show hey look what I did What I do with the Terry Fox run is I don't take a lot of donations from, I say you get out, you get out, I'll support your run, get out

and everybody get out and move. How about we all get out and move and then nobody would have to support anybody because we're all out there doing it and we're all doing it for the right reason. And I hope it inspires somebody to do it. That's the bigger thing. And I can tell you this, I'm 66 now. I could never have done this at 36. I couldn't have done 20% of this at age 36. So let that be to someone who's in their 30s,

because I get people say that, oh man, I get depressed when I read that. Why? I said, well, look how old you are, and I can barely do steps. I said, don't feel bad. I couldn't do steps 30 years ago too. And I hope that's a trigger for people and anyone listening,

it isn't about Mike's tracking, you know, fabulous kilometers on his bike or Roger steps. You get out, you get out, you can do it. And you know, Mike, I'm not trying to diminish. 83 kilometers is quite a walk in one day. It's incredible It's it's really not That's all I'm gonna say. I would say it's incredible basically that you had you found 15 hours to walk Well, I make clear the day. Yeah, that's it was a sign very true. It was a Sunday. Very true. Very true

I'm just envious Wow good on you, man Hey, I got a note from Mike Hanifin and I'm gonna read it and Mike can I say way as nicely to the Blue Jays for a moment here note from Mike Hanifin and I'm going to read it and my can is a segue as nicely to the Blue Jays for a moment here. But Mike Hanifin, this is exactly what he wrote me regarding you, Roger, because these first two words at first I wanted them to be applied to me. But then I realized, no, these are for Roger. Great guy. That's you.

Great guy. We compared notes as official baseball official scorers a few years ago him major league me minor league in high a Vancouver and it was very interesting how different that position is in the big leagues He doesn't even get to sit in the press box anymore in Toronto What the heck is Hannah been talking about You wouldn't want the official score in the press box. Would Toronto. What the heck is Hanifin talking about? You wouldn't want the official score in the press box, would you? I don't know, maybe that they have to do that at smaller, maybe in triple A or high A or whatever. But where do you sit at the dome when you're the official scorer? So first of

all Mike Hanifin is a great guy as well. Thank you for that Mike. I can tell you that Mike here's just a little inspiration for you if you like i spent thirty five years in the inner county baseball league which is a lower level of scoring than what you're doing now i didn't score my first major league game until i was fifty three years old so keep doing your stuff brother number one as as as far as that goes we have the the best primary location we used to be in the press box, yes,

and we now have a booth which opened up with the reconstruction of the Rogers Center. It was about, I don't know, like six, seven years ago maybe. It's a separate work, actually it's less than that now that I think of it. It's a separate area. It is right dead at home plate. We are right next to the Fan 590 radio booth,

right next to it, like the Fan 590, MLB data operations, four data operations guy who operate the pitch clock, the scoreboard, the stats, stats cast, all of that, and myself sit in a separate area and we watch the games on a couple of monitors and have full access to it. It is a fantastic working environment and it's probably one of the best in Major League Baseball for an official scorer because an official scorer does not need any noise or distractions around him. It's a tough gig, okay, as Mike knows. It's a tough gig and everybody, and I always make

the joke, so I was in earlier, I still do quite a few times, I'm in the Jays booth either doing this out of town scoreboard or I used to be in the booth when Mike Wilder was doing it and Jerry Howarth were doing the games and I'd be talking with them, whatever. Yeah. Official scoring is so easy from that seat. The seat next to it, a lot tougher.

All 40,000 people sitting in the ballpark think they know how to be the official scorer, but when you're the guy that has to make the decisions, it's tough. But we have a primal fantastic area. It is not, oh geez, you don't even get to be in the press boxes. No, we're even a better location than the press box. And they feed you? Yes they do. Anything you want or what? Like you got a special... There's a media buffet meal there, which is top of the line, which is great. A lot of people have to pay for it. It's just part of what they do, you know. You come in but they, yes, they give us free meal. Yeah. And by the way,

I just want to state, I work for Major League Baseball, not the Toronto Blue Jays. All right? Well, thankfully... This is a Major League Baseball paid position has nothing to do with the Toronto Blue Jays and the Toronto Blue Jays have no control or sway over and to their full credit in my 13 years in an official score, I have never had a problem with them. Okay, let's talk about what I think are the highlights of this disappointing, again, this is me talking, disappointing, again, I'm a fan, I can say this,

disappointing 2024 season for the Toronto Blue Jays. The highlights being the two times that Bowden Francis took a no-hitter into the ninth inning. That's always exciting. That's the only time I've even tuned in since the trade deadline. I want to see the second no-hitter in Toronto Blue Jays history. Of course, the first one was in Cleveland and that was 1990, I I believe and of course that was Dave Steep. What I find fascinating is that you were the official scorer for both of those games Roger. Yes so I'm one of the three official scorers. We each do 27 games a year. On August the 24th I was the official scorer when Francis first took the game into the ninth inning and on September 9th I think whatever the date was I was just official scorer when Francis first took the game into the ninth inning and on September 9th

I think whatever the date was I was just by chance my next game up So I did back-to-back Ninth inning no haters now you said it's exciting. I have other words to describe exciting Let me set the table here. Let me set the table. So first question I have for you Roger is How aware are you that the pitcher's got a no-no? Because suddenly, you know, the focus, the attention, the eyes, should you call it a

hit when possibly maybe some people think maybe that's an error that has such weight and it's so much more important if it breaks up a no-hitter, how aware are you of that moment? Oh, well, we're aware it's a no-hitter like in the third, fourth inning. That's one of the things your first start night. But here's an interesting thing. You touched on there. And this is where it's a difficult thing. It does not matter.

It does not matter what the circumstances are. It's either a hit or an error. And I'll use an example. There was a game a couple of years ago, Mike, and it was, and I wasn't the scorer, but it was in New York, either Yankees or Mets. It was one of the New York teams in, and the New York pitcher gave up a hit in the second inning that nobody really questioned. He took it into the seventh inning and he's got the one hitter going and the New York Public Relations Department is saying, hey, you're going to take a look at that hit from the second inning to which the scorer, not me again, justifiably says, no,

why would I? Well, you know, it was, and then play was okay, you know, it's one of those but it's a base head The score made and nobody but here's the thing. Nobody said anything in the second inning, right? No, nobody said a word in the second inning, but now it's oh could be a no-hitter like it's so hard to pitch You know her you cannot give someone a no-hitter by saying well, you know He really did a good job and that probably it's a hit or an error. So we watch every single play like the games and no hitter. We do.

We're just, but yeah, so you're calling it the same regardless of whether the guy's given up 20 hits or no hits, but you must be aware of the attention that calls going to get. I was terrified. All of Major League Baseball, all fans, basically, if they think you got it wrong, you just robbed Bowden Francis of a no hitter. It's terrifying. I'll tell you my experience, the first one. So the first game is going.

I've never scored a no hitter in Major League Baseball, scored one in the inner county, but did not score one in Major League Baseball. And I'm sitting there, you know, we have an online supervisor who's in the chat room. So he's watching, and obviously he's watching this game now really carefully with me, you know, if I want any advice to my call, but you know, so, and the data ops people are watching, and you know,

you're tense, but you're thinking, and all I'm hoping is, I just hope this is a clean hit. Because I'm confident, I'm not gonna give him a no-hitter. I'm not, I will call it the way it is a clean hit. Because I'm confident, I'm not going to give him a no-hitter. I will call it the way it is, but yeah. Then afterwards everyone will look at this guy, call it, how could you do that, take away the no-hitter. So the top of the ninth starts, and the first game, if you watched it, you'll remember. Okay, soon as that ball goes off the bat, as soon as it went off the bat, it didn't go, I didn't know it was going out of the park, but Varsho turned around and had to chase it. And in my mind,

I'm thinking there's no way this is an error. Varsho is not going to drop that ball. This is going to, I actually took a breath going, it's either going to be a great catch or, and we all know it left the park. And you must be like at some level you miss, free private question personal question. Are you religious guy? To an extent. Yes. Are you praying to your higher power that it is a home run? If this thing's not not gonna be a no-hitter let it be a home run that kind of takes any of the the sweat off your Brow to be honest. Yeah, I'm hoping it's clean hit. Yeah, so when you see not just for me for the pitcher, too I don't want a pitcher, you know like having to go

Oh my goodness I had a no-hitter and it was a bobble at first. Right. And maybe the guy should have been able to pick it up. And it was one of those plays. That's the worst case scenario. Yeah. And so back to the second game, exactly the same thing happened. And this time, soon as it's off is bad, that's out of here. Right. See you later. So no worries there. Rogers wiping the sweat from his brow. But the flip side is Mike, you're still disappointed. I'd like to be the official score of a record of a no hitter in Major League Baseball, you telling me? Like,

right. Because they're still so rare. It does feel as a from a fan's perspective, it feels like we get no hit. No, it happens a lot more. It happens a lot more. The Jays, I don't know the number off the top of my head, but I feel like I feel like nine or 10 no hitters I can think of off the top of my head being the Jays being no hit. Yeah I don't know if it's that high but Dave Stewart did it Verlander did it, Nolan Ryan did it. There was a combine no hitter. It happens a lot really. Yeah but we can all say hey it happened we've only done it once. And it's happening more in the last four or five years just to the nature of the game especially now with the hit and miss and a lot of guys hitting the homers and the analytics of the game and you know you know

nobody's bunting like well I can tell you what it is it's that you can be pitching a no and back in all back in the day Roger let's sound like Abe Simpson you know shaking our fist at the clouds for a minute here but back in the day you didn't dare remove a pitcher who was pitching the no hitter and it's commonplace now to pitch counts and everything I know you got a no-no through seven you're coming out we got another guy pitching the eighth another guy pitching the ninth and I think that makes it easier to wrap up a no hitter. Yes that's true because the guys throwing

aspirins coming in the eighth inning and he's still fresh. That was the thing about Francis especially the first game Francis was at I think a hundred and eight or a hundred nine pitches going to the ninth inning. They let and he was on a pitch count around 70 to 80. They let him run and and John Schneider basically said I'm not gonna mess with history. I'm gonna give him the crap, the crack at it and other managers, yeah, they'll know it's he's at 106 pitches after seven, sit down, great job, but we got a ball game to win. My best chance is to bring in the guy in the eighth and ninth and he'll finish it with you and at least you'll get a partial no hitter so it's interesting.

I have questions but I have trouble with Roger LeJoy separating the official scorer from the sports fan who hosts shows on the fan 590 like do you ever does it ever cause a conflict for you that you might be the official sc for boudin france has taken a no hitter in the night and then you might have a whole like i don't know a half hour on this topic with callers or something on the fan 590 any conflict at all it is never never been a conflict in my mind it has never been a problem in my career i've had a lot of those kind of wearing multiple hats mike i mentioned i'm not a full-time guy at the fan so when you're not a full-time guy at the fan,

so when you're not a full-time guy the fan, what else are you doing? Well, I worked in the Ottawa Senators' Organization for 21 years, and I hosted a show on Sportsnet 590 and the Fan for all 21 of those years, and when I left the Senators' Organization, a listener reached out and went, you work for the Ottawa Senators? They couldn't tell. They couldn't tell. I'd worked for them for 21 years. But you are on a Toronto sports radio station. So it made it. It made and listen when I first took the jobs it was a case the program directors then going hey you better better watch your Ps and Qs because if I get one issue with you about this and you know so I think I'm objective I can talk about and the nature of my shows too Mike you know if I was on every day five days a week or

whatever you know then it's going to become a problem the way the shows are structured. It hasn't been a problem. That's a great question actually, but no, it has not been a conflict for me. And I have no difficulty with the blue J scoring. That's, I work for major league baseball. I'm doing a service for major league baseball. I can get on the air and saying, geez, maybe Schneider should have taken them out the ninth inning with no conflict of interest.

Right now. Cause here's a question about the fact Schneider did not take him out, which I think I think every Blue J fan was grateful that we got to see Bowden Francis take the mound of the ninth inning. I think I speak for every J's fan on this planet right now. Okay. Oh my God. Like we need something this year has been such a disappointment more on that late later. But I am now at a point when I was younger watching baseball, I just assumed Cito Gaston was making these calls. This was my belief as a dumb teenager. Oh, Cito is making the call whether he's going to go out and get Guzman or if he's going to go out and get Jack Morris, whatever. That's Cito making that decision. Today, I'm not so sure

anymore. I don't know if John Schneider makes the call whether Bowden Francis comes out for the ninth inning anymore. Like, what are your thoughts on that? Do you think he gets from from above? I don't know is Ross Atkins sending a message to Schneider you know let Francis pitch the ninth even though he's passed his pitch count? Well I don't know that for sure and I don't know what you think. I don't think so. Is that possible? No I don't even think well it's possible there's always a way to communicate. You can get on the phone saying but here's the thing about the playoffs last year or any other time. I'll answer the question's possible. There's always a way to communicate with the magic. What about the playoffs last year? You can get on the phone saying, but here's the thing about the playoffs last year or any other time. I'll answer the question this way. There is a framework an organization

works under. And the framework of the organization is we are going to, and I'm just using this as an example. I'm not saying it's necessarily J, Seattle Mariners are like this. We are going to live and die by analytics. If that is your decision, you make a framework of the decision, you make decisions based on that, and you do not waiver. So then, if you're asking, well, is the manager making the decision? Well, no, he's not, because the analytics-based driven data is making the decision, but that does not mean

one guy is over his shoulder on every single decision, saying, hey, remember the analytics drive, see what I'm'm saying and that is not just the Blue Jays Mike that is the old school managers the Tony LaRouche's of the world they were the kind of guys you make decisions based on the data now and some old school guys don't like that and some old school fans don't like that and I respect analytics I get it I understand Mike you know the behind it but you still have to have a feel for the situation. And you can't explain that though. But let's say you're a manager and you know you're going to be criticized no matter what move you make. Right.

Okay, and that's the nature, people are going to criticize you. If you base it on analytics, it's much easier not to be criticized because it's the data. The data shows. I'm playing the odds. Well, you know, so why did you leave Barrios in and you gave up two homers? Exactly where I was going. It was my gut. It was my gut told me to come on. Can you imagine if somebody said? But look at the response from your typical Blue J fan by not letting Barrios pitch.

Did he pitch four innings? I can't remember now. He was out of there fast. He was pitch. Was it, did he pitch four innings? I can't remember now. He was out of there fast. He was out of there fast, but he was dealing, right? We agreed you're watching that game. He was dealing and Kukuchi, whoever came on, he gave up two runs and we lost like two nothing in a must win game.

That's a good example of where it feels like you got a robo managers making decisions and Schneider's not making that call. Well, why do we assume Schneider didn't agree with the decision? Why does everyone... He's the employee, what choice does he have? No, no, no, but why would you think he didn't agree though? Why do we automatically assume if we don't like the decision we think it was taken out of the managers hands? That's an assumption. I don't know John Schneider very well at all. Maybe John Schneider is really analytics-based. Maybe John Schneider is one of those guys who like... I don't know John Schneider very well at all. Maybe John Schneider is really analytics based. Maybe John Schneider is one of those guys that like, I don't know.

And it's worth remembering. I remember Ross Atkins essentially throwing Schneider under that bus by saying that he did not make that call. Well, that's true. Yeah. Afterward saying it. Yeah, that's, that's, that's true. And we didn't really get a good one-on-one discussion about this with Mr. Schneider,

who wisely kept his mouth shut on this this matter and now we don't have to worry about it this year because there won't be any playoff baseball. And that's isn't that the unfortunate part you know people talked about how frustrating it was the last four years where you know they didn't win a playoff game and they lost on the live they won on the last day of the regular season but they got knocked out the playoffs on the last day of the regular season in the other year. Right. Yeah you know what compared to this here oh my goodness I'll take a baseball regular season but they got knocked out the playoffs on the last day of the regular season in the other year. Right.

Yeah, you know what compared to this here? Oh my goodness. I'll take a baseball playoff appearance and not score and win a game over being 15, 16 games out of the decision. It has been a frustrating year. No doubt. Okay. So we're actually I've got more on that here.

Let me give you some gifts here before I play a clip that I recorded last week in a's kind of a funny little setup. So I've given you the book, which you had a copy, but now you got an extra. That's great. Toronto May Believes History. I have in my freezer Roger, a large meat lasagna from Palma pasta. You gave me one last time and I can vouch. I can vouch. It was fantastic. So thank you. It'll be just as good this time They make delicious authentic Italian food at Palma pasta go to palma pasta com They're in Mississauga and Oakville if you want to go to one of their fine retail stores In fact their palm is kitchen location will host us for a TML X event soon, but I'll have details later I don't have it all shored up yet So I'm not gonna tell you but I also don't know whether that will be TML X 16 or TML X 17. Lots of balls in the air,

Roger. I'm a one man operation. It's like the Terry Fox run all this work you got to do to make sure this thing comes out and you're by yourself. You don't have your army of volunteers. Me, myself and I over here, but I do have a meeting on this Friday and working on something for TML X 16. I'm a every time alumnus. The pressure is on me now to get out to that thing. Hope you pick a good times by the way, since you said that. So you got your pasta and I am giving you fresh craft beer. Oh, always appreciated.

I got a meeting there. I'm actually going to be at the GLB brew pub to meet somebody for a beer on a Wednesday. They got a great food at the that's at Jarvis and Queens key, but I'll be at the South Etobicoke location Friday for a meeting that ties into a possible TMLX 16 again, lots of balls in the air. Roger, I'll have more info as it's all determined, but enjoy your delicious much appreciated there much and great product as well. So the first, this is a fun fact for the listenership. I put this on Twitter, but of course, most of you didn't see my tweets because Elon Musk

has scared you all the way, but this is important. I find this fascinating. It was nine years ago today on this day in 2015 that I recorded episode 134 of Toronto Mike with Roger Lajoie. And we did not know that. No, I only felt because every day I pop in and I was shocked to see that the guy who was going to be at my door at 2 p.m. today was at my door nine years ago today. Amazing when you think about it. Happy anniversary.

Coincidence and happy anniversary to you. And as far as X goes or Twitter, whatever the hell it's called now, I got to tell you something. I don't know if anyone else has this issue. All I see is Elon Musk tweets on my timeline and I don't even follow Elon Musk. Because it defaults to for you. You have to change it to following, which is something you have to manually do once in a while as it reverts back. But if you click following,

you're only going to see tweets from people you follow. I got that. The reason I keep it open, I like a variety of different opinions. I don't need to see just the tweets from people. Oh, I like it too. Don't get me wrong. I'm on it every day. But I just wonder why this particular gentleman's account is always at the top of my top line.

That's my question. I know how it works, but why is he on the top of the... At any rate, Mike, social media is what it is Let's move on. I thought maybe you were looking into buying a cyber truck. No, no, no cyber truck for Rod You can't walk as much if you have a cyber truck. I don't want to go to Mars either or a cyber truck I'll just say I I saw I think was read it. There was a video of a guy He was gonna show what you had he had a tear apart his fence

like this pre molded plastic fence, and he drove his cyber truck through it to rip it apart to make a good video, but it completely destroyed this truck like all the fluids were leaking out the bottom, it really messed up this truck. It was just a kind of a fun little video I was watching on Reddit. But okay, I digress enough about him. But I wanted to tell people the description I wrote for that episode 134 if you want to go back. Mike chats with fan 590 host Roger Lajoie about his lengthy career in radio. How little did you know? We were just warming up. His dozens of other gigs.

That's it? We were talking about it. The prime time sports throwdown between Bob McCowan and Stephen Brunt. Oh yeah that was a topic in the day. That time stamps it. Stephen Brunt came on this show and said I will never again co-host a show of Bob McCowen and then two years later there was a big press release I was reading from Rogers. He's back. The return of Stephen Brunt. Stephen Brunt comes to TMLX events Rogers. Terrific guy. And you talk about one of the all-time Canadian media legends. There's no question. And good taste in music too, for Steven Brunt.

Oh, 1050 Shodenfreude and Blue Jays Fever. This is 2015. Blue Jays Fever, they were winning, remember that? That's my favorite post-93. That's my favorite stretch of Blue Jays mania was that Pennant Drive and the playoffs of 2015. You know I can tell you and back to the official scoring for a second so I scored the bat flip game and I that seventh inning first of all was you could write a book

about the seven never mind it was only the Texas Rangers never was only the first or second round the playoffs whatever it was it was just yes and experience all right in the bat Mike, I'm not lying. I got my pen out because we score by hand, we're on paper. You know, I'm putting in, the table was shaking. I'm not kidding because people say that, oh, oh, the place was shaking. And every time I hear that, I go, yeah, come on, whatever. I know it's loud.

No, the table was vibrating with the noise from that crowd after that what a an iconic moment and yes they were and man did they come close when you think about it Kansas City Cleveland ALCS especially Pompeii was at third base and I don't think there was an out inner county guy don't pump played for both Royals absolutely I think he's I think I thought I read he was coming back Let me see the cop now in Hamilton a good friend I thought he might and his brother worked for Great Lakes for a stretch Tristan Pompeii who's also a hell of a ballplayer

But it's all connected to the Intercounty Baseball League. Okay, so although I don't think Tristan He got an injury but the Pompeii father a quick fun fact about K Pompeii his name is Kenrick. Kenrick, before he had the Pompeii boys, he was a dancer on electric circus. Wow. He was known as the cowboy dancer. So he was a very notable dancer. People who were watching electric circus in the early days always knew the cowboy dancer. That was Kenrick Pompeii and he would go on to father Major League Baseball player. Yeah Major League Baseball player. Fun fact indeed. Fun fact

indeed and because I mentioned Electric Circus okay this is what I do on this show Roger I don't know if I would be as effective on the fan 590 because my tangents might not work well in tourist trust Joe radio but I can tell you a co-creator if not the creator of Electric Circus, is a guy named Joel Goldberg. He was on CFMT hosting video shows in the early 80s as Jay Gold. He went on again, he went to work for Toronto Rocks at the 99 Queen Street East, the Chum City Building. He moved over to 299 Queen, they start Electric Circus, he created it.

He was born and raised in Cleveland. So coincidentally, Roger, I'm at an event last Thursday night. Nothing to do with Toronto Mike. I was actually recording from the grand opening of a wellness spa, basically, and health center. It's called Bespoke Wellness Group. I'm there recording. In the crowd, I see FOTMs like Dominic Shulow, Dwight Drummond, and Joel Goldbergs. I record withOTM like Dominic Shulow Dwight Drummond and Joel Goldberg's I record with them But before we talk wellness, I want to warm up my guest a bit get them sounding right get them comfortable So Joel Goldberg is on my mic last Thursday

So this is I have a recording of the first minute when I'm just warming him up I'm recording like I'm gonna edit this out, but I said hey, I'll play it on Toronto mic with Roger Lijua so this is a Cleveland baseball fanatic in a chat I had with him FOTM Joel Goldberg let's listen. Can I interest you in taking Shapiro and Atkins back? No. You know what I was just talking to Dwight about that and they did the same thing to the Guardians that they that they did to Toronto. There's see this is the real time right here Yeah, there was a there's a GM named John Hart and he had that first wave of the Cleveland Indians actually doing well and they made it to the Tomy era are we yeah, yeah, or is it later than that? No, that's Jim told me era. That was a good team

Yeah, Jim told me a Manny Ramirez All those guys. Albert Bell. Right, don't call me Joey. And that was John Hart. He built that team up. Young players, long-term contracts. Sandy Alomar. And they went to the World Series.

And they won five division titles. John Hart leaves, they hire Shapiro and in Shapiro's whole time there they made the playoffs once against Boston and they lost. Then he leaves, we're all happy, then they bring in Tito Francona yeah and all of a sudden they're back in the World Series again you're depressing me yeah so this is just like a spontaneous chit chat just to make sure he's on the mic at work all the Cleveland fans certainly are familiar with the Blue Jays front office there is no question about that what do you I know this gets tricky for you because I

know even though you're not a full-time employee You know you're you're gunning for five thousand shifts and the fan 590 which is owned by Rogers the same Company that owns the Toronto Blue Jays people probably know this Many a person listening now probably has a cable package or maybe their cell service or their internet is with this company the big red Machine so yeah, I don't know if you have to play it careful or not. You tell me, but how much of this 2024 disappointment should Mark Shapiro and or Ross Atkins wear? I think anyone in the front office should wear every season, not just this one every season. And so I will say it's obviously it's their fault. However, Mike Wallner and the Toronto Star had a great story a couple of days ago I really enjoyed reading where he talked to several Blue Jays players and they gave a spin on this which I found very

interesting and to a man they basically all said that they had no idea and could not understand why Blue J fans wanted to have all the accountability put on the front office where in other franchises and cities they have played in, the accountability is on the players. People aren't saying, what the hell is wrong with George Springer's OPS is 694, whatever happened to him? It's no, Atkins Shapiro and this in the front office. I'm not dodging the question, Mike.

You just heard me. I read that piece. I read that piece. I read that piece. Yeah, like to me, that was, it was Chris Bassett was the front guy on the story. Springer is also quoted in the story. And basically that's where it came into. So yeah, and I do see that and they should wear it.

They've had a long run here. I have advocated on air. I think it's time they make a change, but flip side and I'm not walking it back is okay. So they took over the team from Alex Anthopolis who did a great job, really got them going 2015, 2016. They had this great team that was an aging team and we knew it was the last kick at the can. But made the ALCS. They did.

Both years. They did. But that team wasn't making the ALCS the next season. That team was all in Mike for a run. That team was Edwin, look how fast spoke about Tuesday's drop-off. Although, but I know 20 minutes ago you said how close they were to the World Series.

They were. With Dalton Pompei in third place. They were, they were, 100%. However, take it from the time they took over until today. And I know there's no playoff wins, but for four years there were 90 plus wins and in the playoffs three out of four years. And that's not a World Series team and it's not good enough. It's the X.

I got it. I got it. But when people might come up with a viewpoint, it's just confirmation bias. Is it everything they look at? Oh, see the Blue Jays have been a disaster. That's not a disaster. Four years in a row in the play, or three or four years in the play,

row in the playoffs, and 90 plus wins is not a disaster. So I think from that end, I think the accountability, back to Mike's story, really deserves to be as much on the players as it is on the front office. But that said, I think they've had a long run. I think it's time for years. It's nine years. Okay. So if you exclude the cause we talk about the 2016 team, which was technically under the Atkins era, but it is, it was Alex's team. That's

it was Alex's team. So let's, that's why I'm not saying let's disregard 2016 playoff wins. So if we disregard that, because we agree that's Alex's team, then zero playoff wins. And you're right. It's not a complete disaster. There's been playoff appearances. We haven't won a single game in this nine this this nine year stretch. But it felt to me like last year's team. It never felt this again. What do I know? No analytics to speak of here. I'm speaking as a guy watching the games. I'm a big Blue Jay fan. It felt like last year's team wasn't good enough. And maybe the evidence is that they were swept out in that first round but it seemed like we went all in on this fantasy that uh showy otani i mentioned stephen brunt attends tmlx events as luck would have it he was my first guest for the last tmlx event at palma's kitchen

which was the day after the phantom flight to toronto where and I don't have to remind you, I think Blair and Barker went live with an unscheduled Jay's talk because the hype was so real. There were reputable baseball insiders, I think John Marosi, tweeting that Ohtani was on that flight to Toronto. Until Bob Nightingale told him, no, he's not. Yeah. Well, this was until this flight landed and what's his name from the Dragon's Den, Robert Herksevik. It was his plane.

He got off that plane. Ohtani was signing with the Dodgers. He signed that morning during our event at Palma's Kitchen, he signed with the Dodgers. So going all in on Ohtani, which of course did not materialize. And really to me, you sign up the Dodgers. So going all in an Ohtani, which of course did not materialize and really to me, you know, yeah, you were a worse team on paper than you were the previous year, which wasn't a good enough team. It did feel like the on field team that we were putting out in 2024 was not going to be good enough on this program. I predicted

76 wins, I think for the 2024 Blue Jays. This team deserves to finish last in the ale East. And that's probably where they will wind up. Actually, they're probably not going to. They're probably going to go on a little run here. Right. Whatever. By the way, whatever, garbage time or whatever.

So I don't see how you can bring back the same general manager when we're at this point in the nine-year regime. I will not disagree with that. And I just said, I agree with you. I will just add another opinion to that though. First of all, I don't blame Atkins and Shapiro for the Otani plane debacle. That's a media thing. That's a ridiculous thing. Can't they make a call? They must know Otani is not on that flight. Like seriously, because the Fan 590 was a big part of this to me. Make a call. What do you mean? To the Fan 590. You want them to say Otani is not on the plane. Right. Exactly. Because Blair and Barker, this is on that day, because I had bought in with the

Morosi tweet and all this tracking the stupid flight. I feel like an idiot even telling you this, but tracking the flight, having a person like Morosi. I was at the station that day and I was on there. You don't have to tell me tracking that flight. From the fan perspective. So I'm in, I'm like, oh my God, it's happening. Otani's on that flight. There's stupid stuff flying around about Kikuchi having a reservation. So all these things are happening. A lot of it turned out to be BS, but now I'm in, oh God, he's on that flight. This is actually happening.

Otani's going to sign with the Toronto Blue Jays. This is happening. So when Blair and Barker have an unscheduled Jays talk, where they're basically exploiting the hype sort of, talking Blue Jays baseball on that date, which was like early December or something like that. So there was not going to be a Jays talk that day, but there was because of the hype around Ohtani on this flight. Why not tell Blair or Barker, Ohtani's not on that flight?

Well, I don't know what they were doing for that two or three hour period that they would have interrupted their day and say, geez, that guy's just for the sake of, uh, so I can't even comment on that. I don't know Mike, but you mentioned in, in terms of the hype, I go back to that again. The hype was created by fans and media and speculation and going and which is, which is all The flames by putting on that unscheduled Blair and Barker Jay's talk. Well, stoke the flames. You're just reacting to people's, you're just reacting. It's not stoking the flames. But imagine if they could break the story.

Good sources tell us, Ohtani's not on this flight. Nobody did. I know, but this goes back, Roger, this is me telling you. Yeah, you said they should contact him. Atkins should call the, whoever the general manager is, you know, at the fan 590 and say, Oh, Tony's not in that flight. That news would end. It would take in this day and age.

It would take an instant to get that news to the on air hosts. Oh, Tony is not on that. Well, well, like I said, I don't know if he knows where Ohtani is. I just look at him sitting in his office. He's sitting in his. Oh, wait a minute. You went ahead now. So you let me go. He's sitting there. He's sitting there in his office. He's sitting in his office or whatever. And like, I don't know what he's doing. This story developed over a couple of quick hours. You're saying he is, it is incumbent on him to call and say, Otani is not on the plane. How does he

know whether Otani, he might know, listen, he's not coming to sign with the Blue Jays. So, but he doesn't, what does he know where Otani is? How does anybody know where Otani is? And again, we don't know anything. We're just speculating here. That's what you do on sports. We're just talking. You think it's possible. Atkins slash a pyro. Let's talk about Atkins since he's a GM. Atkins doesn't know Ohtani is not on that flight. Maybe Ohtani is coming to Toronto. Is that what you're suggesting? I'm suggesting he does not know where he is. All right.

He could, anybody could say- Do you think at that point, Atkins thinks there's still a chance he's going to land Ohtani? I can't speak for him and I don't speak for other people. I don't speak for other people. All I know is the next day he signs with the Dodgers. Right, the next morning. As we all know, the next morning he signs with them. But I know that hype is media fan driven. And I don't blame people who are involved in that

for that hype and that stuff. Your point being is they should be listening to the fan or paying attention to the radio station and they hear this is coming and it's incumbent on them to go in and dictate the programming and tell them to take Jay's talk off because Otani is not on the plane. So far as far as we know, Otani is not on the plane is like that's a reach in my mind. If you know Otani is not signing with the Jay's and Otani is not on that flight, then

yes. Two different questions. You said they know he was not signing with the Jays that you're right I don't know he wanted to have sushi of kakuchi and somebody's there who knows okay you're right but I will say that the fan 590 this is not just pure fan stuff it goes beyond the Morosi tweet that the fact that you go live with your Jays talk is you are fanning these flames okay you are it is part of the whole you are responding to people's

talking if you don't go on the air they're going what the hell is wrong with you the official station of the jays you got to go on and talk about that you're damned if you do damned if you don't mike if you're in that kind of position it does not matter what you do you're going to be criticized and if you can't take criticism you should not be in the media business if we did nothing we did. Oh, yeah, all this hype's going on. Yeah, let's do our hockey show and talk about the Leafs playing Nashville on Tuesday. People go, what the hell is wrong with them? Yeah, you're missing it, which is sources tell us, Oh, Tony is not on that. There was no sources telling us

that. Right. And then this is a cyclical discussion. And go back again. There should have been a source telling you that. And I'm telling you, I do not know that these guys know for a fact, or they're even, maybe, I don't know what they're, maybe they're in a plane, maybe they're having dinner, maybe there's some, we're all obsessed with this. We just assume that everybody is following it. So I, there's a lot to criticize, but the Otani thing for me was I gave them, here's my criticism is the second, you know, the next morning he's signing, you sign somebody else. You go, here's my criticism, is the second you know the next morning he's signing, you sign somebody else. You have plan B. You've got another thing down the works. You've got a Soto deal. You went from Otani, 70 million, to I say, IKF, Third Basement

and Justin Turner. Like that's your answer? That's my problem. No, I didn't think Sho Otani was ever signing in Toronto. I think that was just driven to, and he was, I don't know if it's him or his handlers or whatever, that just drove his price up even more and you got an extra 50 million bucks from the LA Dodgers, so he's the winner in all this. I will never listen to Morosi again. Okay, Bobuchet. What do we do with Boba Shet? Boba Shet, there was a Rosie DiManno piece that suggested he was... I would use the word disgruntled, but he seemed to need to find his mojo. Did you read Shia Devides?

Yes, that's right. So then I read Shia Devides and it sounds like he wants to spend the rest of his career with with with Flattie Guerrero Jr. as a member of the Toronto Blue Jays. Let's lock up or whatever. What did the Jays do? He had a terrible year. He was injured, but it was statistically a terrible year for Beau Bichette. What are your thoughts on Beau Bichette in his future of the Toronto Blue Jays? Should we trade this guy? It's a great question and it's a great dilemma and I'd resign him. I don't have to think about that too much. He had a rough couple of months injury riddled and his six year sample size in major league baseball is very, very good.

Led the league in hits in two years. I don't have to re-psych him. Everybody knows. Prior to this season, I think most of us felt like Bo might be the better bet than Vladi for a period of time. Right. Everybody did. Mike, I did shows on this V E. Bo, which one would you keep

the last two years? Bo. And the narrative completely switched. At the end of the last year, Vlad got picked off second in the playoff spot. He's too obsessed with that home run jacket. He's always laughing and smiling at the dugout, blah, blah, blah, because he was hitting 260 and had 18 homers on average now he's a hitter again well he just had to cut his hair. Oh Bichette is sulky he looked at him he's looking you know he's got his face and he doesn't look happy and a bit like they're too happy they're too sad they celebrate too much now they're not happy anymore everybody's miserable with the team

but you asked the question about the shed I would sign them both presuming and it looks like if Bichette's comments is shy DVD you're correct and here's another thing you're talking about Toronto and long-term commitment okay well if they're not signing who you're gonna sign that who are you getting like it's like what do we keep saying is all the big big star Soto is never gonna sign with the J's okay then who is you go after somebody else and you've got a guy now look at the second half flatty's this is a second half for the ages right

and he what apparently wants to play here and Bichette bad bad season for sure wants to be here okay well if it's not Bichette playing shortstop who's playing shortstop for the next ten years for the Blue Jays I think you can throw out some names. I'm not trying to come up with names. I'm just saying right you've got one You have one so I would I would sign them both if presuming they both want to stay now if they don't obviously you Get you get rid of them. That's not the narrative around Boba Shed to me is very similar to the narrative around Mitch Marner I find like so you have this extremely talented, gifted player, and a lack of playoff success. People kind of wanted to... The rhetoric, anyways, which you heard on your program probably 100 times, was we can't keep bringing back this core, this big four, and expecting different results. Something has to change. You're not

getting rid of Austin Matthews. No, don't you dare. Nobody will take Tavares. He's an aged man now. And it always ends up, you know, and you don't want to get rid of Nylander because he's great value at the, what he brings to the table. So it always comes back to Mitch Marner. Okay. Mitch Marner has to go, but it looks like Mitch is back. So what are your thoughts on the, the, the, the upcoming season that Toronto made beliefs? They, the, the rhetoric that they were gonna get rid of Marner or trade Marner this did not materialize Well, the rhetoric again was not from the front office a rhetoric was from fans and media discussing it

and Mitch Marner's playoff failures and they are failures are well documented and Again, I'll say the same thing about him as I say about Bichette He's a 95 point average guy in the National Hockey League and ask anybody who plays in the league and they'll say he's one of the premier players in the league, fine, we can't, this is unacceptable, we have not broken through yet. Okay, what's your alternative?

So who's getting 95 points for the Toronto Maple Leafs now? If that's what you're gonna, so it's easy to say, you're bringing it back, you're bringing it back and you're getting the same results I say the same thing about the maple leaves Other day people were talking about it and textures to the station. Ah, the Leafs have been a disaster They've made the playoffs eight years in a row. They've averaged a hundred points a season They beat Tampa Bay in the first round

They lost in seven games to Boston with Matthews and Nylander both missing three games in the series And it was still game seven of overtime. I know it's not good enough. I know you want to win a Stanley Mike That is not a disaster Right. No a disaster would be missing the playoffs. You're right. We have playoff hockey in this market We just have the single playoff round to speak of in the past 20 years Did you know that 2004 was the last time we went around prior to this one round against them. Oh, I'm very familiar with the Maple Leaf's 20 year drought. Waffles on the ice, I remember that throw. I never really understood. Yeah, never really understood.

Yes, by comparison. And by the way, we again take the big picture of the Blue Jays. So 92-93. What did they do from 94 to 2015, Mike? 21 years. Would you have taken a few playoff appearances in that 21-year period? We never got to see Carlos Delgado play a playoff game. And we had Roger Clements, and we had Carlos Delgado, and Roy Halliday. I know. And that awful logo. I'm still mad at that logo. I can't blame the logo. Just never wanted to own that logo. Which one? They had a a few. Yeah, they had the, the, well, they had two, two I didn't like. One was like, uh, an angry bird. Do you like their city? Can I ask you? Uh, I'm indifferent to them. Like I can see why people like them. I, uh, I, they grew on me. I didn't like them at first, but I like them now. I like the current logo, which has taken that original logo and just like

mild little touches on it to kind of modernize it. I did not like the angry bird that we had for a period of time in the holiday uh... Yeah he was mad looking. Yeah I don't like that. Just didn't like it. And they just didn't like it. Um I want to... Let me see where I'm going here. I want to shout out Matt Layden in Edmonton. Matt Layden texts me. All the time. Twitters all the time twitters me and he wants to know what's on your show That's great. He dm's me every day, which you don't see but he does publicly Message me and then he and again, I won't even ask you because you're not running the fan 590 Okay, you you come in for your shift. I know what you're referring to. I saw I saw his tech I'm not gonna touch it, but he seems passionate about

Restocking the shelves at the at Sportsnet. He's like a wannabe general manager of Talk Radio station in Toronto, which is fine. I love his spirit. So shout out to Matt Layden in Edmonton. He promised he would listen and I just want to say hello to Matt. I say hello to Matt and thank you for supporting Mike and good on you. One general, and again you can't speak to personnel decisions at the fan 590 but what we know of in the Jeff Merrick situation is interesting because it sounds like he was disclosing pics moments before they were made and this burned him. It sounds to me and again, I have to get Jeff on the program so he can talk about it, but

it sounds like he might have trusted a buddy too much and he got burned. But I will just say this, gentleman Jeff is a great guy for me to deal with. I would often book him on Humble and Fred. He's been over here on Toronto Mike. He's been over here. I have such a great relationship with Jeff Merrick because he's just seems like a genuinely good guy. And I don't know if there's a more knowledgeable hockey head out there than Jeff Merrick. I think he'll be very much missed by your organization at Sportsnet. I echo that 100% in every way as a person and as the organization and I don't know the, I know what you know about that in terms of details Mike and I'm not a dodger. Yeah I think you know they put it out there, it is what it is, it's a loss and there is not a finer

guy and I remember him back in the live audio wrestling days of the fan 590 I saw firsthand how hard he worked to develop his career. There will be great things ahead for him I am sure one of the great pivots in Canadian sports media history was the Jeff Merrick pivot from wrestling guy to NHL hockey guy Fantastic every when you think but that shows you you know you know, people, it's, it's, how do you become a guy? And that's an interesting thing. Cause you know, my guy, I did teaching a long time, 10 years at both college of sports media and Ryerson university. And a lot of people,

you know, students tell me, how do you become the guy? How do you become the guy? That's a great question. And you become the guy when a program director thinks you're the guy. The program director says, okay, this guy is it, he's a guy, and you become the guy, you get the gig, you get the opportunity, and off you go. Somebody saw something in Jeff Merrick, obviously, back in the day where there's a guy who can become a guy, and once you're doing it, you become the guy. And there's an element, there's some luck, but ultimately, I always look doing it, you become the guy. And there's an element, there's some luck, but ultimately I always look at it,

you need a combination of, you know, how did I phrase it back at school? You need talent, hard work and luck. But you know, the talented, hardworking people, they seem to get all the luck. Isn't that funny? Isn't that funny? That's real funny how that works.

You know who does take partial credit for the career of Jeff Merrick, because I produced a show for them in 2024. It's Humble and Fred, because when Humble and Fred had a morning show on Mojo Radio 640, do you remember Mojo? Oh, I remember them and Humble and Fred were like, you talk about legends. They've done 5000 shows more. Yeah, I got to add those up one day. But when they had their morning show on 640, Mojo radio, talk radio for guys, Jeff Merrick was employed there

and they fought management to get Jeff Merrick to be their news guy, because they liked this kid, they liked the rap on him, and they basically got what they wanted at some point, and Jeff Merrick was the news guy for Humble and Fred, and that is kind of part of what helps that with the live audio wrestling, kind of creates the Jeff Merrick that we know and love. Yeah, there there's a trajectory to it but it's all over the place.

It takes help, it takes a boost, it takes some luck, it takes but again you know here's a person you see the skill they like the guy he's a hard worker it's come on give this guy a break and you get that break take it George Strombolopoulos an even better example George Strombolopoulos okay was a producing one of my shows. We did, back in the day, we used to do live remote shows from the X. And George Strombolopoulos was a producer and he would be going around, he'd be getting, you know, hockey people, oh, Steve Thomas is here, bring him in, just hustle, work, work, work. And then all of a sudden, he showed you, he was always thinking differently. He comes over and he goes, Roger,

I got the guy who's come from here, guess the weight thing here. And I think it's kind of interesting. And I'm like, okay. Put him on for, and it was absolutely hilarious. It was absolutely, and I'm not a guy, I don't like that kind of stuff to be honest with you, Mike, but just he knew it. And you look at his career, I cannot say enough about Jeff Merrick and George

Strombollopoulos, cause I had a seat to watch them when George would finish his shift. He'd sleep on the couch because he was going to the music station afterwards. Edge 102. Yes, just before he got on much music, just before he made his great career. He did the punk show on 102 first. Correct. And he would be working, op-ing as a fan. And live in Toronto.

Just incredible. Now, since you mentioned Merrick and you mentioned Strombo, I wanna shout out the father of the other guy in that trio I always think of who were all night on the fan doing the game, Bob Macco Jr. So Bob Macco Jr., who is an FOTM like you, Roger,

he's thick of thieves with both Jeff and Strombo, particularly Strombo, but they're really good buds to this day. And they were on the air because Macco Jr.'s dad was the program director. Sally passed away earlier this year. Bob Maccowitt Sr. did you have a relationship with Macco Sr.? Yeah, he was a program director for a very brief period of time. The fan liked him very much. He was a really upfront guy, a real funny man, as I remember.

And did not last long because he had a tough tenure. Alan Davis was the original program director, and in 1994, Alan had moved on, I believe. I'm not sure the timeline, but regardless, maybe he was upstairs was but then Bob McAvoy senior became the program director and he came in at a real tough time the baseball strike wiped out 1994 as you know there was a hockey lockout time I remember listening back in the days when we did updates on the fan the lead story on the update was a Chicago Wool Store game from the American Hockey League and I'm going oh my god are we in trouble what are we going to talk about that was the one time we almost went country

in Western music. Like you said, I know nobody says and Western anymore, but country music. He credits a Pat Marsden. Yeah. Oh yeah. He really made a difference, man. Brought the juice to the morning show. Uh, I heard that broadcast. He told me he credits. Yeah. He said, cause he talked about that time. You got no baseball yet Yeah, yeah. He told me he credits. Yeah, he said because he talked about that time. You got no baseball, you had no hockey. You're an all sports station. And Nelson then, I guess, succeeded

him and of course spent a long, long time in the glory years of the fans. So, yeah, 100 percent. Oh, yeah. And if you know, in these conversations I have with Millman, he'll tell you that the toughest day he ever had as program director of the fan was saying goodbye to

Storm and Norman Rumeck. It's tough. It is always tough, Mike, and especially a guy like Norm, who's beloved. And I don't say that because I'm his friend. He's a beloved guy. Nevermind like Don Landry, Mike Hogan, and Gord Stelacue still remains associated with the state. You're talking about guys who, heart and soul guys at the state. Barb DeGiulio, another terrific person, terrific employee. The business of it is tough. And the problem is all business is tough, Mike, but our business is so public that when something like that happens, everybody knows.

You're telling me, man. Somebody's gotta document this stuff. That's what I'm here for. Okay. That's right. Another woman at Sportsnet, not on the radio side, but on the television side, who was there a very long time. And I had a visit from her a couple of summers ago, and it was a wonderful episode of Toronto Miked. But the news came out earlier this month that Christine Simpson is no longer with Sportsnet.

So that's coming up to the bigger things. Again, we're not going to ask the Matt in Edmonton questions because they're very specific. Choose your own adventure GM questions, but Christine Simpson Had a great run and it'll be sad not seeing her on The the hockey a legend Christine Simpson is a legend and back to Matt and Matt, you know, you know Here's the thing that those of us that are employed as broadcasters Have no say in terms of what transpires at the station. And I don't want to say we're hoping we're not going to be next because that's not that

cutthroat. Don't get me wrong. But it's management has its way. There are a lot of factors that go in to hiring and firing people and to make an assumption especially. Well, this guy's left there. So now he'll just go to, yeah, I love it all the time. Guy leaves sports, oh, he'll go to TSN. And the guy leaves TSN, oh, he'll go to Rogers. Well,

first of all, whose job is he taking at TSN and Roger, or her job at TSN, you know what I mean? It's a competitive business, there's only so many opportunities, all I can say, Christine Simpson is Hall of Famer. There is just, nobody tells stories better, and nothing but best wishes for her. And yes, she will be missed. Absolutely. Brian Gerstein is listening to us right now. Hello to Brian Gerstein. Good FOTM. He writes, I loved listening to ACES and still miss it. By the way, Brian, big tennis head. Okay. Why did the show end? Was it due to Tom winding down his career?

That's FOTM Tom Tebbott. Was it ratings? I would love some closure on this. So Roger Lajoie, are you in a place right now to give Brian Gersting some closure? Why did Aces end? Brian, thank you for listening and I appreciate it. And I've heard from Brian in the past as well. So Aces was a one-hour tennis show which appeared 10 times a season for I'm gonna say or a 10 or 11 period. It was anchored and done by Tom Tebbit who was an employee of Tennis Canada. Tennis Canada was the sponsor of the show as you can understand Mike they invested the the money in the show they put it on. A one-hour tennis specific show requires a sponsor because we'll talk tennis and I have tennis guests

all the time, but tennis is not in sports. Stock right here in Toronto. The ears. It won't. It just doesn't. I mean, it's just the way it is. So it's time passed. Tom moved on and therefore tennis can and made the decision that they were no longer

going to do the show. But we appreciate your listening and we do. We still talk a lot of tennis on the fan, but that's what happened to Asus. Well, good on you for sharing that because now at least that makes sense. They understand. Now Brian has closure. There you go. It's all about having closure. And in a small world story, my third born plays house league hockey at Mimico Arena. And one of the coaches there, in fact, coached my boy a couple of years ago, is a guy named Mike McIntyre and Mike McIntyre Is co-hosting like a tennis Canada podcast and numerous time guests on our shows back to

Brian's comment text bra Mike McIntyre has been on our show many times We use them during the US open the National Bank open all the major tennis events whenever a tennis story National Bank open all the major tennis events whenever a tennis story breaks so back to Brian's thing is Mike McIntyre is kind of like a new Tom Tebby he covers tennis for a variety of outlets and we're delighted to have him good guy it's a small world after all Roger and I many years ago now I'm thinking like five years ago maybe when whenever late Leila Fernandez was in the US oh yeah she was in a final and I said said to Mike, at that time, I said, the next time a Canadian, because at that time, all these young Canadians were

coming up and we thought we'd have a Canadian in a grand grand slam final at least every calendar year. And I said, the next time a Canadian is in a grand slam final, I said, you're going to come on over and make your Toronto Mike debut. Well, we're still waiting. Roger is not responding. Oh, you're waiting? Oh, you need to contact the Canadian. So back to Brian. See, Brian, that's why. That's why it's like you need either a sponsor, a specific sponsor or a reason to talk to them. Get Felix in a Grand Slam final and then we can. It's a tough year for the Canadian players. That's exactly right.

They were really, I thought we were going to have multiple champs. Now, Davis Cup was sensational. You could have taken a gap and talked about Davis Cup. But I don't think the average Joe, at least I don't think we know or understand or care really what this Davis Cup is. You are correct. You know, I think I mentioned this in a previous time I've been here with you, Mike, is that, I forget, it was Don Collins, program director, who said, and he spoke to our students, and

he came in one day and he took questions and the kids are going, you guys are always talking about the Leafs, blah, blah, blah. And he goes, well, actually, that's true and it's not true. And he explained the lineup. He says, yes, hockey season in particular, Leafs, but you know, he said, but then he said, he said, okay, then he asked them a question. What time do you get up in the morning? So one kid puts seven o'clock.

The other guy says, what time do you get up? I'm eight o'clock. The other guy gets up at six o'clock. He's going to use three guys. You get up at six o'clock, you turn on the, what time do you get up? I'm eight o'clock. The other guy gets up at six o'clock. He's gonna use three guys. You get up at six o'clock, you turn on the radio, the Leafs lost 10-0 and fired their coach. And we're talking about the Leafs. You get up at seven o'clock, you turn the radio on,

we're, Leafs lost 10-0, we're talking about the Leafs. You get up at eight o'clock, and we're talking about the Argos to mix it up. You're going, what the hell are they talking about? Back to your Ohtani thing. What the hell are they talking about? Back to your Otani thing. What the hell are they talking about? Hockey for Otani's on a plane coming to Toronto. Same kind of thing. You have to respond to what it is. And I think it was Alan Davis who said, look at your shows as top 40 radio. What do you hear on the top 40 radio stations? The same 40 songs all the time.

Why is that? Cause that's what people want to hear. They want to hear the hits. Yeah. So play the hits. So back to it. If it's not winning the U S open, I'm sorry. Tennis is not a hit. I watched a lot of tennis back in the day, you know, um, who I'm like Boris Becker and I'm going back here now. You are old man. You're really started.

I'm but I had a run where I loved my, my, but it was always grand slam tennis. I never gave a rat's ass about any tournament except a grand slam when it comes to tennis. And I'll say, I don't think we care about this, this noise I was hearing about the Davis cup. Like this is unprecedented. They've got who gives a fuck. Part of my French. This is my show.

I guess I can swear you can't do this on your show, Roger, but I don't think the Davis cup resonates with us average Joes, unless you're a tennis head like Brian. What is it? I still don't really get what it is. Well, Davis Cup is international tennis competition. Yeah. And here's another thing that happened. It also they wanted because of the time difference at the exact same time, the Canadian men's soccer team qualified for the Olympics.

I was excited about it. It was exactly the same time though. You talk about like bad timing. Bad timing is special and yeah there's no doubt it is. And I know people you know look at that but again I go back to Allen Davis's voice in my head, play the hits man, play the hits. It's like oh it's kind of interesting. I mean it's a big moment for Canadian tennis. Okay get Mike McIntyre on for 15 minutes, but we're not doing a tennis show. Okay. Perfect timing for James Fraser's question. He heard Roger Lajoie was returning to Toronto Mike. He wrote in and said, there are a lot of self-professed football fans in Toronto,

as Roger knows, and CFL football is great entertainment, as Roger also knows. So what's the secret formula to building that bridge? That was the James Fraser question. I think I'll just summarize it to say, if there's a lot of football fans in the city and CFL football is so great, why does it get so little coverage on Sportsnet Radio? If we, if we ever came up with a podcast or a show or a specialty show topic of top 10 Toronto sports questions of all time that are always used a year after year after year Is it why doesn't anybody like the Argos and just the late great Jim hunt?

There's another guy from her back in the day the radio Hall of Fame. Heaky shaky. Jim hunt said the CFL is like porn Everybody watches it. Nobody admits it. And I can't think of a better description because his ratings are good. Even in Toronto, television ratings are good for the CFL. But they don't fill BMO field. They don't fill BMO field and it just doesn't resonate. And yeah, you know, go back to the days 20 years ago with the blackout. They didn't even have home games on TV. The CFL are terrible marketers.

Everybody loves the NFL too much. Some people think the NFL is not in Canada because the CFL exists. It's a second rate league compared to the American league. You can go on and on and on. Frustrating to me. I love it. I talk about it when I can. Back to Alan Davis in my head, play the hits. We do more NFL because that's what people want to hear. I'm sorry.

No, I mean, I root for the Argos. I will attend a game now and then. I was really big on the Flutie years. If I go back again, the Rahib rocket Ishmael years were super hype. Yep. Super hype time. Gretzky, Candy and McNall. That was a big deal to me. I love pinball. I saw his last game. I made sure I bought a ticket and went to his final game. I just had the agent for Ricky Williams on the show

and I was very excited to see that Ricky Williams was going to wear the double blue. So I'm rooting for him, but the fact they can't fill that damn BMO field. And the one time they kind of came close, they laid an egg. The first plug the play time they kind of came close, they laid an egg the first playoff game last year. Oh, that was frustrating.

So it's like, but why I don't understand TFC can play whoever and I mean, why does TFC draw so much better than the Argos at BMO field? Great question. Changing demographics is one that leaps to the top of the mind. Maybe there's more dedicated soccer fans because of our multicultural city and they're into it and they're willing to come down there but that's that sounds lame because it's only one I didn't on the head it's those Argos fans are 905ers and that's a tough it's a tough they like their car they don't want to take the goal they don't want to go down there and you know that's a frustrating thing because people look at it all the time oh well

look where they're playing is like well 30,000 TFC fans find their way down there listen I just went I just went to concerts all the time down there. You're 100% right. I just went to the C&E Grand Band Shell to see Cypress Hill and I took the go and I'm thinking the whole time oh my god is this convenient. I take the go every day. A short walk from exhibition. And I'll tell you one thing Mike that's another we talk about topics you can talk about all the time. People say oh the location and you know people have the reason people don't go is the stadiums out in the middle of nowhere if you ever been to a Buffalo

Bills game the stadium is in the middle of nowhere the traffic is horrendous and you tell somebody hey you got to go to the Bills game let's go and you're in your car for three and a half hours going and three and a half back and you know what you don't care Right because you want to see the NFL and so listen that is not an excuse Yeah, I believe it middle of nowhere. Oh, yeah, you mean where exhibition Stadium was until 89 or whatever Right served as the Argos sold that sold Argos sold that place out back in the day all the time Shout out to Howard burger Howard is another legend from the fan. Absolutely.

Good, good FOTM there. All right, we're winding down, but Diamond Dogg wants me to ask you what sport you would talk about more if you didn't care about playing the hits. I rephrased it based on your terminology, but basically if listener interest was irrelevant, so this is a fantasy world where you don't care if anyone listens, what sport would you be talking about more on 590? Inter county baseball and junior hockey, because I worked in both of them to be honest with you.

That's the answer. That's my answer. I would. And if you want more of a mainstream, Argos, tennis and golf. I think tennis and golf are sports that have good conversation, but golf we treat the same way as we do tennis. It's the US Open that's great, or the Canadian Open's in town this year, great. Let's talk about the Canadian Open in the other 50 weeks of the year.

Not so much. That is a great question. Thank you for that. Did you know there was an actor named Roger Lichoy? No idea. And he was on Bewitched? No idea. Okay, that's a fun fact. I'm going to have to check that out. Roger Lichoy was on Bewitched. I idea. Okay, that is a fun fact. I'm going to have to check that out.

Roger Lichwa was on Bewitched. That's a fun fact for you. And here's another fun fact for the listenership. See, I do my homework, Roger. You were married to two Ritas, but not at the same time, right? These are two different... Yes, thank you for that. My first wife's name was Rita.

Let's get clarified that right now. My first wife's name was Rita and my second wife's name is Rita. Yes. What were the odds on that, Roger? Pretty slim. Kind of the same. I'm not sure. I'm not sure.

I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. Let's get clarified that right now. My first wife's name was Rita and my second wife's name is Rita. Yes What were the odds on that Roger? pretty pretty slim kind of the same as being the official scorer for both ends of the Bowden-Francis no hitter. No, I'd say that the Rita's thing is far more obscure because you were one of a pool of small pool That we're gonna score those. Rita back in the days not that wasn't that uncommon name folks I'm maybe it sounds like that way to you now

But there were a lot of people named Rita back lovely Rita meter made somebody crunch the numbers and get back to us What were the odds that Roger would marry two Rita's? Okay now, you know, you marry all the readers you want but your sports media career That's a lot of love of your life. Did you just come up with that one? So if their love of your life. Where did you just come up with that one? So if the love of your life- First it's cockroach, now I'm married to two readers at the same time according to you. Facts are facts, right? We can't argue facts, you know that. Is there anyone other than Marilyn Dennis, who is the morning show host on Chum 104.5?

She's doing it today. In fact, she's working from home with a new co-host. I got the press release from Bell Media. I read these press releases. So Marilyn Dennis, she was already the morning show host when you started on the fan back in 92. So can you, off the top of your head, can you name another Toronto radio personality who has been on the air at the same station, the same length of time that you've been on the fan excluding Marilyn Dennis. Well currently I don't think there's anybody I don't listen and I'm

not as in tune to the personalities at other stations so I apologize if there is somebody who is a legend on another station not that I'm aware of I will bring out because we mentioned earlier you know other fan people Gord Stalek Norm Rumac, Bob McCown, who probably done more shows than I have. Wally Crowder at CFRB was the morning man for 50 years. Now you think about that. Well, shout out to Ridley funeral home. He's not there now. And think about it though. 50 years. Well, you're on your way, buddy. You're on your way. And I know you're going to, the obvious is that you're never, you've never been, you've

never been a full time employee. That's probably why I've been here as long as I have. Let's be honest about it. It's the fill-in guy. Why are you gonna make a change or gonna blow up the station which you have several times that I've been there. Well what about him? Oh no he comes in he fills in he does shows you utilities great guy let's yeah well we can that's that's likely why. So I'm very grateful I hope it's much longer, but I know my place at the station and I also know the way the business works. And let's say I had taken back in the day, I've been asked this question, Mike, I'll

answer my own question. Have you ever been offered a full-time job at the station? The answer is no. And yet also you need to know I've never asked for one. This arrangement works for you. I have never asked for one and they have never offered one so yes it works for both of us. That didn't work for me, it works for them too. Maybe if I said hey guys I need to have a show they go yeah you know we don't like you that much

anymore or they do. No. I go three four years the ratings are bad. You're right. No the secret to your success is you're never a line item on the payroll spreadsheet. Well, it's true. You're never a line. You're in a different bucket budget wise. That's very true. And your pay as you go, no health insurance, you know, all these other little things or whatever. No, you invoice. I don't know how you work, but an invoice for episode. By the way, people ask me all the time, how do you know your show number?

Because I invoice per show. It's easy. It's easy to keep track. 4073 as we speak. Cause I know it's 74 is tonight. Tonight, seven to 10 fan five nine. Okay. Now, cause I don't know when your next appearance will be. I have, this is the mop up point, but congrats again on your longevity. Obviously you're good on the air or they wouldn't have you back 4073 times.

And this is multiple managers, like multiple decision makers through the decades who none of them have said, Roger, he sucks. Not on my airwaves. Cockroach. Cockroach. That's what I think of that guy. Obviously he's a cockroach. You can't kill the cockroach.

Mike, I say the same thing to you, not to stroke you. And I'm making this offer. Stroke me, Roger. Someone should stroke me. I'm making this offer. I would like to interview you on an episode of Toronto Mike. You start the show, you do the thing, and then you turn it over to me, and then I start. Yes, I told you, leave it with me.

You want to come in to see the fan. By the way, you'll probably be disappointed, but then, regardless. It won't be the first time, and I do want that experience. Okay. Even if it's for four minutes or whatever, we're working on it. So mop up. We're almost done. I know you got to get out of here. You've been amazing. I think we're almost at 90 minutes. Quick question. There is a movie called Mr. 3000. The, uh, the late great actor shout out to Ridley funeral home was Bernie Mac. He had 3000 hits and he was kind of

an egotistical guy who kind of branded himself as Mr. 3000. Hey, it's hard to get the 3000 hits, only whatever, 30 something people have done this. I'm one of them. But then they retroactively took away three of his hits. So I have a question. Is that right? Yeah. So I didn't know that. So this is obviously- She was 2997. Right. But But he was Mitch so this is about him in his older years How do I can I get three more hits like this movie? I don't think it's a good movie But it's a good premise, but you as official scorer of a many a major league baseball game Is there a statute of limitations upon when when you could take away a hit and rule it an error? Statue of limitations. Oh, yeah

Can you now tell me hey, we're taking away three Pete Rose hits. Oh no, no, no, you can't do that. Here's how it works. So there is a statue. So let's say, let's say there's a game, next game I score, actually let's make it a fictitious game, I don't wanna jinx myself.

There's a close call and I call hit. All right? I can change the call during the game because the online supervisor will look and sometimes I'll send them a message sometimes saying, take a look at that play because we're going to make the call fast, right? Like 15 seconds fast. Take a look at that play. Let's make sure we're right. Let's get it right now. So, you know, and if he looks at it and I look at it again, I can change it then if I want. I usually don't. Then there is a 24, I believe it's 48 hour period where the player or a player's

representative is usually his agent can appeal the call and they can appeal to Major League Baseball and a five-person committee will look at the play and they will vote on it and they'll either uphold my original call or any official's call or decline it. So the statute of limitations is 48 hours to change a call. So someone might have a hit. I think I got a hit. No, it's not a hit.

It's an error. But then you got the hit. But no, going back and forth, you can't do that. But by the way, since you brought that up up I think one of the things I really enjoy as a stats guy is Major League Baseball Taking care of the Negro Leagues putting the stats in the record book. I thought was exemplary. I think that's fantastic It's I don't say it's long overdue because I wasn't even thinking about that I didn't even think that was a thing but that is marvelous It shows you and Willie Mays actually wound up with nine more career

hits. Just before he passed away, he was told, Hey Willie, you know, your two eights, whatever his hit thing was, you got nine more. And he took great joy in that because there were, he was briefly in the Negro leagues and he had nine hits in the Negro leagues. And that's why the numbers are, are such a fascination for me. Pleasure being with you, my friend. Roger, always great. Look forward to your, maybe your next appearance is you interviewing me. I'm very open to all of these possibilities. We are definitely gonna be working on that.

Maybe we could do it. No, I don't wanna do it at Christie Pitts. We could do it at Christie Pitts. We'll just talk about the Inter County baseball league. We'll do it here. And you know, where I set up shop is I'm right beyond the outfield fence. So the game's happening right in front of us.

Yeah. Which is wild, because you're reacting to very high I'm based on in front of you But so we should do both maybe you get your butt to Christie Pitts for Toronto May Believes game And we can do the other thing and maybe do the other thing and do it all done Let's do it speak cockroaches together. No, I'm the only cockroach in this room Roger you're back here where it all started man It all started with the Etobicoke Gazette and here you are in South Etobicoke

44 years nine months my career started the Etobicoke Gazette just down the road from here. It's great to be back You stay well, sir and that Brings us to the end of our 1550 first show You can follow me all over the place. I'm at Toronto Mike go to Toronto Mike calm For all your Toronto Mike needs whatever they may be Much love to all who made this possible. That's Great Lakes Brewery Palma pasta

Recycle my electronics dot CA that's where you go if you have old tech old electronics You don't throw it in the garbage, you go to RecycleMyElectronics.ca, put in your postal code and find out where you can drop it off to be properly recycled so the chemicals do not end up in our landfill. Roger's a numbers guy. If he wants to see the numbers, the zeros in that bank account grow, he's going to go listen to the Advantage Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada and shout out to Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of this community since 1921. See you all later this week when Marcia Young from CBC News returns to kick out the jams.

Looking forward to catching up with Marcia again. See you all then! It's like wine and it won't go away Cause everything is rolling in gray