Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Sports Radio The Fan 1430: Toronto Mike'd #1430

Episode Date: February 15, 2024

In this 1430th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike is joined by Dan Shulman, Allan Davis, Nelson Millman, Scott Metcalfe and Tim Haffey as they discuss CJCL 1430 going all-sports in 1992. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Advantaged Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada and Electronic Products Recycling Association. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

The pitch, it's girl, it's hit a ton! Left field and way back, see you later! Home run, Candy Maldonado! Fly ball deep left field, high drive, deep drive, back to the hall and jump up and yes sir, there she goes! Forget about resigning Joe Carter, get Poe Drake in the playbook. You've now completely lost your marbles. Alright, I believe they're under the table. I think it's great we're getting an all-sports radio station here in Toronto. I'm a huge Leafs fan, and I can't wait. This is gonna be great. We were talking off air.

Is this a hockey town, or is this a baseball town? It's changed the last couple of days, like it's a hockey town. Oh, not about it. Clark, bracing in the checklist! He levels it with a 0-3! Clark with Pearson. Clark, two scores! When does Clark believe Swin 6-5? What a comeback! I think this is great. Toronto's needed a sports radio station for years.

I can hardly wait. And the winner is... He scores! Michael Andretti! And his two loving, Campbell Johnson! It's great, I mean I'm a big fan of the Jays, terrific team around town, and you've got race line now in 7th and 8th, so it's an incredible show. I mean you hear all about the NASCAR racing and the Indy, it's terrific. Here he comes, Michael Andretti, looking for the checkered flag. There it is! Your race winner, Michael Andretti, has won the 1991 Molson Indy. I think this is a great idea. I'm a big sports fan. It's about time somebody did this. And I'm looking forward to hearing a lot of sports on the radio and now I know where to tune.

There's a right to the body, a right up, a left hook by Tyson. A right to the head by Tyson. A left hook by Tyson. That's Richard Spielberg. He stops the fight. Comes between the two fighters. And Mike Tyson has retained his world heavyweight title. There's a snap, there's a kick, it is up, it is no good! Norwood missed, four seconds left, the Giants have won Super Bowl 25 by the score of 20-19. Here's the pitch. Swung on! Felt it deep right! It might be! It's gone! A home run for Kurt Gibson and the Dodgers win it.

Kurt Gibson has hit a home run at the bottom of the ninth and the Dodgers win it. And there's Bedlam. There is Bedlam at Dodgers Stadium. Kurt Gibson has broken it up. The Dodgers have defeated the Oakland A's. You're listening to Canada's first all sports radio station. The Band. 1430 of Toronto Miked!

Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta, enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. RecycleMyElectronics.ca committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past. The Advantage Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada.

Valuable perspective for Canadian investors who want to remain knowledgeable, informed, and focused on long-term success. And Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. Today, joining me to discuss CJCL's launch of all sports radio, the fan, way back in 1992, is Alan Davis, Nelson Millman, Scott Metcalf, Tim Haffey, and Dan Schulman. Welcome everybody. Hello, Mike.

Hello, Mike. Thank you, Mike. Let's go around the floor. There's more sponsors than we had when we launched the station. Oh, perfect. Well, I'm hoping, Nelson, we're gonna talk about the launch around the horn. We had more sponsors than we had when we launched the station. Well I'm hoping, Nelson, we're going to talk about the launch of the station. I'm going to try to get out of the way. I want to hear about the lay of the land when CJCL before it went all sports, the decision

to go all sports. I want to hear about those early days, the legacy of the station. The big day of course was in 1992, September. I want to hear from all of you. I will get out of your way and then later I'll come in with some questions from FOTNs, but let's just go around the horn here. So Alan Davis, you're making your Toronto Mic debut. This is fantastic. It's great as I said to see all these people here and the people here, including Tim, are the ones who were who were there at the beginning in

September of 1992 and our reason for launching all sports was Tim Steve Simmons wrote an article some months ago and he used the word desperation in it about you know Maybe why we ended up where we did. And I thought that was somewhat appropriate, maybe a little aggressive, but appropriate at the same time. Uh, we had a frequency that was struggling. We had a number of, uh, really good assets in the blue Jays and, uh, and the maple leaves, but maybe not a music format that could compliment it all.

And we decided that it was time that we took that sports audience that we had and maybe see if we can migrate to longer hours and convert that and that's that's what we did and you know a technical term just I'm sure Nelson would be able to back this up when you look at the format itself all sports versus what we were doing back then in our industry in all industries there's a power ratio that you look at and you the power ratio maybe that we had for what we were doing with music of your life wasn't necessarily converting to revenue. Whereas when you looked at the model of all sports, which was happening at that time in New York and Dallas and I think Philadelphia at that time with WIP, they were able to demonstrate that there was a power ratio where

you were able to generate a lot of revenue with the audience that a sports format would deliver. So, what a desperation maybe that's why this happened. Does that sound right you guys? Yep. Okay, wait, listen, and that's okay. That was perfect. That's like the teaser. Yeah, I was gonna say that's the teaser. That's it in a nutshell. Now we're gonna pull out those threads and get a little more detail. But I want to say hello as we just go around the table here. Nelson Millman making his Toronto Mike return. You are an FOTM. How the hell are you doing Nelson? You know what? I'm fine. All is good. I'm You know what, I'm fine. All is good.

I'm gainfully unemployed with no marketable skills. I'm sort of playing golf. As Alan once said, radio is a business from C students and most of us are under qualified. So I'm fine. I'm in warmer clients than where you've climbed. Where are you? Where are where are you Alan before we get to Nelson again? Where are you Alan? But you're in where Buffalo in Buffalo. Okay, so you got the snow too. Okay, but Nelson no snow where you are Where are you Florida? Yeah, Bonita Springs, which is about halfway between Naples and Fort Myers

When do you come home Myers, a lovely, lovely little bird. When do you come home? End of March. Okay. So we come down, we come down for the entire, entire winter. Okay Nelson, thanks for coming back. Go ahead. No, no, I had nothing.

Okay, well let me get the intros out of the way and then you guys are just going to tell me the story. Scott Metcalfe making, you've been here a few times Scott, because you were here recently for the 30th anniversary of 680 News and you gave me a few gifts. I want to say hello to you. I want to hear how you're doing and I want to thank you because you sent over a package knowing you couldn't be here in person and it is like, what are these called? These are the microphone flashes. This is a fan 1430 flash. Is there a story around this? I love it. And then tell me how you're doing. They're named after you. They're Mike flashes.

But if you get the small one over there on your right, okay. It's show and compare it to the other one. So you see the smaller one was the one that everybody was using back in the late eighties, early nineties. When we went to the fan 1430, I think Alan was probably involved in this discussion and we might have gotten the idea from the fan in New York. We were looking around for mic flashes because that's a big part of the marketing early on, right? You want to get that mic flash in all the Leaf dressing room, Jay's dressing room, like you just want to get that imagery out there.

So we decided to go with that big one. And Tim may remember this. It might even be Tim's story that when we first started using it, I remember one of the reporters came back and said, oh, the TV guys are really mad at us. And I said, why are the TV guys bad? He said that because the mic flash is so big that when we hold it up, it can kind of get in the way. And one of the camera guys, I think it was CFTO said, that thing's so big, you could land a 747 on it. Well, that's good. We ordered bigger ones. Yeah. Oh yeah. We eventually had giant fan five 91s that you, that you could land that airplane on That voice you hear belongs to Tim Haffey who I think I've heard give how many 2020 sports updates through the years? Probably 10-20,000. Okay and Tim sounds so good because Tim is

sitting beside me in the TMDS studio. Tim you're making your Toronto Make debut. How are you doing? I'm doing fine. I'm very happy to be here and I'm pleased to be joined by all my former supervisors and for a short time Dan Shulman was a peer for a couple of years there. But I think we bring unique perspectives. I'd be really interested to hear what Alan and Scott and Nelson have to say in terms of how the whole sports radio came together and which from my perspective is actually March of 1992. But my perspective is much different because I came in, and I've researched this and the date had to be

Friday, March 13th, I know it was a Friday. And I came in, Alan had invited me in, I'd had an interview with Alan maybe six months earlier, Alan and I had been talking, I can tell that story later, but I'll just skip ahead here. But I came in March of 13th, 1992, mid afternoon, I guess late afternoon, and I thought it was coming in for a meeting and I met Scott Metcalf for the first time and a few others including Dan who was in the newsroom prepping his first show and

Then suddenly I discovered I was being thrown on the air at midnight I had to you know readjust my entire focus But luckily I had about six hours to prepare and just sort of fake my way through that first overnight shift. I'm glad you're here. Typical Alan hire. And he just hired people to put them on here and hope for the best. And one more plan, one more introduction before I get the heck out of the way.

Dan Schulman has joined us making his Toronto mic debut. Dan, how are you doing? Not my Toronto mic debut. No, making are you doing? Not my Toronto Mike debut. No, making your return. Did I say debut? I meant return. Obviously, I left one hell of an impression on you the first time. Actually, Dan.

You didn't give me the pasta thing. I'll say this to you, Dan. I put together this Mike-umentary on Joe Carter's walk-off in 93. And I have you on this Mike-umentary with the greatest story I've ever heard I think is remind us where you were when Joe Carter touched them all in a freight elevator at the Sky Dome as it was known then I was doing the pre and post game shows at the time so my job was to get up

to the hotel lobby at the ballpark and do the post game show so they went to the bottom of the ninth and I think it was six, five Phillies. So I started making my way up and there was this big freight elevator, the kind with the big metal door that comes down and the big wooden doors that come in and the big latch and whatever. And it just kind of didn't work for a little while.

And I was in there for a minute or two and then it felt like an earthquake. And that's when Joe Carter hit the home run. So the world being what it was then I didn't see it till probably the next morning on a sportscast somewhere. So I had a pretty good idea. They had won the World Series. That was the only positive outcome I could think of when I felt what I felt in that elevator. But Yeah, I missed it

It's a great story though, and I'm glad you're back and how you doing? You're doing alright? You're a busy man. I'm a busy man, but I'm doing great. Thank you. We're all a little bit older. I don't know if any of us is any wiser than we were back then. But I'm a big fan of, you know, common shared experiences and memories and nostalgia and this group certainly fits the bill. I mean, I wasn't in management like Allen and Scott and Nelson were, I was more like Tim. I mean, when I showed up, I was 24 years old. I was so young that Allen told me when certain newspaper writers would call to find out

about my background and they would say, how old are you? Allen would say, just don't tell them. Why would you tell them how old you are? It's none of their business. And Scott was really my entree into the station, which I'm sure he remembers well. I did sportscasts at the beginning. I was so good on my first weekend, I got pulled off the air before my second weekend and I had to go back to Metcalfe University for

a few more months and get some more great tutelage from Scott. And I was working up in Berry. I would come down every Friday afternoon and Scott and I would listen to tapes and eventually They put me back on the air to do sportscast and then my life really changed I don't want to jump ahead too far, but I guess this would be March of 92 We kind of went to a hybrid right like 5 p.m. To midnight and I think that 16 March 16th of 92. Yes, which was a Saturday Well, I remember the date as being March 16th. I don't know. It's a Monday. It could have been a Saturday.

I'll just jump in here for a sec. I remember it was a Friday because I was relieved on the Saturday morning by Fred locking and it was definitely a Saturday morning. So, so we So we launched that hybrid format, as far as I can tell, Friday, March 13th. And- You might be right. I thought it was a Saturday, but let me be back up. We'll say whatever day it was, three days before,

I'm sitting in that little makeshift office with that old couch and the fridge and the sink, and I'm sitting with Todd Macklin. The smoking room. Yeah, the smoking room, right. And Alan Davis walked into the room and looked at me and Todd and he said, oh, by the way, you guys are doing a talk show on,

maybe it was Friday, because Saturday we would have had the Leafs. So it must have been Friday. You guys, Bob's doing five to eight and you're doing eight to midnight and go get them and walked out. And Todd and I immediately burst into tears and had no idea what to do.

So I would have been, I had just turned 25, Todd would have been 24 and God bless Alan, the king of sink or swim. He walked into the office and said, go get them boys. And so we did that for about six months, right? March to September until we went, 20 sports, but it was a, it was a very exciting, fun time. So Dan, you're talking about your about your first evening hosting show there? Yes. The reason I thought it was a Saturday is, and I will defer to everybody else's memory on this show, and I mean that sincerely, but it's the music we played. Bob played like Saturday in the Park by Chicago or something, from five to eight, and then I came on at eight

and we played his song. And then we like used to blow it up sound effect. And then we played Elton John's Saturday nights, all right for fighting. So that's why I thought it was a Saturday. Maybe the least one on the West coast or something. I might be totally wrong. You know, it's interesting.

I've got very vivid memories of that day because it was so kind of life-changing for me at the time. But like I said, I remember coming in and, uh, Alan and I had talked back in the fall when the blue J's were playing the Minnesota twins in the ALCS and I'd been, I'd been working for BN at the time running all over Toronto covering sports. And I thought, you know, CJCL seemed to be the lead sports station in Toronto. And I thought maybe I can squeeze in there and do sports updates or reporting or something. And the first name I latched on to was Allen's

because Allen had the title of network sports director. And then Allen, you probably don't remember this, but you put me off at first. You said, Tim, Tim, Tim, we're right in the middle of this baseball series and the twins and the Jays and Jays theoretically could have gone all the way that year. So you told me, give me a call when it's all over. So, so I dutifully did when the, the two,

Jay's got knocked out by the twins in that series. And then I came in and we had a really good interview and more of a discussion. We talked for about an hour, I think all over the map. And then what you told me was, Tim, there's things happening here. They're kind of hush hush. I can't really say, but we'll keep in touch. And we left it at that. And then I think I might've called you one more time between then and March, just to touch base. And then I came home one day, I picked up the Toronto sun and it said CJCL going sports radio.

And I thought I better call out. So I went to my answering machine, you'd already called me and left a message and it basically said, get in here. So I came in for it, get in here for a meeting. I think you said, and I, in here. So I came in for a get in here for meeting I think you said and I like I and I came in for that meeting and this I remember vividly I walked into that newsroom for the first time from the hall. I looked to my left the first two people I saw were Barb DiGiulio and Natalie Pujo which is a nice first impression of the station. Then I looked further to my left and Scott Metcalf just came out of his door, so processed another face. And then I looked straight ahead and Dan,

I did actually know you by sight because I'd seen you out in the field. And so I recognized Dan and then Todd Macklin was with you and Scott Ferguson was running around frantic. I think he was probably just about to go in the air. And that's visually what I all took in. And then I guess at some point I talked to Scott and then Scott informed me, by the way, you're starting at midnight. Wow. Okay. I'm going to pass. If only there was a way to figure out a date from the past and what day it might be. It was a Monday. Right. Okay. I recall, yeah. Okay. What I recall is what Dan recalls as well and what Tim is recalling. The thing that I

remember is Scott Metcalf brought a tape of Dan Shulman to me after you had already been doing some sportscast for him. Yeah. And it was a cassette he brought up and he says to me, uh, after you had already been doing some sportscast forum. And it was a cassette he brought up and he says to me, this is hockey. You need to listen to this guy. I think he could be really good. And so I recall listening to that tape. And then on a Saturday, you were doing news. I think it was a Saturday that I came in

and you know how you walk through the newsroom, Scott's office was kind of off to the left and you were way back at the back there. And I walked back and sat down and talked with you. And I remember having the conversation about you could do hockey already. I listened, I said, but, and for whatever reason I said, if Tom Cheek or Jerry Howarth were to get hurt,

we don't have anybody that could really back up to do baseball. I said, you should really think about doing baseball. You should just think about it. That's all I said, not knowing what would happen, but knowing that you had this great talent. So I kind of parked that in my brain. And then Scott, by the way, Nelson and I talked virtually every day, didn't matter where he

was, my best friend in the world. And we talked every day about this format long before it ever, ever was launched. You do need to know that, Mike, that this man and I talk sports and sports and radio literally every day. That's why he won't call me anymore. That's why he's in Florida.

He does not want to be around me. I love his wife though. But we talked about, we talked about Dan and, and we talked about this format. And I remember the second conversation I had with Dan was just before he went on the air that night. I did say to him, I know this cause it was in the hall. I said, you don't know it, but tonight your life

is going to change, you will not be the same after this. It just won't, because I knew that once people heard Dan Schulman doing a talk show, that things were going to change rapidly. We already have Bob in place, and by placing Dan next to it, I had a high level of confidence, as did Nelson, that this format was going to work. We didn't know how long it was going to take, we didn't know any of those

things, but we did know we had two very very very good talents that we could build around and I remember. I think Dan really stood out to me. We did the Molson India race. Alan was one of me. I think we made one of the first to put a car race on the radio when the Molson Indy came to town. And Dan's only job was to get tape from the pit and bring it back to the trailer that we were broadcasting from. Eric Thomas was at the area, I think Sneva, our friend Tom Sneva came in and spent about

a million dollars in room service. But Dan would, the whole race is running back and forth and back and forth. He'd talk to a driver and talk to somebody in the pits and then come tearing back into the trailer. Back out he'd go and I'm sure by the end of it he must have lost about 20 pounds but that was what it was going to take for talents like Dan Schulman to get to the position that he's achieved. Well and Mike the funny thing is like before Allen and I do remember Allen saying that to me in the hallway I had never done a talk show so the hockey Allen and Scott I guess you're talking about must have been the Barry Colts.

I was doing Colts up in Barry. Like I came from CKBB in Barry. That's the only hockey I had done. Then it could have been, but Scott, do you remember because it was, you also did you not, you did basketball at- Or maybe at Western. Might have been some Western stuff.

But all I wanted to do was work at a Toronto radio station preferably in sports so I could live in Toronto. I was from Toronto and I was up in Barrie and Barrie was great. I mean just a crash course and learning stuff because as you guys know I have no background, no education whatsoever. I'm a math geek. So but I was just minding my own business doing sportscasts and having a great time, an absolutely great time. I had Mike, I had no inking my own business doing sports casts and having a great time and absolutely great time. I had Mike, I had no inkling. We were going to sports five to midnight and no inkling that I was going to do a talk show until the second.

Alan said to me, go get them tiger. Scott, I want to hear you for a moment. I have a couple of clips. Thanks to you. Maybe you can set them up. There's the football clip from the University of Western Ontario, and then there's a rehearsal for a talk show. Yeah, you can. So because we're on the let's go in chronological order. Let's do the football

University of Western Ontario play by play. So, and this is, I always love this when people, you know, managers say, you know, I discovered that guy or whatever. For me, the great fortune that I had was that Dan discovered us. He came to us and he had the tapes and he had the passion and he had the drive. And this is play the University of Western Ontario football because when I heard that, I thought this guy's got something special. Trying to get a drive going second and seven backstay in the block. Sam was quick pass and he has belted just as he let the ball go by middle linebacker Dan Wicklum as the

Griffins continue to blitz and blitz effectively. Wow. Great penetration there by Wicklum. He was able to grand Samways hit him in a very susceptible spot right in the ribs. It's a good thing to see that Samways is walking off okay. That's a quarterback's nightmare is when you're doing that follow through you leave your whole midsection susceptible to a hard hit like that. Luckily Sam luckily Samways is going to walk off okay. MacCarrie now into punt. Darrell Skews will play but he won't punt return in the second half. It's Brian Campbell joined by Dan Tucker back deep for the Griffins. They're coming after it. Here they come, MacCarrie, he gets it off.

It's probably his best kick of the game, down to Campbell at the 31 of Guelph, up to the 35, and quickly downfield for the Mustangs to bring him down at the 32. Can't get the number on him just yet, his number 40, Matt Chirot. I'll tell you one thing, Dan, I don't know if you noticed it there, but MacCarrie is still taking a lot of time to kick the ball he seems almost greedy for that high average to maintain in his favor I don't think Larry Haylor cares about that average I think he just wants some kind of a kick down field and the Mustangs picked up the Griffins rushing well there if they wouldn't have I'll tell

you a hundred percent that kick would have been blocked well MacCarrie with a very poor first half gets his best kick of the game off in the second half Walters in at quarterback Al Ananek split right. Brian Campbell split left, handoff Daryl Skus. Gain him about three and he's wrapped up by the linebackers at about the 38. Wow. You're all like me. I know, I know. You had just gone through puberty at that time.

I guess. Let me say a couple of things. The other voice is my friend, Joe Milstone, who I think is much better than I am on that tape actually. He was pretty good. He was dispelling, I guess. I have not heard that since the day when, obviously I handed a cassette to Scott in 1991 or something like that.

Those are great memories. The funny thing, I don't think that sounds like me. It almost sounds like it's sped up a little bit or something. And I don't know if it is or it isn't. And not to change the topic here at all, but it kind of sounds like my son, actually more than it sounds like me. On that note, Dan, I want to say congratulations to your son, Ben, and he's the new voice of Toronto Blue Jays on the radio. That's amazing. Thank you. Yeah, he's very excited. I'm very excited.

And I don't mean, this is a memory show, so let's get back to 1991. But the first thing I thought when I heard that is it sounds more like him than it does me. But Western was great. I'll tell you, here's, I'll tell the story super fast. I went to Western, I wanted to write for the Gazette. And there were like a hundred people in line. I went the first day of Frosh week and like a hundred people in line so I started walking back to my dorm and there was a door that just said radio Western so I knocked on the door and I somebody said come in I said is this the campus radio station they said

yes I said do you do sports they said yes I said you need volunteers they said yes so Alan is right in the hallway that day. That was a life changing day, but go back to Western. I never intended to do India this. And I just got lucky. And for three or four years, I did football games, basketball games, a little hockey. And I did a talk show called from the cheap seats, which I think is don't might exist there, I believe. And, um, it's, uh, worked out. Okay.

Yeah, it worked out.. Go ahead, Scott. Sorry, Mike. Yeah, I recorded that off a cassette just like, what, two weeks ago. And I said to Mike, so that cassette is probably, the oxide's probably wearing a little thin on it. Oh, okay. That's what I would explain it. Scott, set up this other clip I have of young Dan Schulman. It's relevant to this part of the convo. Yeah, this is a talk show rehearsal that has never been heard anywhere but probably Dan and me and Todd Macklin and maybe Alan and Nelson.

We rehearsed. Yeah, we did. We did. And what we did was I thought it was wise. So I don't know whose idea it was, but obviously it would have been yours. No, no. Anyway, any rehearsal Scott was always, maybe we should practice a little bit. And I remember going, I don't think we got time, Scott. Six o'clock coming. It's going to be six o'clock in an hour. If it was a good decision, it wasn't.

But what, what we decided to do was let you do, I think a couple of hours and we played commercials and we did intros and we did extras just to have the rhythm of what it was like to do a talk show. Because otherwise if you're just stepping in there, you're not sure like do we break or what's going on? So we did this rehearsal and it's just Dan and Todd goofing around. They're, they're making, they're having some fun and it's not serious at all, but it gave them the idea of the rhythm. So here's a Dan and Todd Macklin in a rehearsal that has never been

heard by most people before. 21 minutes after the hour here at sports radio, CJCL 1430, Dan Schulman with you until midnight tonight. Midnight tonight, another three and a half hours of all the sports you can handle. Yeah, I'm happy about it too. Plenty coming up in the next hour. We will have Julius Irving, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Magic Johnson in the studio for a little round table next hour. But first the highlight of the show. Down to Florida we go to talk to Todd Macklin the copy boy with the Boston Globe looking forward to another

Choke-filled season by the Red Sox and Todd are we gonna get a race from you guys this year or what? As usual we'll challenge the Blue Jays We'll probably win the division because it is every second year, you know that we do so you're doing the division then we'll probably We'll either get blown out in the championship series or if we do manage to squeak by there by some Fluke of nature we'll get into the World Series Probably have the champagne already out in the clubhouse and of course blow it So that's that was it

Wow. Well, that's an exclusive right? No, no one else has that. This is a very big exclusive. I don't think so. That's the question. The King of Sports radio is having great guests and David, you're getting great guests that show. I recall- No wonder we blew the budget.

No, I recall Scott, here, listen to this. I recall this, that interaction. It's great that you got that, that's fantastic. You know, we were in a rush the whole time. It was frenetic pace because the decision to do this wasn't one that was made a year or two in advance. It was actually made months in advance and it was a result of, let's try to continue to expand

on the Toronto Blue Jays broadcast, which was very successful obviously because the team was doing so well. So we added hours of programming and we eventually were able to succeed in getting primetime sports on the air. And our reason for doing that was to continue to push that envelope a little further. There was a demand for Toronto Blue Jays programming. There wasn't a demand for the music of your life or whatever the music format was, but there certainly was for the talk and sports format. So we continued to push that and we were eventually able to get our good friend here, Nelson Millman, who was managing CJBK in London at that time and we had to have London as an affiliate because LeBats were backing our programming and we

needed their home office to be able to hear it and so Nelson, smart as he was, played coy the whole way along and said okay well I'll add it to the station and Paul Williams and I did tell him well you're you we really need you you're the last one everybody else is going knowing full well when we get in the car he was the first one no one else had done anything at that point but we knew that we were going to be able to legislate the rest of the telemedia stations to take it but But that, that you got to understand when I was running CJBK and Alan came, a hat and hand on his knees begging for us to take some of the programming. The deal we cut was one that had never been cut with these guys before. So we were, every home stand we brought in 20 contest

winners. We got them into the into the Sky Dome, now something called something else, long before the gates opened. They got to watch batting practice and they would get to meet one of the players. And that was kind of the negotiation that went on in order for us to become the first station to carry. But the Blue Jays network was very strong at that point. Alan had done a great job because you've got to remember there was the radio station and then there was the network. And the network handled all of the syndicated programming.

Handled the Jays, the starting of primetime sports and a number of other features that used to get syndicated. So really the station and the network were two different items. When the decision was made to go sports, Alan was clearly going to be the program director. There was nobody else who was ever going to be able to do it as well as he was going to be able to and I came in and took over took over the network and so that's how that came about and and Brian time sports network built out to be a pretty good network and at the end of the day what were we looking what were we looking for is revenue on the net on more of a national basis than just trying

to fulfill that local line, the local stuff. And Mike, we had one huge advantage. The Blue Jays were really good and on the verge of winning two World Series and the Maple Leafs were on the verge of getting to the conference finals two years in a row. It all went south in 94 with a lockout and a strike and we had nothing to talk about for a year.

And had that happened a couple of years earlier, none of us would be on this podcast today. But, and I'm sure you would agree, Alan, like our timing from a, from a Toronto sports perspective could not have been better because I think you said it, Alan, and you're right. People had an insatiable appetite for Toronto sports, blue Jays, especially blue Jays, but Leafs obviously too. People couldn't get enough. Like you, you could interview anybody about anything.

And if there was any tiny connection to the leafs or the J's, people couldn't get enough of it. Yeah, you're right. And from a business point of view, our budget started in September. I mean, it was kind of a weird thing, the way they worked at that time, but we had to have everything put to bed.

And so when we were five to midnight, and everybody immediately, by the way, Michael and Tim was part of this immediately, there was this excitement about what was happening. When Bob went on at five o'clock and then when Dan followed, there was this excitement immediately that this this was something that we needed to do. that this was something that we needed to do. So it moved really fast from that point on to get the rest of this done and you had to fill out the rest of the dance card. And so, you know, it was a frenetic pace to identify the personnel.

Like we had Bob McCown, we had Dan Schulman, Scott was running a very, very good newsroom at that time that he was gonna have to convert to sports by and large, and he had really good people in that room. We also had the Leafs with Joe Bowen at that time, and it was Gordon Stelick and Bill Waters and shaky and all these people. So we felt like we could do it. But I remember getting up one morning going, well, that gets me from like about five o'clock to this.

I still got to do, we still got to figure out six a.m. in the morning all the way through. And I mean, this panic was there constantly with me, like, how's this all going to work? And that's where Nelson and I, we talked constantly. We talked about it all the time. It's all I ever did was talk about people, talk about possibilities, and talk about what I felt was going to be huge. I always in my heart felt that this thing was going to be big. I didn't know how long it was going to take but I felt it was the right decision. You know, I went after Nelson, I talked at length about Henny and Hodge. You guys remember the whole Henny and Hodge stuff? Like I was going to get Brian Henderson, I was going to get Rick H Rick Hodge and that's gonna be our morning show. I think I'd already talked to Dan about

Dan, you're not gonna stay in the evening so we're gonna have to move you in the middays which meant I now had to figure out what to do in the evening. And I was interviewing people coming in all the time but Mike Hogan had come in, I had talked to Steve Simmons by that time, I talked to Damien Cox by that time, I talked to Mary Ormsby by that time, and they all had an interest. We didn't know whether it was all gonna pull together, but they all responded with, I'm interested, I'm interested, I'm interested. And so John Wray, who was the market manager at that time, I would meet with him regularly and in identifying these personnel, he was at the other end going, we can do this, if they're willing, we can pay them this and so on.

And so it was all kind of coming together, but it was really, this is frenetic day to day pace. And we had to hit, as Dan noted, we had to hit September because the blue J's were going to be in the playoffs. We have to capitalize on that moment. That's really important. So there's no ifs, ands or buts. If we're going to go, we got to be ready by September. You know, you you know, Al, another, another name that was very prominent at that time in the on air side was, was Ken Daniels, who was backing up Joe Bowen in the morning sports. And I found Ken's presence probably along with Scott Metcalf's probably as helpful to

my development as anyone's because I did a lot. I did the weekend mornings and in fairly short order, I was backing up the morning shift and Daniel's was kind of my model and I was kind of working with him as a mentor and he and I used to hang around a bit. I remember he took me to the, uh, that restaurant that had down to Maple Leaf gardens. I can't remember the name of it, but it was the hot stove lounge. Yeah. You had to, you had to know someone to get in there. And so Ken brought me in there, but,

but what I, what I remember just developing my own skills, which was hard to do because five minutes sports updates, I had no experience with that. I'd been doing a lot of reporting up to that, but getting the sports update thing down so that they were coherent was a bit of a chore at first, but I couldn't have been in a better environment because Joe Bowen, Ken Daniels, Scott Ferguson, I could model, model could model them. Even Dan Schulman was doing sports updates off and on a bit.

But the other thing is, we tended to go a bit long. I had a little trouble going long at the time. I'd eventually cut it off, but the scripts were too long. And I thought, how does Scott and Barb DeGiulio in particular, how do they manage to always come in well under time? So because we used to put our scripts in a little tray, I started studying, studying Metcalf and the Julio scripts and I thought, aha, the little light went off.

That's so you knock the story down to two lines. And then once I incorporated their style into the end with the others, I was kind of modeling. And finally, I had all enough, enough to draw on to put a coherent update together that that came in under time to. Amazing. I'm not leaving you guys. My dog had to pee. So we're going mobile for a second here while I let her out and let her back in.

Love it, Dan. Now, Scott, I'm going to turn to you. Turn the camera around so that my dog can see. I'm glad I'm recording this video because this is priceless. Okay. So Scott, actually I'm going to'm recording this video because this is priceless. OK, so Scott, actually, I'm going to like Nelson. I'm going to play a little audio. We're talking about I believe the date was September 4th, 1992. Is that right, Scott? Yeah, yes. Yes. What day of the week was that?

Do we know that for sure? What was the Monday? Well, I was a. Are you sure? Because Labor Day is Monday. I feel like this might have been a Tuesday. Am I out to lunch there? Uh, no, we would have gone on Monday because keep in mind they were in a, they're in a pennant race. So we would not have taken that Monday off. Look at that. We at the ballpark. I think I was at the ballpark. Yeah. Okay. So what I'm going to play lunch from a hotel. Okay. That's what I thought. I'm going to play a short clip that says goodbye to the music of your life, CJCL or whatever it was known as prior to the launch and then the launch.

So let's get your feedback. So let's listen to this. 953. Loan. We thought this was an appropriate final song for 1430. No more music and can't do better than this one. So that gives everybody, especially the kids listening, like this is what it sounded like at 1430 before you guys go all sports.

It's music like this, essentially. It was a Friday. A Friday. It was a Friday, I just looked it up myself. Okay, so there's a song. I don't think I was there that day, I think I was off. You took the day off. There's no question you took the day off.

What time was it? What hour did we switch over? 3 p.m. Yes. Okay, here took the day off. What time was it? What hour did we switch over? 3pm. Yes. Okay, here's the stinger. I'm going to play a little bit of the launch. So here is how it sounded when you launched. You're listening to Canada's first all sports radio station, the van 1430.

Live from the Sky Dome in Toronto, this is sports radio, The Band 1430, all sports radio is on the air. Greetings, salutations, best wishes. Good afternoon from Toronto. Bob McCown, Dan Schulman, Mike Engels around the table. And give yourselves a hand here. Thanks a lot for coming down and joining us. We've got a cast of thousands down here. We're gonna introduce you to them over the next few hours. This is a memorable day in Canadian radio and not just sports radio, but radio in general, Dan.

We get the unique opportunity to put a brand new radio station on the air, a brand new format. A format that some will be familiar with. It's been in existence for the last four or five years in the United States and with great success certainly in cities like New York and San Diego, Los Angeles, Minneapolis and a few others, but pretty exciting to have our first one here in Canada. First time in Canada, it's worked in some U.S. markets, similar in size to Toronto. We've got a couple of great properties at CJCO. We've got the Blue Chays, of course.

We've got the Maple Leafs. We hijacked Mike English from down in Indianapolis. Toronto boy comes back home. We've got a lot of people enthused about it. I think we're going to have a good time. This is, without a doubt, this is probably the premier sports city. I would go as far as saying North America. I mean it's great for me to come back home here and we've got the Jays and you've got the Leafs and you've got all this great interest and everything from college athletics to what have you, even the high school and some of the different events that come into the city.

I mean there's just lots of sports going on and there's a great interest. Well, there's hopefully a great interest in what we're doing. Otherwise, we'll pick out a few of those records that have been passed on to you. Get those CDs. Well, what are we going to be doing over the course of the next 40 or 50 years? You're going to be handling the morning show. What are we going to look for? Okay, what can we, well we're going to, Joe Bowen is going to work with me very intricately

in the morning and Bob Durant with news, Stephanie Smythe doing the traffic and what we are actually going to do in the morning, some folks might be a little bit surprised because we're not going to come at you with a billion scores in the morning. We're going to do some lifestyle stuff, stuff that people are actually interested in besides sports, you know, whether it's your mortgage or the pudding. One thing we always talk about because Joe Bowen's so up on this right now, the dump's going in near his house. He wants to know how he can stop this dump from going in. So it's just going to be lifestyle stuff you're interested in,

stuff that when you go to the water cooler, you say, hey, do you hear Bones? He talking about this today? Or, you know, we're going to be lifestyle. Stuff you're interested in, stuff that when you go to the water cooler and say, hey, do you hear Bonesley talking about this today? Or we're going to also talk about what you talked about the night before. Hey, we've got to listen to Bob again and Dan because they had this guy on, that guy on and what have you. Sports is going to be all weaved in through this whole thing. That of course is our main theme, but lifestyle I guess is probably the best way to describe it. Dan, your thoughts on what you're planning on?

Well, I want to mention just before we get to me at noon that Steve Simmons of The Sun and Mary Ormsby of The Star will have a show on from 10 until 12, very issue oriented. They'll be on Monday to Friday for two hours. Once we get to you at noon, we're going to do kind of the same thing that we've done in the evenings for the past six months when the format initially changed. Move it up into the midday, talk to as many ball players, hockey players, coaches, all that kind of stuff as we can. Do some lighter stuff, do some fun stuff,

let the fans in on it, and basically, just whatever's the hot story of the day, we'll do. And then at three o'clock, you'll mosey on in. Mosey on in. You better mosey on in with a little more of an entrance than that. Well, I'll be mosey on in with you. With me for an hour.

So you and I get an hour to yell and scream at each other. And then I get to go home, and you're so upset you gotta work three more hours and get it out of your system. And Hunt will be here at five o'clock, as he usually and hopefully a little bit earlier today and we'll chat with him. Well as we mentioned a cast of thousands and lots of dignitaries and celebrities with us here. And we have a majorly cake for those of you who are listening on the radio this afternoon. And if you're tootling around downtown Toronto we invite you to come down.

We're in the lobby of the Skydome Hotel at the Skydome and we've got a little champagne going here. We've got a big cake to celebrate the launch of this brand new radio station for you here. 24 hour sports radio. The fan 1430 is on the air. I want to hear your thoughts hearing that. I don't know how long it's been since you heard that, but that gives me shivers. That's that's that really that's amazing. I appreciate you finding that. I don't think I've heard that since maybe the day we did. Yeah, I haven't. I haven't. There's a great picture of the three general managers of the Toronto Paints with Bob and the cake.

I've got somewhere, but I'm not at home home second. We're looking through the trash. You know, we can look, we look back on it differently now Mike, but back then, I think if you had pulled a hundred people walking down Young Street, is this going to succeed? 98 of them would have said, no chance, no chance. How can you do talk all day? And again, you know, we like, Bob was already Bob, right?

But there were a lot of people kind of in my age group who were, we didn't know what we were doing. And Alan deserves a ton of credit for empowering us to take chances. I think that's the best way I can take it. He said, Danny, go do your thing, just go be you. And I made mistakes. We all made mistakes And people like Mary and Steve they weren't you know, they were sports writers radio was new for them, but Alan

You know, I thought Alan and Scott were a great combination because they came at it from very different areas and obviously Scott was more newsroom and sportscasts and Alan was more talk shows and and and some other things. But they were a great combo. And Alan's the guy who kind of looked at me and he said, just you're going to be fine, just keep doing it. And I'm sure he said it to 50 other people there. That's because he didn't know what to do.

Right, so if it went poorly he could blame somebody else. No idea, he just, it's going to do it. None of this, and I don't want to gloss over this too quickly, Scott was such an integral part of every piece of the operation. He was the smart guy. He stayed out of the line of fire, but Scott made very, very few mistakes, unlike Alan

and I, who made a ton of them along the way. But Scott was always the voice of reason. After Alan had left and Scott was there to support me, he kept me grounded because I was nuts. He was that filter for me and for Alan. So Scott deserves an awful lot of credit for the success of the station. I thank you for those comments. But what I would want to point out is in the early going, and Alan alluded to this about

he and Nelson, they talked about that radio station all the time. They lived and breathed it. They poured their passion into it. And one thing I remember about working at that place that made it joyful was you'd be walking down the hall and Alan and Nelson would be in Alan's office and they'd be howling with laughter. Like, that was the feeling of the building. The building was fun and exciting and it carried over onto the air as well.

It was radiant. It was supposed to be fun. Yeah. Here's a quick Allen story. This is in 1992. This is probably more like 1994. So I might've even been doing primetime sports by then because Bob went mornings for a while and all that. And I, and I loved basketball basketball and I would I would talk a lot of basketball I we had straight stringers probably isn't even a word anymore but I would get like college basketball stringers we were paying them like ten bucks a hit I'd get six scores from a Syracuse game until I was like what are you doing like it like nobody but you care so one time I'm talking basketball and Alan walks into the

studio where I am and I can still hear the sound of that door as it opens in the studio. And we go to break and he looks at me, he goes, stop talking so much basketball, nobody cares. And then like two months we heard, the Raptors are getting an expansion team. And Alan just, you know, like with great comedic timing barges through the door, remembering our conversation

from a couple of months earlier and goes, now you can start talking basketball. That was when the rap used to come in. And speaking of basketball, you remember that, that sports ticker we used to have in the newsroom, which was just continually cranking out paper. And if you didn't check it every 10 minutes, you'd be knee deep in the paper. We had that programmed not to give us NBA scores.

Even in those long five-minute sports upstates we were doing, we were not doing NBA scores. We were making sure to get all the NHL, the MLB, the NFL, the CFL. But then I remember 94 when the announcement came, I remember covering the news conference where the, where the Raptors were, were formally announced. It was then that we switched that sports ticker to spew out NBA scores. So there was even more paper coming in and yeah, Dan, yeah, Dan sort of capitalize it, capsulize that there was a sort of anti NBA feeling in the sports community in Toronto until suddenly out of the blue, the Raptors became a thing.

And then we all just dutifully figured out what a point guard was, or at least myself, what a difference between a point guard and a shooting guard was, and it got up to speed. And yet the majority of the programming on the station still revolved around the baseball hot. Yeah. And the Raptors, as they got better,

because that was a bad basketball team for a very long time. And you remember CFRB gave it up in 1999, and we kind of jumped on it from there. But, sorry. No, go ahead, Nelson. I was gonna say you remember you and I would talk about this all the time though, but Scott mentions about having fun and you and you and I to this very day we I love this man to death and and we have so much fun together and that has never ever changed. And you know he truly is a wonderful man. A lot of the time we talked about the

radio station can because he'd drive up to my house and we would say, I'm coming to your house and I'd say, and, uh, and there he'd be knocking at the door and my darling wife, she would have prepared an entire meal for him. There were, uh, there were moments. Yeah, there were moments. And, and for me, uh, a light would go off. A moment was when I heard Dan.

And I knew, I went home, I remember thinking how confident I was that we have someone here that we can build around. And I was able to put that aside. I heard Damien and Gord on the side, I was putting them on on the weekend for a little while. I phoned John Ray, I was on my way to play hockey. I phoned him and I said, you need to listen. I just found our next show and they had Pete whatever is that Cubby in there. And I got so excited.

I remember saying, put that away. Here's the other thing that was exciting for me after we launched three to four, three o'clock, Dan, Barb and Bob. And that, I can remember saying to the three of them, sports radio, that's what we need to do. We need to have fun. Maybe in the trance. Right, we need to have fun. We need to connect with the audience

in a different way than just talking sports. But sports is the backdrop at all times. And you just nailed it. It's the best hour. It was always the best hour on the radio station. It was just fantastic. Nothing was scripted in that hour, ever. Because, so I did noon to four, Bob did three to seven.

We overlapped three to four. So we'd come out of a sports cast at say 306 and we're on the air. I saw Bob for the first time at 305.58. Like nothing was scripted in that hour. And it went a lot of different directions. I'm not sure in 2024 we could do that. We'd get in some trouble, but it was different. And it was hard for me because of everybody, I was probably like the most straight lacedaced guy the hardcore sports guy Like that was that was kind of my rep but that hour that at that hour was different

That's for sure it was and and Barb made that our work Yeah, she stood up to you two and Scott I know maybe Scott can speak to Barb Barb was incensed when we were going all sports There was a point where she came into my office and said, if you think that I can't do sports, then you are absolutely wrong. I can do, if I can do news, anybody, she said, anybody can do sports, Alan. Anybody can do freaking sports for crying out loud.

So don't come to me and think you're gonna replace me. I can do this. And I was just like, okay. She was great. No problem. Yeah, Barb was, and I remember she first came, And I was just like, okay. She was great. She was great. Yeah, Barb was, and I remember she first came, I think it did traffic, early days, like before sports.

Then she got into newscasting. Barb could do anything. She was just brilliant and a fantastic broadcaster. And she could adapt. We had a consultant, we had a consultant who used to come in, Rick Scott, who was just a terrific guy and really a lot of help in terms of building the station. And he would tell me every year, Art is one of the best sports writers in North America. Better than anything he'd heard in the States, better than anything he'd heard in Canada.

And he's, every year I would hear that say yes I know I didn't hire her somebody else did but I know. Well Barb's strength was I think she brought the newsroom experience she'd written news which is a tight format and you've got to hit your marks so she could translate that skill into writing sports which someone like myself initially struggled with basically writing tight and as I said earlier I kind of figured out how to do that when I needed to by you know just into writing sports, which someone like myself initially struggled with basically writing tight. And as I said earlier, I kind of figured out how to do that when I needed to by, you know, just looking at what Barb and Scott Metcalfe are doing with their news background. But Barb was our first evening sports update anchor.

She was, she sort of pioneered that skill of doing, you know, banging out a lot of scores on the fly while the games are happening without sounding like a bingo counter, just banging out numbers. Cause that was a little skill you had to develop as well. Had a break up that litany of scores, uh, with, with some color, some substances of what was going on in the game. And Barb kind of pioneered that cause she worked with Dan in the evenings as the, as the update anchor Monday to Friday and that early in that initial six month, the lead up to the all sports launch in September.

Could we do this? Do you mind if we briefly walk through the opening day lineup? I was there for this. So I was a teenager and I loved sports. And I remember personally being very excited that we were going to have an all sports because like Dan alluded to earlier, we had a perfect storm. The Jays were World Series contenders and the Leafs were with Gilmore. It was just electric here. I have a picture of Wendell Clark wearing his seat to my

right here. And it was just that team that went to the final fours two years in a row. And that team in 93, if I remember correctly, wins the first 10 games of the season when the Jays were wrapping up their back to back. So anyone can chime in with any thoughts but the the morning show was Mike Inglis and Joe Bowen anyone want to share any thoughts about like recruiting Mike Inglis to come home as I heard and then you have your your make-believe play-by-play guy uh by his side how was that that was six to nine a.m. yeah that was the toughest that was the toughest day part when we launched because Mike on that opening day called it lifestyle and we had a lot of discussion about that. You can't do all sports in the morning.

There were two things, Mike, that we had to be very careful of. The first thing was we couldn't have call-in radio and I was adamant about that. I was adamant that we can't portray a radio station that's just decided to take an evening sports show and put it on all day and have people just call in because that will fail. What we were trying to do was take people to the story. We were trying to take prime time sports and take it for the rest of the story. We were we were trying to take primetime sports and take it for the rest of the day. That was kind of what we were trying to do. It was really important that we have people like Steve Simmons and Mary Ornsby and and people who are connected to the community in a very deep way, the sports community that could bring the stories and then take us to the stories. But in the morning

we were really struggling. So it was Mike and it was Joe, it was very loud, it didn't work. Personally, it didn't work, it didn't last long. And it created the first of our many hurdles that the station had to get comfortable and to connect. And we had to make changes in the morning. Al, you remember the tagline that, and in fairness to Alan, when I was at the network at the time, as all this was going on, while we talked about it, I didn't really have a lot of influence in terms of what might happen on the station. But certainly the discussions were, and I think Alan and I both thought, you do have

to be pure. If you're going to be a sports station, people come into the radio station, you have to deliver sports. And the tagline that some of the marketing geniuses came up with was everything a guy needs to start his day. Well no, we're a sports radio station and you weren't giving me everything I needed to start my day, believe me. But that discussion went on for a very long time and I still think that may have set back

that day part longer than it should have. It was, but it was a struggle, it was a struggle in the United States too. Keep in mind that other stations that had flipped to the format were struggling with that day part. The fan didn't work until they made a change and Don Imus ends up being their morning guy. Because they had Jim Lampley in there and other people and they were struggling. They had Mike and the Mad Dog. They hired Don Imus.

Yeah, and Pete Franklin at one point. But there were issues that how do we do this morning thing? And it took a long time for that to sort of play out. To be frank, I believe it took a generation of listening for it to really work itself out, where younger people who would love the format, there was at one of the schools in Toronto at the end of our first year on the air, they were asked by their teacher and the class of young kids

what were the two things that were most impressive about what may have happened new in the in the past year and one of them was the launch of an all sports station and that was communicated to me and I can remember thinking there's just no way this is not going to be huge and that at some point the whole idea of all sports all day will be fine. I mean the Blue Jays helped us let's face it the morning show was full of Blue Jays talk anyway but once that you guys remember Scott you certainly will remember we had a rating of over 700 thousands you know we went from 140 kume to over 700,000 and Billboard magazine named us the radio

station of the week or some darn thing. And it was, you know, it was an amazing thing. And of course, our company was they were holy cow, this is going to be magnificent, right? They invested a ton. Sports radio costs an awful lot of money. And they weren't really that eager to spend all this money. But that rating was huge. Well then the fall was gone and the winter comes and the the leafs is Dan right the leaves were

great but all of a sudden it was 400,000 and oh oh that's not good and now things really started to get it got started to get tight really tight And there were a lot of changes that happened as a result of it. And a big part of that was the struggle with our morning show. Okay, so that is six to 9am. And then Mary Ormsby and Steve Simmons are nine to 11am on on launch day. People had no idea what they were doing that were great. Yeah, sorry, go ahead. they were a couple of print people and new to radio but entertaining that's a credit that's what Alan did he found he found these people that had credibility and it didn't matter which medium they were

They were in and gave them an opportunity to take their skill set and use it to build into something else. Smart people are smart people and whether they're writers or television broadcasters or radio broadcasters, they will still be smart people. He's bang on, Mike. I mean, that was a, we needed to communicate credibility in a big, big way. And I can remember one of the writers from the Star

when he asked me what this whole thing was gonna be about. And I said, it's kind of the television head as it happens. Remember the show As It Happens? And Bob Holliday at one time at CFTR, remember he had that show that he would do. television head as it happens. Remember the show as it happens, you know, and Bob Holiday at one time at CFTR, remember you had that show that he would do, it was just news that was just taking you to the stories. Sunday, Sunday. Yeah, we're going to take you to the stories. We're going to take you to the stories. I

don't know about that. I mean, it's Montreal Jack phoning in and you know, no, we're going to take you to the stories. And Mary and Steve were fantastic at being able to discuss in depth both teams, all teams, the stories, the history, they knew Toronto and they knew how to do that. They didn't know how to broadcast, but I didn't care about that. I said, that doesn't matter. We can figure that all out.

Don't worry about that. You guys just get on there, open up the mics, as I told Dan, just go down and do your thing. Don't worry about the rest of it. You know, don't worry about the driving part of it. That's Scott. We've got Scott for that. He'll figure he'll help you through that. He's a genius at that. But the rest of it was really important that they just they communicate that credibility and those two did that. So, so Mary Ormsby, Steve Simmons, two great FOTMs by the way and that leads me to another pair of FOTMs that just reunited in this basement this past summer. Actually it was probably this past uh maybe it was like December actually but

Damien Cox and Gord Stehlich they took us from 11 a.m to 1 p.m. What do you want me to say? I could go on here, but I love those two. Those two were fun, they picked at each other, they got into arguments, they were fun to listen to, so they took again credibility but then created a very entertaining two hours to listen to. They could have had a guest if they wanted to, wasn't necessary, because they were able to create this entertaining

two hours of really just fun radio to listen to that the backdrop was sports. But they just connected really quickly. I think what made that show work was the difference in the personalities because Gordon is kind of this gregarious outgoing guy who you know smiles all the time. Damien more of a thinker, you know a little bit more, I don't want to say sarcastic side, but but it was a great columnist because he could take that he could take a position and hang on to defend it all the way along. So and great shows are created by the difference in personalities not by the similarities.

Absolutely. Absolutely. And that brings us to Dan Schulman, who's we're lucky enough to have him on the chat for 1430 today and Barb DiGiulio. There are also FOTMs. Pretend Dan's not here. What can you say about Dan Schulman with Barb DiGiulio? 1 to 4 p.m. I thought Barb was fantastic. What can you say about Dan Schulman with Barb de Julio? 1 to 4 p.m. By the way Can I say one thing of course I've I love Dan to death and Greatest broadcaster that I've ever been around he said to me after lunch one time and this would before we ever launched to

To all sports we went to lunch and it was really a discussion about where we were going and that kind of stuff. And he was already getting a lot of praise for the work he was doing on the air. He had already, I think at this point, been approached by ESPN, which by the way, March 16th or whatever that date was, I knew too that it wasn't gonna be long before they were gonna be calling.

And it wasn't, it surprised me how fast it was quite frankly that they called about Dan. But I was telling about a number of people love what he does, they love his talent, they love everything and we got to the back door at that our holly street 40 holly street there and he's opening up the door and I'm behind him. And he opens up the door after heeping all his praise on me. He turns him. He goes, you know what, Alan, the one thing people don't spend enough time thinking about is how hard you have to work to get to that. And I've never forgotten that. Never ever forgotten that.

That sounds like me as a dad preaching to my kids for their whole entire lives. He worked his butt off for everything that he has and I tell you as much talent that he has naturally, nothing happens without the hard work he put into it and I want to make sure you know that. I've always felt that way and there's a reason why you have won the accolades that you had is because you work very hard on it. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate that. I still do it now. I don't know how to do it any other way.

Okay. Again, pretend Dan's not on this zoom. Okay. Oh, I'm sorry. Dan wasn't there. So anyway, he was also a little goofy too. You know, sort of like hard to control sometimes. You didn't want to do afternoons. I know that I don't want to do prime time sports. Bob's I don't want to do prime time sports. Bob's going to do the morning, I don't want to do prime time. Don't talk to him about prime time. I didn't want to do mornings.

I didn't want to do, I'm not telling you that much. I don't know how many times I tried to get you to go to mornings, he wasn't, Dan wasn't going. But what Dan's, and he's not here, Dan's incredible ability to make the other person look good. incredible ability to make the other person look good. And that's, you know, he gave Barb the room to be Barb. The same way when he's doing a baseball broadcast, his focus is creating an opportunity for whoever is sitting in the other seat to be great. And that is one of the, that's certainly one of the reasons that if Dan was here, I

would tell him. But as he's not here. And you know, there's little things where Dan kind of mentored us all without really knowing it because I remember I was in the newsroom once and Barb DeGiulio asked him, hey Dan, after I do the Blue Jays story, should I go to other American League scores or maybe to the Leaf game? And I thought, that's an interesting question. Whatever Dan's answer is, is probably what we're going to do. And to tell the truth, I can't even remember what your answer was, but whatever it was,

Barb and I both did it. Wow. So the question I was going to ask you guys, pretending Dan's not on the Zoom, is Dan Schulman the greatest graduate of the launch of All Sports Radio 1430 The Fan? Like the most successful graduate of that launch day, if you will. I'd say yes. Yeah, I'm not sure what the criteria is. Oh, the one thing I would add is that there's only one of the original managers who's still working. So I think part of the nod has to go to Alan.

He's still employed. He's still working. Alan, before I get back to the lineup here, because I'm very interested to talk about this next host of prime time sports, but Alan, where are you working these days? WGR in Buffalo. In his living room.

Wow, good for you, man. Okay, good for you. So on the heels, you mentioned that one hour overlap where you've got Bob McCowan, you've got Dan Schulman, We are in Buffalo. In his living room. Wow. Good for you, man. Okay. Good for you. So on the heels, you mentioned that one hour overlap where you've got Bob McCowan, you've got Dan Schulman, you've got Barb DeGiulio, but then it's a primetime sports and joining Bob McCowan is Jim Shakey Hunt. Let's take a moment and talk about Bobcat.

He's not on the zoom. He's, you know, I know he's made some great progress. He had a stroke. He was very public talking about this and we hope Bob is recovering well and we want to get his get him back back a plus. But please spend a moment talking about, you know, Bob McCowan and primetime sports and Jim shaky hunt three to seven p.m. Well, it all started.

Well, it all started. It all started in 1989, if I can go back that far, Lem Branson said, you know, Bob McCown is coming back to town and I really would like to be able to use him if we can. And I jumped at the chance to add him to our Blue Jays broadcast. And he brought back talking of sports at that point. And we expanded that to six o'clock as soon as we could. As I said, Mike, there was this demand for more baseball content back then. Anything we could do with baseball, we could certainly sell and monetize it.

So we did. And then we moved to the opportunity of primetime sports and talk to Bob at length about going to drive time with it. And we created a primetime sports at that point, there was a lot of a lot of Bill Waters and and Bob at that time, but then Bill moved. I think he was back doing color with Joe. And then that moved to Gord. And then that opened up that time slot in there.

And Shaky was obviously the- Well, Wilbur went back to the leash to be the assistant. That's what it was. Yeah, he went back to, that's correct. That's correct. And then we moved, and I can remember Bob sitting in my office not knowing in which direction to go. All I knew was he wanted somebody in there.

He wasn't going to do it by himself all the time. He was like not a big fan of that. As funny as it is, you know, it's Bob's show and we all know that without Bob there isn't a show and that's absolutely true. But he also knew I got to have somebody a foil in there, somebody to play off of and and shaky was perfect for that. So we put the two together and it was it was magic. You know in other markets there were the the young aggressive host and the old writer, the old gum shoe or whatever you want to call that and shaky fit that bill pretty well.

So, from three o'clock on, that was really your prime time obviously for that format. And where you have normal talk radio stations where you grow from the mornings and music stations, you grow from your morning day part. Sports radio, we discovered it was from your afternoon drive. It wasn't for mornings. Your prime time slot was afternoon drive.

Who chose the music for prime time sports? Do you know? Okay, Alan, okay. I did, yes. Love that song. But it was sitting, we sat in the production room there and played a whole bunch of stuff A question did come in we got tired and picked that one. I think it was I honestly I think it was

I think I think it was that one never left, right? It was one of those where that's okay. I remember somebody wanted to call it who's on first and Before we selected primeetime and I was adamant I go no it's we're gonna talk sports in primetime let's just call it primetime sports and and then the music was just sitting there and listening a whole bunch of stuff Mike if I could just jump in for a second on please Bob McCowan because I know we're gonna to go on to other shows, but as Bill Waters used to call him the mercurial Bobcat, and he was like herding cats.

No question about it. He was his own guy. And what I'd say about Alan and Nelson was they were fantastic in managing Bob McCowan. I think Bob respected them. He appreciated that they let him go a little bit. They'd have to every once in a while steer him in another direction and they were successful at that. But they were two of the best and that helped so much because Bob was, he was such an iconic part of the radio station that you really needed him to be focused and going in the right direction. And I think Alan and Nelson deserve a huge amount of credit

for that. It was about trust. Bob trusted us to make sure that he was going to have every opportunity to succeed. And Alan went through the same thing every day at 345 he'd come in my office whether I was in there or not and put his feet up on my desk and he would talk to my chair if I wasn't there and if I was there he would talk to me and my goal every day with Bob was to either have him leave my office, either mad at me, happy with me, or laughing. And any one of those three things, he would just go in and the magic would happen.

But that was, you know, he needed that, to have that trust that we were gonna be on his side. I think, I'm sorry, go ahead. No, I just think, I think for all of us, there was, hey, am I doing OK here? You know, Dan would Dan would say that. I mean, whether you'd say it out loud, I know he'd come off the air and go, am I doing OK here?

Am I doing OK? I listened all the time. And 99% of the time, I was able to say, yeah, you're doing just fine just just keep doing what you're doing and Bob was was the one we all you know he led trust me Nelson and I knew don't get in his way our job is to get out of his way and just to help where we could that's all just help I still do that today I don't get in I don't get in talents way I to help them. I was on the air for a period of time.

I understand what that's like. So get out of the way and help them as much as you can. And then every once in a while, you might have to say, hey, you know, maybe we shouldn't have gone that direction. I can recall when we went with Prime Time Sports, there was that consultant from the fan that was in town when we went five o'clock before we were launched. He's in the office, John Ray, there's me, him,

and it's five o'clock. I think you were on with Bob at five, weren't you, Dan? I think that five o'clock you were there. Just that one day you mean when we launched? That first day, I thought you were with him because I can remember he starts talking and we're listening in the office, right? And in my head, we have to be entertaining. This is sports, it's not news, it's not general talk. This is sports. We have to be entertaining.

And five minutes into it, just like I did with you, I walked into the studio again. And he's right on the mic. I said, if we're not gonna have any fun doing this, we're not gonna do it. We're not forget it. We're not gonna do it. You you come on. What is this? We need to have fun. Start laugh. I haven't heard you laugh. Has he been on here 10 minutes? I haven't heard a laugh. And I think that resonated with him. Dude, this is prime time. You're Bob McCowen. You're the best there is. Have let's have some fun. And after that, I mean, we really didn't have to have those types of conversations.

We had a bunch of other ones, but not those. We always talk contract forever and ever and ever amen. We'd start negotiating the day the other, the other, the other side, you'd start talking about the next. He would, he would leave the office. Yeah, no, I think I like this idea. I think I, I think I'm comfortable with this. I think I'm comfortable with this. And so, you know, you might go home and think, I think we got him. I think we got one. He, you know, I was thinking what, I am comfortable that I am comfortable, but there's just a couple of things and then this would go on and on and on. Okay, on that note, so I did ask if anyone

had any questions and I got a bunch, but there's one that's appropriate for this moment from Glenn who says, I've always wondered about the programming decision to let Bob McCowan do a Toronto morning show from Las Vegas. It never made sense to me having a broadcaster in a foreign country to talk local Toronto sports."

I don't think he did the morning show from Las Vegas or no, he was doing prime time from Las Vegas. So that answers that, Glenn. Thanks for the question. I think, you know, if we look at what we're doing today, we were just ahead of the curve, that's all. Right. And you know what, the shows from Vegas worked.

It was better when he was here. I remember poor Shakey sitting in that studio all by himself, waiting for, where's Bob? Shakey didn't have fun in that time when Bob was doing the show from Vegas. And I actually went down to Vegas a couple of times and I'd walk in and there's Bob feet up on the desk, cigarette going and having the time of his life. But it was, I'm not sure it ever hurt us. I'm not sure it helped. I'm not sure it drove more audience because of it. But it was perspective and it was something he wanted to do and he's that good.

He's that good. And on that note, I'm going to play an ad that we all kind of remember fondly and maybe we can find out some details about this. No, I listen for weather and traffic. It pops in every 10 minutes or so. Hey, a guy like me got a plan this day. The Bob McCowen Show. Everything a guy needs to start the day. We say mornings on the fan 1430. Weather and traffic. Al? What do you want me to say?

What do you want me to say? The outtakes were far better. Well, I want that audio. You know, we're on a podcast is watched by many, but I'm going to say this. That was not my best time there. I was never a fan of moving into mornings. I hated every second of it. I was fine with Dan doing, doing prime time. I was, I've said it,

everybody knows I've said it. I did not enjoy that time in my life. That was a tough time. It became fortuitous in a way because I think Dan moved on to his next gig. And then that created the opportunity to put Bob back on, on prime time. As I remember from Dan's first memorable visit to the basement here, he's the only other host of prime time sports. There's only been two. Yes. Yeah. I did it for two years. Yep. The show never skipped a beat. So yeah. And loved working with shaky.

You know, remember him. I mean, just loved working with shaky, but yeah. And then Bob came back to prime time after, after I left in 19, I think February of 95, because I started doing the J's in 95. So, which I have to remember about the sports radio format is there's a building full of program directors. Everybody knows how to program a sports radio station. And it doesn't matter whether you're an executive out of the corporate boardroom in a business unrelated to media, you're a program director.

So we always had lots of help running the station. Well, that is so true. Even at family gatherings, I would get my ear full of everything that needed to be done. And Tim, I like this, but you might want to tell your bosses that they should do this. And if it got too intense, I'd kind of move elsewhere.

There's three more people I want to shout out here. Let's start with Mike Hogan, because Mikeogan, after a Bobcat and a shaky, Mike Hogan had seven to 10 PM when you launched 1430, the fan. Um, you need somebody to come off the bench. There has to be bench strength. Mike provided bench strength. Uh, it was a good place to put him, uh, cause he can handle any sport really well, very knowledgeable. But if Dan had to take a day off, you could plug Mike in. I felt really confident. He was someone who I felt that, okay, wherever I have a hole in any particular time, I can rely

on Mike. But on a day-to-day basis, putting him in on game nights was a perfect spot for him. And I thought he did a really good job in there, really good job. Solid broadcaster, really knew his stuff. And he surprised me how much depth he had, and it didn't matter the sport, but he could handle it. He was the one you know Dan and Bob two great personalities. Dan and I say this honestly I think Dan had a really good grasp most sports but Mike Hogan really had a grasp of almost all the stuff. He was he there was nothing you could fool him on he could he could he could talk so that was a good spot for him. There was nothing you could fool him on he could he could he could talk so that was a good spot for him

And he also went to high school with members of the tragically hip I can speak to Mike to a certain extent because he and I were he started I'd I think our first time he walked in about ten days after I started in that March of 1992 and we both worked on the weekend sports updates and we kind of became the two senior new hires I guess and then we're both hired full-time on salary in the fall But I was doing the weekend mornings he would relieve me and I remember and that was the routine for a long time that we'd fill in a lot during the week doing updates and I did a lot of reporting which I really enjoyed and Alan came in one weekend and somebody that was supposed to host that

noon show the afternoon show hadn't booked off or wasn't available so he got Mike and I there I'm just finished my morning shift Mike's relieving me and he's looking at us both and he says here's what I want to do Tim I want you I want Mike I want you to win a host that show I think that was Mike's first hosting shift and Tim you I know you've been working all morning, but just continue. So that's what we did. And I thought, yeah, this is working out perfect

because I didn't want to host. I was really hoping he'd pick Mike because Dan quite frankly was setting the bar a little too high for my liking. And I really was enjoying the reporting and I was hoping that would eventually evolve into my regular job, which it did, doing the

sports updates and a lot of reporting. And so that I remember that shift. That was Mike's first hosting shift and clearly he impressed and then Al sort of advanced them on to being a regular swing host when we went full time. Okay. You guys have all been so amazing. I just actually, this time has been flying here and here's what we're going to do. Yes, I want to talk about one more time slot, 10 PM to 2 AM. Then I want to read just a few questions because some good people have some questions. I'm going to read them and then we'll do a little mop up. But first, only one of you is in my basement right now. That is Tim Haffey, whose voice we just heard. So Tim, just to make

everyone else jealous, large meat lasagna in my freezer from Palma pasta. You're taking it home with you. Nice. Yeah. It's all I've got is the box here, but it's a freezer. Tim, it's in my freezer. You will leave this. It should be this.

Look, there's no games here. This is real. Radio guy. Oh, I got is the box. What's going on? It's in my freezer. Tim fresh. Yeah.

Fresh craft beer from Great Lakes Brewery. Okay. So you get the beer. Thank you. Great Lakes for sending that to Tim. You get the pasta. There's a measuring tape for you from Ridley funeral home measuring tape. Great. Well, shout out to Ridley funeral home. There's a great podcast. You should subscribe to leave it alone. Leave it alone. No, go ahead. Go ahead, Nelson. Uh, they got a reservation for you. Just. I would crack open one of these beers, but we had to rule the fan back then. We couldn't drink on the, on the air.

So I'll defer to that. Not when we went to the Leaves Golf Tournament, we didn't. Oh my God. One of the best radio I've ever done. Scott, can you give me that tape? I want that a tipsy Dan Schulman tape, if you can dig that up for me. Okay.

So just to wrap it up. There's no tape. There's no tape. They burned that tape. Okay. So I want to tipsy Dan Schulman tape if you can dig that up for me. Okay, so just to wrap it up They burn that tape Okay So I want to let everybody know about the advantaged investor podcast from Raymond James, Canada Hosted by Chris cook see a lot of great insight and educational content for you the advantaged investor And if you have any old tech like old electronics old cables go to recycle my electronics dot ca They'll tell you where to drop it off so it can be properly recycled because we don't want those chemicals ending up in our landfill. Who wants to tell me about Jim Richards and Norm Rumac

Storm and Norman Rumac 10 a.m. Sorry, 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. on launch day I could tell you that Scott said that release out which was August 11th 1992 basically saying we were gonna go to all sports and I could tell you on August 11th in 1992 I had no idea who was gonna do ten o'clock I was all about let's just shut the radio off. I had no idea and I was still interviewing people as producers and on this very same day Jim Richards came in and I met with him first and then Norm Rumack came in second and after meeting with them, I'm Richardson Rumak they didn't know it but I said I just this is 10 o'clock so I went to the two of them now Jim came

principally to try to talk and he was interested in any shift at all Norm came hey if there's anything I'd love to produce, he was producing some television at that time, I think he was doing some work at maybe CFRB at that time, but he had no idea. What's that Nelson? I think W5. Yes, it could have been. I think he was producing there. Yeah, he wasn't coming to be a host, but he talked for 20 minutes. He just would not stop talking and his energy. And I just, I got to have somebody at 10 o'clock. So I brought them back in the next day.

This is 10 to two. You guys want a shot? It's Richards and Rumack. And that's how that started. Nelson, I remember you telling me when you were in the basement here about that was like the hardest day of your life at the fan, be it 1430 or 590, the day that you had to let Storm and Norman Rumak go. Am I remembering correctly?

Yeah. I was lucky enough that I didn't have to let too many people change professions. But at the time, budgets and body count, excuse me, for lack of a better word, didn't mean to tie it back to the film at home. But that was a tough day. And he wasn't the only one. And we see all sorts of layoffs and whatnot, but we had to make small changes and and sadly that was Nor car caught up in that

Yeah, that was that was very tough always remember late nights listening to the late-night vampire and hearing the Hammer head alert hammer head alerts This was a lot of fun back in the back in the day on beliefs were god's team right wendell clark yeah yeah i was gonna say wendell ruled that was the other one i could tell you a story about hammerhead alert how that started yeah go ahead and i'm gonna take some credit because uh my brother and i when we were younger i'd say to him uh how was the party and he'd say oh a bunch of hammerheads right right meaning bunch of stoners guys like that and I

was saying to Norm one night I said geez Norm you're a lot of your callers sound like real hammerheads tonight and he ran with it but no he I thought was my contribution the word he picked up on it and then he created hammerhead alert on his own and then the rest is history. But he'll verify it with t-shirts. I love the origin stories. Okay, now we're going to burn through some great questions that came in. One from a great FOTM who comes to many a TMLx event.

By the way, I know half of you are in the States right now, but if you wanted to come to TMLx 15, it's on June 27 from 6 to 9 PM at Great Lakes Brewery in Southern Etobicoke. It would be great to see you there. Great to see you there, Tim. But Brian Gerstein writes in, this episode 1430 is the podcast we all need. Not sure if the timing to launch in 1992 was always the plan to take advantage of the heyday of Toronto sports franchises here, or if it would have happened regardless based on WFAN in New York City who were first to

go 24 hours back in 1987, but regardless it changed my life completely. My fondest memories of the early years was hearing Jim Shakey hunt with Bob McCowan who needed a 15 second delay and not a 7 second one never knew what he would say and I was there for it. Is that true? Did shaky get a 15 second delay? No. No, we didn't.

We had a 7 second delay on virtually everything for protection. But what turned out to be 680 news,DR had gone through the process as I recall of exploring the possibility of going all sports and And we beat them to it. I mean it was a year later that 680 went to the all-news format that they were definitely going down that road and believe news format that they were definitely going down that road and believe Alan, you may or may not remember that. I mean, obviously what was happening in our building, I didn't pay that much attention to maybe what others were doing,

but it was out there. If we don't do this, someone else is going to do it and they're going to go get the, you know, they were going to go get the J's that that was probably the biggest reason is that we had, if we don't do something here, we might lose them. And so I go back to what Steve Simmons wrote, you know, perhaps out of a little bit of desperation. I didn't actually know that until Roger's bought the fan and I had some discussions with the execs there.

Yeah. Similarly, I understand Scott, I think we talked about this when we talked about the 30th anniversary of 680 News, but there was an art, there was a race there as well because 640 was going to go all, sorry, all news and 680, it was going to be like for who's going to get in there first. And then 680 won that race. I think what, what was happening at the time was it was just AM radio. The music was dying on AM radio.

You couldn't make a business because FM was so much better quality. So all the AM radio stations, all of them had to look at other options. And so absolutely they were all considering these other options. CJCL was super well situated having the J's and the Leif's, so it just wasn't an easy decision. And I want to say one thing, Alan, about John Ray. You've mentioned his name a few times. Most people aren't going to know who John Ray was, but he was integral to making this happen. He did the studies, he did the research, and I think he was the guy who said, let's go.

Yeah, he's the one who sold the plant. I mean, he was the one who put it together. I mean, and then empowered the rest of us to go do our jobs. But he was the one who convinced there was, it was really, and I will tell you, Lem Branson as well. Right. Lem was always a big believer in it. And I did and I had many conversations with Len along the way. But John was the one that put it all together, every part of it. And he had some tough meetings because sports radio is extremely expensive.

So you might be able to show the potential for revenues, but you couldn't get away from where we're going to have to hire three people to man four hours now when we had one body in there. He had a hard push on that. And telemedia, I think at the time, I think at the time was also struggling with their print assets. So if you look at their portfolio, it wasn't it wasn't that it was just desperation for an AM radio station in Toronto to do something. There were some other issues with print, with TV Guide and Canadian Living magazine. So as a company whole, John had a hard job to be able to say, this is going to cost more, but the other end of it is it's going to be a very profitable enterprise. And you know, I think also he said, maybe it's just to me, what else are we going to do?

Eric writes in and says, I remember exactly where I was when CJCL oldies turned into the fan 1430. I was on the couch. Does he remember the day? Sorry. oldies turned into the fan 1430. I was on the couch. You remember the day? I was on the couch sick. This is Eric speaking. Ultimately turned into pneumonia. Okay, Eric, I hope you recovered. You're still with us. That's good news. Okay. I'm curious if the Blue Jays or Maple Leafs provided statements endorsing the format change to the CRTC. statements endorsing the format change to the CRTC. We didn't need to go to the CRTC. No. AM station. FM stations need to get approvals. I don't think we even let the CRTC know. But they did support it.

They absolutely supported it. I mean, I don't think it was anything official, but both teams supported it. Are you kidding? Moving to all sports? Yeah, well, all of a sudden we were doing talk shows from the gondola at Maple Leaf Gardens. We were going down to spring training.

We were at the golf tournaments. As we said, we were in the hotel lobby doing stuff. Um, we were, we were everywhere and that was great too. I think we haven't talked about that at all. The ability to, to be remote, to be on site when things were going on, a lot of these decisions were made at the 11th hour, if the team won a playoff series, that sort of thing. Um, I thought that was great.

Radio is all about intimacy and immediacy and for us to be where the players were as much as we were I think was tremendously important too. And Scott, you'll remember that it was the advent of the brick, the first, the early cell phones. And we utilized that.

You know, we're gonna take you to the story. We were able to utilize that. You know, we're going to take you to the story. We were able to utilize that when, um, Ruth McNall confirmed that he had bought the Toronto Argonauts along with John Candy, Bob got them on the phone in New York in their car, Howard, this Howard Berger doing his best Howard Berger stuff. And Bob had those two in a car. And I can remember that moment thinking this is, this is what this is all about. And, and it was a magic moment, but

it was all those brick cell phones back then. Yeah. And I mean, now cell phones are ubiquitous and nobody even thinks about it. But back then it was a big deal if somebody had a cell phone and, and we didn't like paying the bills. They were expensive. I hate to do this. Do life is calling me duty is calling. Right. Dan, you've been amazing. We'll, we'll mop up without you, but thanks for being a part of this. You got to have finals, finals, finals, Dan. Come on, man. Final thoughts and we are wrapping up.

It is in the last five minutes here. Okay. All right. All is in the last five minutes here. If that makes you feel like. Okay, fine. So let's go. All right. All right. So last five minutes. That's my pledge to Dan Schulman.

Okay. So Mike Rogoski says, great topic. I remember the day they made the switch. They filled all sports content for 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It seemed like a monumental task at the time. With 2024 eyes, what do you guys see as the legacy

of all sports radio in this city? It was a different time. It was a different world. You couldn't do it now the same way, but I remember as a kid going back even further, only two Blue Jay games a week were on TV, Wednesday night and Sunday afternoon. Like radio was immense back then

and everybody was in their cars all the time. And again, I think we had great timing with the Leafs and the Js. And I will still have people, I'm sure you guys do too, I'll still have people come up and talk to me about the fan days. And I left the fan 29 years ago. It's insane. And

you know for people in their 20s right now none of this probably makes sense but for people in their 50s and 60s it was a time that none of us will ever forget. It was fun and exciting and we were winging it and you know we didn't hit, we swung and missed a few times but we made pretty good contact too. And I think people will remember it as a great, a tremendous success. I really do. And these three guys that we're talking to today

are a huge reason for that. And I'm thinking, okay, the perfect storm of all that great Toronto sports activity in 92, but then we talk about 94 and it's like, so how close does the fan talk about 94? Like how close did it get like was there a moment of like, okay? We're gonna go country music now like in 1994 you're hanging on by the skin of your teeth, right? I Can tell you that 94?

Wasn't pretty but the the one change that telemedia made was they brought in a general manager by the name of Doug Ackers. And Doug, it was a hard sell to him because he was a business guy, he was the guy with the black mask and he was the hatchet guy. But after about three or four months of him being there, maybe a little bit longer for argument's sake, six months. Alan was not programming at that point, he'd gone back over the air. I was the executive producer, Bob Mack, who at senior was the program director at the

time. It was pretty close to shutting down. And we made one change that we just returned to this utility with 20-20 updates. And we promoted nothing but 20-20 updates and the sub-promotion, the other things, trying to just become a utility and group LP audience from there. It wasn't pretty and it was pretty close to the end, but Doug, I will always admire the way he hung in there and kept the telemedia overlords at bay. And Nelson, the other major development then was National Sports Radio at night, which we ran for a while and Alan was the lead host. And initially I was doing the updates on that shift for good stretch.

But national support. In some ways people heard it. Yeah, I do remember working one, it's a funny story, I'll make it quick, but suddenly the producer came into the studio and waved us all off and said, we have no stations. It was just one of those little quirks because the stations on the network could opt out if they had local programming Blue Jays or something else.

You're broadcasting to nobody. Yeah. It's just that there was just a little space there where we suddenly, there was nothing. So we all stopped. And then suddenly we were like back on. And then we went back to work. Okay. Round the horn again. Do you have any opinion on that? I do have a piece of work, thanks. But I do know that what Tim may not know to this day

is I knew how many stations were on there every night. And I told, and Gord didn't know, it was Gord and I. And at one point I did indicate to him, he was off on a tangent and is that going to be okay? And I looked at him and said, don't worry about it, man. There's nobody listening to me. And he went, what? I said, we don't have one radio station on this thing tonight.

Don't worry about it, man. That's wild. And just ahead of our time. Yeah, it was. Yeah, it's like that today, I hear. So, okay. I want to thank you, Tim Haffey, making his Toronto Mike debut. You came all the way here.

It's worth it for the pasta and beer. Thanks for doing this, Tim. Thank you, Mike. And great reconnecting with all my old friends from the wild west days of sports writing on the 90s. All your old bosses. I'll find out later how you did. Nelson Millman making his triumphant return.

It's been too long, Nelson. You're a great FOTM. Thanks for doing this. I know you're a busy man in Florida. Not so much. They're a great SOB, Nelson. Great SOB. Great SOB.

Alan Davis, you made your Toronto Mike debut. Thanks for doing this. Good luck in Buffalo there. And it was important to get your perspective here. This made the episode great. Thank you so much. Thank you. Scott, you know this. Thank you so much. Thank you. Scott, you know this wouldn't happen without Scott Metcalfe.

You're like the straw stirring the drink here, buddy. You know what I think of you. Thanks for the gifts that you sent the fan 590. Sorry, the fan 1430 cards and everything. I'm going to take photos and tweet them. But thank you, Scott, for being a part of this episode. One of the great things about radio as Nelson mentioned and as Dan mentioned is intimacy and immediacy and you kind

of have picked up that mantle Mike because you don't do any editing on your show it's just live and it it's Wild West and we love it. Thank you kind words thank you so much. And Dan Shulman... If you wouldn't mind doing some editing on this show. I think that would be good. Dan, I know you're busy and you made time, gave me a good 90 plus minutes here. Thank you so much for being a part of this episode. And again, congrats to your son, that's a huge deal to be the radio voice of the Toronto Blue Jays. And we can't wait to hear you call Blue Jays games again this summer. Thank you.

And great to see you guys. And I'm sure everybody feels the same. We've all met different people, done different things, been different places, but these will always be some of the fondest memories of my career. It was wall to wall fun. At least that's the way I remember it right now. It was wall to wall fun and I wouldn't have had, you know, I wouldn't have been as lucky as I've been to have some of the other opportunities I've had if it weren't for CJCL and for these three guys right here.

I can say Mike though, every other day he was coming down, well this person just called, I have this opportunity and this person called and this opportunity and I'm going, it never, never ended. It never ended. Yeah, but I didn't badger you about contracts like Bob did. We just talked about contracts. You left. And that brings us to the end of our 1430th show, episode 1430. You can follow me on Twitter and Blue Sky.

I'm at Toronto Mike. Much love to all who made this possible. That's Great Lakes Brewery. That's Palma Pasta. That's Recycle My Electronics. That's Raymond James Canada. And that's Ridley Funeral Home. See you all tomorrow.

We're going to talk about Big Rude Jake. See you all then. Nelson's back, I guess. And I've kissed you in places I better not name. And I've seen the sun go down on Sackers.