Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Stormin' Norman Rumack: Toronto Mike'd #235

Episode Date: May 3, 2017

Mike chats with former Fan 590 personality Norman Rumack about his years at the station, hammerhead alerts, and his latest projects.

Welcome to episode 235 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a local independent brewery producing fresh craft beer. And propertyinthesix.com, Toronto real estate done right. I'm Mike from torontomic.com and joining me is Storm and Norman Rumack. Well, thanks for the warm welcome. I like the music by the way. An original

composition. I feel like I'm going retro back into the early part of the millennium and hanging out at Shark City on Eglinton Avenue. The good old days? Oh yeah, those were good old days. I go right from doing my gig at the fan and just walk down a few blocks. The fan was on Holly Street near Yonge and Eglinton. And Shark City was on Eglinton, close to Mount Pleasant.

But I used to hang out there. And a lot of the hockey players back then, not only from the Leafs, but from other teams that they were in town, would hang out there. It was quite the place. Was it the Muskoka Five? Is that their hangout? Or no? Not well.

I mean, they would hang out there, like any of the players would hang out there in the wintertime. But yeah, I had a venture up to Muskoka, so I'm familiar with, was what, Lake Muskoka. And what's the other one? It's all hockey people, because they're the only ones who can afford the properties there, where like the lots are,

it's like living in Forest Hill or Rosedale. If you have a lot on Lake Muskoka, you've got a few million shekels to spend. But anyway, it's nice to be here. Thanks for inviting me. You know what I searched long and hard for? Right off the top, I searched everywhere for a sound clip of the

Hammerhead Alert. Even I would have a hard time getting that. I have it somewhere at home on a CD. If you had the CD, I know it's at home on a CD. Do they even have CD players? If you had the CD, I know it's too late now, you're here now, but I could rip that and then I'd have it and I could put it in my soundboard and periodically during an episode, I could drop a hammerhead alert.

You mean if I feel like yelling at you or hanging up on you? Could you do a request? Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, the station has somewhere in their computer logs. Someone, I think, still has it. And if not, some of the former Fan 590 guys have gone on elsewhere, probably have. But, I mean, I was told – I don't know if I should mention any names. Yeah, you've got to mention names.

This is Toronto Mike's. Let's hear the names. I was told that way back when my friend and colleague Barry Davis or Jim Richards, now doing very well, of course, at News Talk 1010, might have had stuff like that on the old blooper reels. Barry. Jim did the blooper reel show. And Barry, we were all told, had this worth millions, if I can say that, collection of blooper reels from the first couple of years.

Because they ran that every Saturday morning. I'm friendly with both. Barry was here a few weeks ago. Oh, was he? Well, if anybody would know where to find it, it'd either be Barry or maybe Jim or my old friend, producer Stan Matecki. But I haven't seen them in a while.

So if anybody has the Hammerhead Alert sounder, it might be one of those three gentlemen. Maybe we can work on that. I'm on the case, Norm. I'm on the case. I would even give a finder's fee if I could get a copy of it. We'll pay them in beer.

Yeah, sure. I will talk to Great Lakes Beer, who we'll speak about in a moment. That'd be awesome. They will give beer to the person who produces the Hammerhead Alert. Okay, I mean, I could try and do one here for you now, but you know what you need? Could you do that?

Yeah. I'll be quiet for a second, and then I'll just put that. Do you have a sound effects board? If you can give me a siren, like the old siren, the old fire engine. You know what? I wish I were that nimble. Well, okay. We'll do without the sirens.

Hammerhead Alert! Hammerhead Alert! Hammerhead alert. Hammerhead alert. I love it. No. I'm going to cut that out. I got my Norm Storm in the room. There you go.

Hammerhead alert. I tried to make it sound as 92, 93 as I could. Up to 95. You know what? I have the talent where I could get a siren, put it in the back, and that over top, and I'll just create my own hammerhead alert. That's perfect. Yeah, I mean, that became kind of like my signature.

That was like my trademark. We don't have as much. I want to spend, you know, Howard Berger spent two and a half hours in here. Really? Yeah. Okay, I'm going to be, well, I may not be able to spend. I don't have that kind of time today. I know.

I'm late, folks. I admit, I am late. I caused a delay. Mike's got a dentist appointment. And I screwed up. I was late, folks. I admit. I am late. I caused a delay. Mike's got a dentist appointment. I have a dentist appointment. And I screwed up. I was late doing some other business. So Mike might severely punish me. Hammerhead alert. For being tardy today.

So right off the top, I just need to share that my youngest took her first steps last night. Well, congratulations. It's exciting to see those first steps. And I saw them last night. So I'm playing Fats Domino, I'm Walking. Very nice. I like the retro tunes here. Can I make a song request? Go ahead.

I mean, you know, if you think it goes with the year. As I've already told you, I'm not very nimble, but let's hear the request. Okay, so, you know, being a child of the 60s, etc. So I guess if I had to pick my favorite tune of that entire generation, I have a few of them that go between the Beatles and the Beach Boys, but if I had to pick one, I'd probably go with Good Vibrations. Because that song, I'm sure a lot of people remember it,

was years and years ahead of its time, from 1966. It inspired the Sgt. Pepper album, right? Because that's from Pet Sounds? You know what? You're in the right ballpark. Because I heard or read a quote from Paul McCartney,

who had said, if I'm not mistaken, that God only knows, the other Beach Boys are from Pet Sounds. He thought it was one of the best pop songs of all time. Of all time. Fantastic songs. But here we go with, yeah, Good Bye Bramble. And I'm pretty sure that this,

this is from Pet Sounds, and I'm pretty sure I've read that the Beatles heard Pet Sounds. Oh, they loved it. They did Sergeant Pepper in response. They were inspired by the... Well, I mean, that wouldn't surprise me. I hadn't read that quote.

But no, this song, and I saw the Beach Boys twice, at least twice. I saw them at Massey Hall in 1972, and then at Exhibition Stadium in 74. It was just awesome shows. And that was the original lineups, or I know they keep messing with the lineups. Well, Brian Wilson was going through his emotional tough times, and he wasn't with them at the Massey Hall concert, but I'm pretty sure he was there in

74. But you know, they had a bunch of different musicians who were well established who toured with them. One of them for a time was actually Glenn Campbell. Oh, wow. So yeah, he did some stuff for them. The gentleman who was the lead singer for, you remember the pop band,

the duet, The Captain and Tennille? Of course. Yeah, well, The Captain did a little bit of that. And then another guy named Bruce Johnson, who also toured with the Beach Boys. So they had a bunch of different, and they were buddies with Jan and Dean. Anyway. I could do all 90 minutes on this, but the people will be. This is awesome.

We're doing a 60s show, folks. Can they call and request right now? No. They can Skype me, but no one can hear us, so it would be useless. How about another blast from the past or a twin spin right here? That's the station I grew up with, as a lot of folks did in the Toronto area.

In fact... I did load up walk songs. Oh, this is Johnny Cash. Absolutely. So I was thinking, what are the best walking songs? Because my daughter walked yesterday. You walked the line, I guess. But I won't play them all. I don't have the time.

But I brought in, I got Nancy Sinatra, These Boots Are Made For Walking. Yeah. She did another song called Sugartown. She did a few songs. And I have Dire Straits, Walk of Life. And of course, remember she did the duet with Big Frank. Yeah, that was the creepy duet for a father-daughter. Whatever, yeah.

This will take you back. Folks, here's a hit from 1965 with Radio Mike right here. Can I say? 10-50 Chum, Toronto. Beautiful. And the hits just keep on coming. I just got to give you a post-it hit and we're good to go. Ah, Walk on the Wild Side.

You know what's also special about this gentleman? Tell me. Can I say? People are going to say, oh, here he goes again. He what's also special about this gentleman? Tell me. Can I say? People are going to say, oh, here he goes again. He is an alumnus of Syracuse University. Thank you very much. Oh, man. He is.

One of our best. The late Gray Lou Reed. That's right. So was the lead singer for the then young, later on the Rascals. Is it Felix Cavallari I think that was his name but he was he was an alum of Syracuse as well okay all right listen to me my

friend okay so you got a few questions I gather I got some questions but first I need to urge everybody listening to go to patreon.com Toronto Mike and help crowdfund this a very special thank you to Michael S., who didn't want to do Patreon,

so he Interact e-transferred me money to help fund this project. So thank you, Michael S. If anyone else is afraid of Patreon and doesn't want to do patreon.com slash torontomike, just send me a note, and I'm very flexible. Unmarked dollar bills and brown paper bags, whatever. We can work it out.

Yeah, someone told me about Patreon, and I should go on. When I first heard of Patreon, boy, that sounds a lot like the missile system. You know, Patriot? Maybe that's what they're afraid of. Well, I don't blame them. But if it brings you money, God bless them. That's okay. The beer in front of you, you've seen it by now, the Great Lakes beer.

Which one's that? You got the one with the octopus on it. That's my favorite. Is that like Red Wings beer? That's right. Eight wins to a cup. Remember in the day,

I used to call them the dead things. I remember it more than that. Norm, I remember vividly Murder City dead things. Well, that's right. I used to do it with that like Yosemite Sam

kind of accentuation. So it was the Murder City dead things. Well, that's right. I used to do it with that Yosemite Sam kind of accentuation. So it was the murder city dead things. Love that. Yeah. But I need to tell you. People are wondering why I said dead things, because I grew up watching Yosemite Sam on the Bugs Bunny show. Sure, of course.

Yeah, Looney Tunes. Yeah. So that's for you. That's from Great Lakes Beer. You're taking that home with you. There's also a pint glass. Awesome. The pint glass goes home with you, too, because you need something to drink this stuff in.

Oh, Red Leaf Lager. That's a staple. I guess they couldn't use Maple Leaf Lager, right? Would they get sued? Not really. No, because the team's name isn't Lager. I don't know. Everything is called.

What isn't called Maple Leaf? That's right. That's right. There's a zillion companies. You can't trademark a tree? Come on. That's your beer. That's your pint glass from Brian Gerstein from propertyinthesix.com.

That goes home with you, too. He sent me some nice notes. Did he? Okay. On Twitter. Yeah, Brian. He's a big fan of yours. Oh, thank you.

And you used to listen to the fan all the time back in the day. That's for you. That's awesome. I got a tip. We were actually talking a little bit about real estate before I started recording, but I have a tip from Brian here. Okay. Brian says that according to the latest Toronto Real Estate Board stats, realtors in April entered 33.6% more new listings into the MLS system compared to the same month in 2016.

33% increase in listings this April versus last April. Is that why we're hearing about this from the mayor, Tory, about the crackdown on the folks, the good folks from way, way across the planet specking on Toronto property? It's like, I see these... For those of us who are middle class wage earners or lower than that, and I've been on both sides...

Which is a lot of us. Yeah, a lot of us. It's like, I keep seeing these condos going up in Toronto. Who the hell has the money for all these things? Like, one condo is expensive enough, one piece of property. So I'm wondering. It's like, it's a dumb question because, yeah, it's obviously people are buying like 10 at a time,

renting them out or whatever they're doing. I'm less convinced. I think that's the fear mongering and the speculation, all the foreign money coming in. But I'm less convinced. But I'll finish Brian's point here. New listings were up double digits for all low-rise home types. That includes detached and semi-detached and townhouses. So Brian says this is likely due to sellers wanting to cash in with the high prices in the marketplace

rather than a reaction to the Ontario government's recently announced fair housing plan. So contact Brian directly. I always talk about propertyinthesix.com. You can actually phone him up right now and talk to him. 416-873-0292. 416-873-0292. He'll give you an update on your specific neighborhood because he sees varying

markets throughout the city. So every neighborhood, it's a little different. Give him a shout. He's a real estate sales representative with PSR Brokerage. So Norman, that glass from Brian, it's a gift to you. Hey Brian, thanks. Drink the Great Lakes beer in there. I will. You can drink it during the show if it

gets... Hey, you know what? Brian might know my oldest brother, Marty, who's a real estate attorney. He does a lot of transactions. So can I give him a freebie, a shameless plug? My brother, because he's my brother. Hammerhead alert. Go ahead, of course. It's martinrumak.com.

Real estate law, family law, wills, power of attorney, buying or selling a house, a condo, co-ownership. martinrumack.com. 30 years. 30 years. 30 years, Michael. Legal experience. Martin Rumack. R-U-M-A-C-K-A.

I think that's a conflict of interest, Norman. I just told people to contact Brian. Okay. Well, Brian might know my brother. Maybe they've done some deals together. You never know. Here's the deal. Everybody, contact Brian first.

416-873-0292. Then contact Marty Rumack, and then everybody's happy. I'm sure they know each other, right? Because attorneys, real estate guys, they all know it's one big happy family. In fact, Zach Hyman, Toronto Maple Leaf, his dad lives a few blocks away from me, Stu. He's the one who bought up all those junior teams, remember, back in the day? Yeah, that's right.

But Hyman, what a workhorse, and what a fantastic penalty killer. And he's the nicest guy. Well, talking about his dad now, Stu is the nicest guy. He was one of my devoted, sorry, listeners on the Fan 590. There were a lot of us, Norm.

Well, thank you. I appreciate that, Mike. I'll just say, some people listening, because I sometimes read comments online, like just for going down memory lane, I read the comments from when I got released by the fan. And on June 23rd, it was of 2009. And, you know, what what folks understand, I get obviously the love hate reaction. Right. But I went out of my way to solicit that because I knew from being, when I was way back in 90, 91, I was, sorry, 91, 92, excuse me. I was producing talk shows at then CFRB. It's now News Talk 1010. So I produced for some really big names back then, Ed Needham,

Larry Solway, Charles Adler. And one time we had a meeting with these consultants from Cincinnati and, you know, obviously they meet with the the consultants they want to clue you in on your best way to get good ratings or great ratings well they made it clear score high in the love hate index and that's the answer right there so when I finally thanks to god bless him Alan Davis is now the program director at GR 55 in Buffalo he was the man who got the fans started as the program. He gave me my big break. So when I went on the air, when I finally got my opportunity with monster names already there like Bob McCown,

monster in terms of their talent and what they were or what they became like Dan Schulman as well and several other fellas, I figured I better make a name for myself real fast. Otherwise, I'm just going to get lost, get lost. I was grateful for the opportunity. So even when I was working with Jim Richards and when we were paired together, the idea was just to give us some seasoning, not that we would be paired together long term.

But it was a lot of fun, and I'll talk about that. But I knew as soon as I got on that mic, I had to create a love-hate thing real fast if I wanted my name to be remembered. You know, like in the song Fame, remember my name? Well, you've got to do that in radio, otherwise you're history. So I would do whatever it took within the rules of the CRTC. You know, keep in mind those seven dirty words are applicable in Canada too. So I never used any of those, but I would do everything short of that to make sure people remembered me

because, and I knew, again, scoring in the Love-Hate Index. So how would I score in the Love-Hate Index? Well, I'd be the ultimate homer, which back then nobody else was doing. Now, everybody's a homer. Everybody's a homer. You're a trailblazer. I was. I'm proud of that. Did you see my t-shirt? Did you see my t-shirt? Okay. What's that?

I'm wearing my, it's What Would Wendell Do? I love that. Mike is actually wearing a shirt that's got Wendell's face, like retro Wendell from the mid-80s. Yeah, bloodied face 1987. WWD, I didn't even notice that to you. I was like, I gotta put on a t-shirt. Norm Womack, here's what I remember. I'm a little out of order, but that's okay.

I'm going to tell a story anyways. Many hours listening to you. I wouldn't trade Wendell for all the real estate products. He's the greatest hockey player on the planet. Yeah. All heart. Again, I meant what I said, but obviously if I was just talking amongst friends, I wouldn't go to the levels that I did on the air.

But again, that was to push the love-hate thing. So I would take it to ultra-ridiculous levels where would I trade Wendell for Mario Lemieux? And I'd say, well, okay, I might have to think about that. But the real funny one was somebody calling in, you know, because I had this thing going about the Red Wings, right?

Because they were the big rival. And somebody asked me, would you trade him for Sergey Fedorov? And I said, there's no way I would trade him for Sergey Fedorov. And I'll tell you a funny story. I knew the, I got to know quite well, they became friends, Newport Sports Management. That's Don Meehan, Pat Morris. Yes, big names.

That's right, from Newport Sports. They represent the largest number of NHL players, and including Wendell, by the way. So Brad Smith, the former Maple Leafs... Motor City. Motor City, Smitty, for a time was working with them. This goes, again, this is back 20 years. So I was doing my defend Wendell thing,

and I wouldn't trade him for anybody or almost anybody. I needed a little bit of backup, so I got Smitty to come on the air. And I mean, realistically, Federoff in his prime was a hell of a player, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I know that. But I'm just saying, for radio show purposes,

I asked Smitty, would you go on the air with me and just back me up a little bit, please? Because I'm taking a bit of a beating on this. So I said, Brad, would you trade Wendell Clark for Sergei Fedorov? And he sort of whispered, whispered. He was kind of like, nope. I guess he didn't want it.

I mean, even the fellas at Newport Sports got a chance. Even Wendell got a chance. The nicest thing about Wendell is he doesn't take any of that stuff seriously. I was pleased as heck. I got invited to his wedding. His wife, Denise, is a lovely lady. Their kids are all grown up. And I had a hell of a great time at the wedding in Saskatoon.

That was a lot of fun in 96. But anyway, I had a lot of fun with that particular argument. It lasted forever. And guys would call in, you know, like fill in the blank of the name of the player. Well, would you trade Wendell for this? And, of course, it was a blessing from the good Lord that when I got on the air shortly thereafter, that

spring, the Leafs had that incredible playoff run and Wendell was absolutely on fire. Oh, man. Remember the back-to-back fights with Probert? Yep. And of course, things really took off when the Leafs beat the Wings. Yeah, in that first series. In the Borchewski overtime tip, yeah.

And you remember those Wendell goals in Game 6 in the L.A.? It was the hat-trick, if I'm not mistaken. It was the hat-trick, for sure. No, you can't forget that. Yeah, so, I mean, I was really fortunate that, you know, my heart and soul, I honestly am a Wendell fan, and I was before I got on the air. So I meant what I said, but again, with radio,

because if you want to be successful... You're an entertainer. You have to kick it up a notch, if you will. I mean, if you're just going to speak and just say, well, in my opinion, I like that guy, because you can't do that. We are in entertainment. And I never forgot that. And I knew I had to really push the love-hate thing. So when guys even now send me on Twitter some equivalent of hate notes, like, oh, you're such a this, you're such a that, or you still don't know what you're talking about, like whatever, I actually thank them because imagine someone remembering that I hung up on them or cursed them out, not swearing, but had a tough conversation with them

and hung up on them on the air in the early 90s, and they're still thinking about it. Like that to me, they don't get it, but that to me is the ultimate compliment. How many conversations, Mike, do we remember from like a month ago? Like do you remember every conversation? No. So imagine someone remembering something from a radio dialogue from someone they've never even met from 20, 25 years ago

and hanging on to it like it was their wallet. I mean, I'm so flattered. I'm grateful to the Lord. You should be flattered. I mean, the fact that the first thing I thought of when you were coming over was hammerhead alert. In my cranium, it's embedded in there. One thing I

should point out, you are a host, an entertainer, you are a host, an entertainer, you took calls, but you were never a journalist. You didn't cover the team. So I think your homerism I think is fair game.

Yeah, of course it was. Everything's fair game when you're on the end. I didn't mind it. I used to love the fact that when the media critics back then, Rob Longley,

the Toronto Sun, oh, help me out, Truth and Rumors, Globe and Mail. Oh, William, not Blair, William, oh.

Oh, I'm embarrassed. It's not Christie, is it? No, it's, I'm sure it's William, right? William? We could Google it. You know what, you go ahead and,

I'll Google it, you keep talking. Yeah, so anyways, when I'd find my name in the paper, you know, from the media critics at the time,

you know, all three papers, the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star and the Toronto Sun, you know, would do like weekly reviews or more often. Truth and Rumors was in the Globe and Mail about twice or three times a week. And when I would find my name in there, I was grateful because they spelled my name correctly. They listed the radio station properly. It was a free ad. Like, what more could you want? I didn't really care what they said. As long as they mentioned my name

and the radio station, and, you know, they put it in as Storm and Norman. So I was absolutely thrilled. I didn't really care what they wrote. William Houston. William Houston, yeah. And, you know, the nice thing about him was when he was writing that column,

if there was a mistake, like something I thought needed to be corrected, he would gladly correct it. The next day it would be just whatever the correction was. I love the publicity, and I knew I was going to get that kind of reaction. I once joked with Rob Longley when he was still doing that. I see him occasionally now. He follows some of the teams.

I said, Rob, what would it take for me to get the front page, the front page of your column or in the sports section? It says, when you get fired. That's right. And you know what? When I did get released in 2009, I was very honored. I got the top of page two in the Toronto Star. That's pretty good.

Not like the headline, but on that page. I'm going to play a clip. In fact, here, we mentioned Howard Berger earlier, and he's fresh in my mind because he was only here like two weeks ago. Yeah, good guy. I always got along well with Howie. So he talked a couple of things. One is he told a story on my podcast about you booking him for Canada AM.

Oh, in Oakland. Yes. Yeah, I was story producing for CTV News Canada. I'm from 88 to 91. And because, you know, I was a hardcore sports guy, so they gave me that beat. It wasn't like every day, but whenever stories came up. So the Blue Jays are playing Oakland in the ALCS in 89. They flew me out to Oakland for a couple of days. It was like a real short trip.

And I had to get someone on. Keep in mind, they're three hours behind. I had to get someone on from the ballpark in Oakland at 7 a.m. Eastern time, which is 4 a.m. Pacific time. So the Jays played a night game there in Oakland. So basically, I went back to the hotel for an hour. I'd seen Howie in the press box.

I said, well, can you do a hit for us at four in the morning at the ballpark? And he agreed to. I go back well, can you do a hit for us at four in the morning at the ballpark? And he agreed to. I go back to the hotel to catch a nap and then we go to the ballpark from the moisture and the condensation. The seats are like soaking. You can imagine, it's the bay, right? The seats

are soaking wet and we're just out there sitting in these wet seats for a five to seven minute hit from the ballpark uh in oakland and yeah howard berger agreed to do it because like i didn't at that stage uh you know because it was canada am i didn't know a lot of the sports media personally but he agreed to do it to get up at that crazy time and yeah so we did a hit and i remember my my boss uh wendy day the executive producer canada am reminded me when i was going out there. I was like, you're not there to watch a ball game.

So as soon as the hit was over, I couldn't even, because the Jays were playing the A's in an afternoon game for a game. The first game in Oakland was at night, and then they had a quick turnaround. The next day was an afternoon game. So anyway, we did the hit, and then I had to head to the airport

and catch the flight back to Toronto, so I didn't even stay for that second game. But yeah, Howie was a good sport, because how many people would agree to basically stay up all night to do a five to seven minute hit on Canada AM? But it was Canada AM. That's a big deal. No, I had a great I mean, I was talking about Wendy Day. I mean, she

gave me an opportunity, and I was grateful for the three and a half years that I was working. I worked on some amazing stories, including that one and some other great sports stories as well. But yeah, that was a lot of fun going to the ALCS in Oakland. Now here's something about Oakland, which I understand is still true. So of course it was my first, I'd been to San Francisco before, never been to Oakland.

So when I check in at the hotel, which was the host hotel for major league baseball, I can't remember which one it was, but you know, it was one of the prestigious chains of hotels, right? I don't know if it was a Hilton or whatever. Anyway, so like anybody else who's new in town or hasn't been before, I go to the front desk. I ask the clerk. I said, by the way, where do you go at night in Oakland? And he paused for a second, and then he

just said, you don't. You know, that was, well, from what I understand, that's still true. You don't go out at night in Oakland. It's not exactly the safest spot in the USA. Tough town. Tough town. Tell me how you, how would you end up at, I guess it was the Fan 1430 when you show up there, right? Yeah, well, what happened was I was, I went from Canada AM.

They laid off 10% seats. They. Let me be a little more clear. CTV laid off about 10% of its workforce after the first Gulf War. So April of 91, right? Which, by the way, Storm and Norman Swartzkopf.

That's right. I did not rip off the name. Someone, if you want to, because even the guy, what's his name, McKee, was the first media critic, not the because even the guy what's the name mckee was the first media critic not the first the media critic for the toronto star when i started the fan 92 he actually phoned me it's like how did you get the name storm and norman because everyone's now you ripped that

off from schwartzkopf now i'm not saying he said it but he wanted to know so i said well if you want to verify what i'm saying is true speak to my buddy from summer camp days steve greenberg he's from columbus ohio and he gave me the name Ohio. And he gave me the name Storm. Why did he give me the name Storm and Norman? Because when I was at that time, 18, I was training or starting to train in martial arts. Eventually went on to the best club, I got to say it, the best martial arts club in the GTA, Twin Dragon Kickboxing and kung fu i trained with them for about three years i love those guys mick and martin mcnamara but anyway i i've developed some really solid abs so i let my buddy steve greenberg who was built like a

middle linebacker i let him and his friends punch me in the gut as hard as they wanted to without i mean i wouldn't let them punch me in the ribs but but just in the gut, on my six-pack, right? And they couldn't move me. I let them wind up. So because I was a bit of a hot dog or a lot of a hot dog, my buddy Steve Greenberg started calling me Stormin'. I mean, as it turns out, everybody who's played pro sports with the first name Norman, if you want to talk like the basketball player Van Leer, gets the name Stormin' Norman. And even on the Raptor games now, obviously, you know, Leo Routens. Stormin' Norman Powell?

Yeah, Rod Black and Leo Routens. I think they give me a little nudge when they use that for him. But go ahead. Yeah, it's great. But anyway, no, I didn't rip it off from Schwarzkopf. I honestly got it through friends, and that was when I was 18. So the name stuck, as you would expect. It's kind of like pizza pizza, Stormin' Norman, right?

I love it. It has a ring to it. So it stuck, and that's why I used that name. But yeah, the guy in the star actually phoned Steve Greenberg to verify the story and make sure I wasn't lying.

See, I'm surprised he actually did that because I would think that's a common nickname for a Norman. Well, because his column, I mean, damn, I wish I could remember his name

because I thought it was McKee, media critic, sports media critic for the Toronto Star around 92, 93. Was it Ken McKee? I'm probably going to be embarrassed if I find out it's not quite right. But anyway, he wrote his column on that particular occasion, well, so who is Storm and Norman, right? And so part of the conversation was, you know, how did you get that name, that nickname? And I told him, and he phoned Steve Greenberg, who's working in Columbus.

He was from Columbus. And we go back to summer camp days. So he verified the story. So it is true. So there. Sam McKee. Is it Sam McKee? No.

No, it's not Sam McKee. Okay, well, anyway, he was the sports media critic for the Toronto Star- I can't remember before Chris Elkovich, but okay. Well, this, yeah, I'd say he was there for probably five, six, seven years around. Dave McKee? No, I thought it was Ken, but I'm... Ken McKee. I can remember what he looks like.

It is now. Anyway, yeah. Okay, so they laid off people at the end of the Gulf War. Yeah, so they laid off in April of 91, the end of the Gulf War. Well, I got hired within a couple months, starting July 91, to work at CFRB 1010, or News Talk 1010, producing talk shows, evening talk shows.

So it was quite a star-studded list. Ed Needham, Larry Solway, Charles Adler. And on the weekends, I would produce Ted Wallachian, who did a Saturday and Sunday night or Saturday night show. And so, you know, that's where I really learned the essence because there's no... I don't think... I may be wrong be wrong back then there was no school who taught talk radio i mean even the school i went to which is one of the best in the world and it is true syracuse university back then talk radio was still there was only a handful of people who'd done it and so i would you know as producer i'd line up the guests and then screen the calls so i learned basically from watching these guys and from the consultants they used at 1010

about what made those shows work. And it was great. I got paid to learn how to do talk radio. And then again, certainly one of the essentials I learned from the consultants about creating that love-hate relationship. You want to hear about one of the best

moments I ever was witnessed to in radio? Of course. Okay, so I'm producing. I was actually not so much producing. It was call screening for Ed Needham. He didn't have guests. He just took calls. Here's how successful he was. He would come into the studio before the show even started,

like right after the news update. The lines were all jammed before he even set foot, before he said a word. They would bring him in for the ratings periods because he was like a magnet. Wow. I think he was a former war correspondent or photography correspondent during the Vietnam War. So anyway, now this guy was strict. Even before I found out he served in the military, he had military-like rules, which I think were good. But I found out some other people have been dismissed.

Why? Because if you're producing or call screening, you're on the other side of the glass looking at the host, right? rules, which I think were good. But I found out some other people have been dismissed. Why? Because if you're producing or call screening, you're on the other side of the glass looking at the host, right? That's just the way the studios are set up. If you ever took your, he told me too, just before I started, if you ever take your eyes off him and start watching TV instead of watching him, because he may signal, you know, get rid of a call or whatever he wants to communicate to you, you'd be fired right away. You'd be fired right away if you ever took your eyes off him.

Secondly, he had some other rules. No calls on the Middle East, no calls on that horrible conflict in Bosnia and Serbia, Croatia, if you remember from the mid-'90s, horrible, like every war was horrible. So at the time, no calls on, this was in the early-' 90s before it took on another war, but in any case,

no calls on those two areas of conflict and no calls on abortion. So that was the ground rules. Why? Because he found what would happen is one side would call, then the other side, and then the other side, and it just never ends. And no one's going to change their minds on that one. No, and it never ends.

So it's just like, you know, it doesn't... It just becomes frustrating rather than entertaining. So other than that, though, he'd take calls, and the moment that stays with me the most of producing or call screening for Ed Needham, some gal, gal, some older lady, just judging by her voice, calls in, and she is tearing him a strip up, down, left, right, center,

and so I'm figuring, and this is going on for, he's letting her go and go and go. It's probably about three, four minutes. And now this was genius. I wish I had used it, but I, I never heard it before. Never heard it again. He let her go until she ran out of breath. I'm saying like, is there, she'd run a marathon, let her go until she couldn't come breath. Like, is there she'd run a marathon? Let her go until she couldn't come up with any more words.

She was exhausted. And you're just like, oh, boy, is he ever going to go nuts now, right? And what does he do? It's about three seconds. She has nothing more to say. She's tired. He waits about three seconds, says, you're listening to CFRB 1010 Toronto. And I thought, wow, you talk about a curveball.

It was magnificent. It was mad because anybody familiar with his show was expecting him to just like go nuts on her with a retaliatory comment. Said nothing, just went to break. Brilliant. Just brilliant. So you learned a great deal about talk radio from CFRB. Larry Solway, I grew up listening to as a kid, you know, because I'm almost 62. He did the talk shows on 1050 Chum in the evenings. You know, for a time, they went to talk shows.

And, you know, his shtick, which as a little kid, as a preteen, I thought was hilarious. I used to listen like a lot of folks did because he would hang up on kids and he would hang up on old ladies. And like the kids called in, they somehow got through. He says like, it's past your bedtime. Goodbye. You know, and he, I sort of learned, or that's who I kind of looked up to in terms of hanging up on people because it was just sheer entertainment.

People used to listen to Larry to hear him hang up and go nuts on people, which is what I did. But I didn't hang up on kids. The one thing I'll say is I let people argue with me. I didn't cut them short. They had their say, and I thought they were entertaining. I'd try and milk it for all it's worth. I don't really care if they're cutting me up as long as it was entertaining.

So why do you leave CFRB for the fan? Well, because what happened was a colleague who was working at CFRB, Brett Coppin, was a news reporter. He knew I was a sports junkie, so he tells me, it was like June or July, hey, a buddy of mine, Alan Davis, tells me they're at 1430, which back then was Music of Your Life.

Music of Your Life, yeah. He said, hey, a good buddy of mine, Alan Davis, he's the program director at 1430. Do you know, Norm, they're going to be going all sports next fall? I said, no, I didn't know. Well, why don't you go over and, you know, you're a sports guy, why don't you make an appointment, go talk to him, tell him I sent you. So I left the message for Alan Davis and yeah, Brent Koppens said I should give you a call. I go in for an interview and I thought, yeah, you know, maybe, maybe give me a chance to go on the air, but

if not, I've got a great producing background, right? From CTV News and CFRB 1010. Right. And then I brought in a demo tape. Ted Wallachian, when he was doing a Saturday night show, let me go on air with him. You know, we were playing 60s. Yeah.

I did a segment with him on a Saturday night protest music of the 1960s. You know, like Phil Oakes, Peter Palmer, like the whole long list of, you know, that genre. And so I actually had a cassette demo tape of me on the air. So I brought it in. I played it for Alan. And he said, well, you know, I said, I'd love to go on the air. And he hired me as on air.

It shocked me. Wow. And even Bob McCowan, who I used to line up as a guest on Canada AM, like not in Oakland, but I mean, just as a studio guest, it'd be him, Stephen Brunt, the late Jim Hunt, be like a rotation of three or four guys. Bob was one of them. So even Bob thought, oh, he was going to be hired as a producer because he knew me from

Bob. Actually, I'll tell you another story. It was quite nice to meet him before I worked at the fan. But yeah, so quite to my surprise, I got hired to go on air. I was going to, I remember there was a quote in the paper the day the fan lodged, September 4th or 5th of 92, that Norm Rumack and Jim Richards were like a late-night experiment. That's how we were written up, which was true, I guess.

But I was so thrilled I was going to get an opportunity to go on the air. So, again, I went back to that's how I ended up at the fan. I went for the interview, and Alan Davis liked, I guess, the way I sound and what I had to say. And that interview process started in July of 92 and did about two or three more interviews, and then Alan hired me towards the end of August, and that's how I became one of the day-oners at the fan

and there for 17 years, and then Don Collins brought me back for another two years in 2011. Do you remember the other day-oners? Oh, sure. Can I hear the names? Yeah. I mean, you were Rich's and Rumak. What was your time slot? 11 p.m. to 2 a.m., but we did way more than that. A lot of people, I mean, because you have to listen

around the clock. Anyway, to get us experience was a brilliant idea by Alan Davis, so we get a little more seasoning. We'd go on Monday to Friday 11 a.m. to 2, sorry, 11 p.m. to 2 a.m. following Jay's talk or Leafs talk, but back in September it was Jay's talk.

Scott Ferguson, was he doing it? Yeah, Scott Ferguson. I'll give you all the list. In terms of what the game plan was. So we'd come back on at 5 a.m. to do a little tee-up for the morning show. So we'd be recapping scores and headlines and putting in sound bites, et cetera, et cetera.

And then on weekends, now weekends was the, that was like boot camp. Because so Friday we go to 2 a.m. Then we're back on at 5 a.m. till 9 a.m. Saturday morning. Same thing, then Saturday overnight, 11 p.m. to 2 a.m. Back on Sunday morning, 5 a.m. to 2 a.m. back on Sunday morning 5 a.m. to 8 a.m.

so there was no sleep Saturday and Sunday night right go home to sleep during the afternoon Saturday and Sunday and certainly Saturday I'd be back on later in the evening again so it was like a marathon on Saturdays and to some extent on Sundays and then Monday to Friday be 11 p.m. to 11 p.m. to 2 a.m. again and but that's how Jim and I had some fun because we had this we have because we had to come back on at five we had to put together this like little update leading it to the the big sports up there to the morning show so we would do that's when we work on these promos. Now that, I must give credit where credit is due. Jim was a genius when it came to creativity. So we'd try and find some fun ways to promote our show

because they would play these promos. And even the guys at the station were like pissing in their pants, laughing at some of them. So the funniest one, from my perspective, and I know Jim will remember this, we called, courtesy of the fan, they paid for it, one of those 1-800 sex phone lines. Sure. Of course. They charge you by the minute, right?

Pre-internet. That was really important stuff. Of course it was. So we call and we, but of course, being, you know, being clean cut straight shooters as we were, we didn't call her to have a sexual dialogue. We wanted her NFL picks. Oh, yeah. So she evidently became quite clear she wasn't really a big follower of the National Football League. She had the voice, though, to sound like a sex phone dialogue expert. So we, you know, so it'd be like, OK, so who's going to win between, you know, what do you think the score will be between the Rams and the Chargers?

And so she would ask, well, what color jerseys do they wear? So she would pick by the color of the team. And to cap it off, like I say, she had the voice. She put on the sexy voice when she was talking with us. And then in the post-production, Jim would put on, you know, kind of like that music, the burlesque sound, the stripper music. I'm not talking about Metallica. Metallica is the real

stripper music at the nightclubs, and I know that from being sponsored by those people. Yeah, Metallica and Motley Crue. That's right. So anyway, there was a bed of music, pardon the pun, there was a bed, that's what we call it in the industry. There was a music bed with that kind of, you know... Yeah, the burlesque stripper music. Yeah, the burlesque stripper music with this gal giving us her NFL

picks. So we did stuff like that. It was fun. There was only back then, in the Young-Eglinton area, because the fan was on Holly Street, one place where you can go at night to get a coffee. There wasn't that Tim's up at Young and Broadway. Even the Golden Griddle at Mount Pleasant-Eglinton, I don't think they were all night at that stage.

So there was one place, and we'd go in there to get a drink. I can't even remember the name of the place. It was an independent. And for some reason the lady didn't like us. She used to give us dirty looks, but we were giving her business. So Jim and I would go in there and we would kind of quickly leave. But that was the only thing you could do at night.

So we'd just do these crazy promos and prepare the 5 a.m. to 5.30 update that we did. Oh, that's good. And then eventually, Alan let us go into doing our own individual shows about three months later. All right, now I want to hear the opening lineup, the initial fan club night in Atlanta. So the morning show was Mike Inglis, Joe Bowen, Stephanie Smythe. Ten points, right?

Did you get a list? I didn't know I was getting a prize for this. Maybe like a second beer? I'm trusting your memory on this one. From Brian Gerstein. Brian, I hope you don't mind. I had to plug my brother, Marty, so I'm giving you an extra plug. Brian Gerstein, sales representative, Midtown Office.

Call him for all your real estate needs. And Brian, thank you for the beers. I just thought I'd interrupt with that. Okay, so Brian, we've got to go back to the lineup, the Fan 590 lineup. Okay, Stephanie, just as you go, I'll tell you if they've actually been here in this studio. So Stephanie Smythe has been in this studio. Okay, cool. Joe Bowen, I assume.

Not yet, no. Not yet? Not yet. He's on my hit list. Mike Inglis, of course, for a long time now has been the play by play voice of the Miami Heat great guy really good guy he did very well for himself he's been there a long time

always with a nice greeting I got along with all those folks including Stephanie Stephanie I haven't seen in a long time but I did bump into her on one occasion so then now that 10am slot changed quite a bit but some of the fellas who had been on there would include Steve Simmons. He's been on the show?

Yeah, Steve's a great guy. Steve's a great guy, and he was working with Mary Ormsby. I'm sure the best soundbite ever, even bigger than some of the boo-boos I had. You must have heard this one. Tell me. Remind me. Okay, so Steve Simmons working with Mary Ormsby. I'm trying to remember. He was talking about maybe

Pat Burns, God rest his soul. Somebody else who had big hair. Somehow they're talking about somebody using a blow dryer on their hair. Steve, he's a straight shooter, right? He accidentally said that so-and-so, you know, Steve is a straight shooter, right? He accidentally said that so-and-so,

whichever person, maybe it was Pat Burns, but whoever it was, you know, so-and-so, you know, they did it. They got a nice blow job. Barry Horsby is just rolling over, killing herself laughing. Maybe Barry Davis has that clip too. Oh, Barry must have.

If you had one all-time blooper from the fan, and even Steve was like pissing in his pants laughing on the air. He couldn't stop laughing. They had to go to a break. They were laughing so hard. Simmons and Ormsby. Simmons and Ormsby. And then, I may be missing something,

but Dan Shulman moved around a different, I think initially he may have started at 12 or 1, but his show was the lead into primetime. And so actually, Dan was a sweetheart. He really went out of his way to promote my show. What he would do is, for example, about 3 o'clock would be the top, I don't know, the top 3 at 3 or the top, something like that. You know, just like could be any segment from any part of the fan 24-hour cycle. And he would put as people would, you know, people could call in and vote for which they wanted to replay.

And usually one of them would include one of my zany, outrageous phone calls, you know, like a heated conversation or a yelling match, whatever it was. And he would quite often play them. It was great. It was great to get promoted at three in the afternoon with Dan Shulman. He was amongst guys in broadcasting. You'd be hard to put it. There's a lot of nice people. You'd be hard-pressed to meet someone nicer than Dan Shulman.

I hear this. A lot of people talk about how nice he is. Always like, you know, some people, you know, you see them. I guess they're well-intended. They'll say, hi, how are you? But they're halfway down the street before you even answer the question. Right. Dan actually, like, looks you in the eye, pays attention,

and actually, you know, he genuinely cared about other people. Another guy on my hit list. I need Dan Schulman in this studio. Yeah. Well, he's, like I say, always, doesn't matter if you haven't seen him for 10 years, he's always a gentleman, a nice fella, and he was always nice to Jim and I and always went out of his way. You know, that doesn't always happen in radio.

There's rivalries, so people won't always promote someone else's show because, you know, they kind of maybe feel threatened by it, but Dan Schulman always did. I love the guy for that. Excellent. Oh, yeah, and then, of course, I don't know what to say, Bob McCown.

Now, Bob did some different time slots. Remember, he did the Breakfast Flakes with Barb DiGiulio for a time? Yeah. I don't think he was really crazy about doing morning radio. But obviously, I mean, he did it, right? Because they asked him to. So they did that show. I don't know how long the Breakfast Flakes lasted.

But eventually, of course, Bob was back doing primetime. And that's where he got started. And that's where he still is. Was it Jim Shakey Hunt? Was that his initial co-host? Well, for a long time, yeah. Jim was the co-host. I mentioned he was one of the guys that used to book on Canada AM, and I loved listening to those two together.

I think they had a wonderful chemistry. And, you know, Shakey had all these great stories, and some of them, you know, he didn't care about being politically correct. No. He would, you know, say didn't care about being politically correct. No. He would, you know, say stuff that only he could get away with. But he was always nice to deal with. And I mentioned I met Bob, or I knew Bob, from booking him on Canada AM as one of the sports guests.

So when I got laid off from Canada AM, I mentioned 10% of the workforce from CTV News got laid off after the first Gulf War in April of 91 so I phoned Bob, I told him I was putting together a video demo reel to see if I can get hired somewhere as a reporter and you know, people don't know this side of Bob, but he invited me over at the time he was living on Sudan Avenue, which is

a block away from the fan at Young and Holly Street and he invited me over to his house and he took a look at my video. You know, he just gave me some ideas. But, yeah, he had me over to his place, and we talked for about an hour. And that was, you know, that was 91. It was like a year before. Who would have known that I got hired to work at the fan?

But, yeah, Bob was always very nice to me. Well, it's good to hear that his curmudgeon shtick is just shtick. That's just for entertainment purposes. Yeah, it's just like my shtick was shtick. I mean, you know, when you talk to him in person, he's just a straight shooter. I mean, he doesn't mince his words. If he has something to say, he's going to say it.

But, you know, when he's away from the microphone, he's just like talking to a regular guy. You mentioned Barb DiGiulio. So I need to point out that Barb has been on this show as well. But I asked her the same question. Remind me who was their opening date. She drew a big blank. You know what? My mistake.

My mistake. I admit my mistake. Mike Hogan was a day one guy, but Mike also moved around into different time slots. Now, I think Mike may have... He did a couple. I know for sure for a time he was doing early evenings when there was no Jays or Leafs game on that particular time. But he also, I believe, I just can't remember when he started doing late mornings

because he had that for a while. You might remember for one year they brought in, as they called her, the fabulous sports bait. I do remember this. I don't know if it even lasted a year. And then they brought Mike back. But yeah, Mike worked in different time slots. And again, he became like a little bit of the anti-leaf.

But not in a mean way, but just he didn't want to be the homer guy, right? And he was a fan of the Whalers. I remember that, yes. Of all the teams. I'm scared. And back then, I had names for all the teams not named Toronto, nicknames, not named Toronto Maple Leafs. So just because he would give me the gears about the Leafs, so I would give him the gears about Hartford. So I used to call them the Hartford Failures.

That's a good name. It's a good name. Yeah, I had names for every other club, as you know, so I could go through them. But anyway, I gave you a 10-minute answer to a 30-second question. No, that's great. I have a Twitter question from Steve Leggett. Oh, yeah, and Jim Richards, by the way, aside from working with me,

he would do different shifts, and he had that unbelievably great Saturday morning show. It was funny as hell. Was that the game? Well, game? No, game was... What was game? Game came on Saturday at 1 a.m.

That was with George Strombolopoulos. There was a whole bunch of young guys who were just starting out then. Yeah, Merrick was. Yeah, Jeff Merrick was on that. Another guy, Laurie Honigman. I don't know what became of him. But, you know, just a bunch of guys who were friends. But, yeah, and then he had a gal with an English accent who was part of it

who introduced it. And, you know, with the English accent, it was game. But anyway, yeah, they did that at 1 a.m. after was done or spider sorry i forgot to mention spider how can i forget spider spider jones yeah that's right uh i had a i had a right and of course that's where george got started strombo because he was opting spider show he would opt other things too and but he helped spider a lot yeah and uh yeah spider and i got along great along great. He would do the opposite from me. I would hang up on people and he would do his

initiation, right? Anyway, he was... He had a great fall and we had a lot of fun working together. Oh, so Steve Leggett on Twitter says, I think he worked for Roger Lejoie in the souvenir store at the Gardens. Is there a story with that?

Well, what happened was I actually was a, Roger was the business manager of the Marlboros, so I went in there wanting to volunteer just to strengthen my contacts in sports in 86. So Roger was the business manager. I got hired, or you want to say I got hired. I was a volunteer with the Marlboros, he's right, but I was a volunteer from 86

until Harold got rid of them in 89. So I spent a lot of time. I mean, I volunteered a lot of time. Every weekend during the junior hockey season, or almost every weekend, when I wasn't tied up with something work-related, I would be down there at Marley home games just helping out. I mean, I did all the Joe jobs. I would get

the coffee, the donuts, photocopy, like all the ultimate Joe jobs. But I liked it. I loved hanging out down there. Of course, they'd let me come in to see some of the Leaf games, you donuts, photocopy, like all the ultimate Joe jobs. But I liked it. I loved hanging out down there. Of course, they'd let me come in to see some of the Leaf games, you know, because I had a building pass. And it was great. You know, I got to know some of the people like Frank Bonello and Jim Gregory and George Armstrong, who was scouting for the Maple Leafs back then. So I made a lot of great connections, which paid off later on. And it was just a lot of fun more than anything. And Roger and I have been great friends ever

since, since 86. And we're still great friends now. Roger, I can't remember what number it was, but he had some 3,000th show or something. That's right. I joined him on that. Oh, yeah, yeah. Because he was here just before that. That's right. And yeah, so I brought Roger in first as a guest over the phone. Remember, I brought him on. It was early, a few months into my shift on the air. I put him on like on a 5 a.m. phone interview like in the middle of the week when we were doing that 5 to 5.30 slot.

And then eventually, you know, he became more frequent. And then, you know, I brought him in. After Marty York worked with me for a time, uh, and then there was, uh, Marty was, uh, was no longer there. So Nelson Millman just said, okay, you go ahead and pick whoever you want as your cohost. And because I'd known Roger, he'd been a guest on the show and we were friends. So I picked him to be my cohost and that was around 99 or 2000. And you guys had a, uh, a had a show, was it on Rogers cable?

Yeah, it was called The Home Team for one year. And I think at the time there was a little bit of maybe some bad feeling because we weren't owned by Rogers then, or the fan wasn't. It was owned by Telemedia. But eventually they sold it to Rogers. So they eventually wanted us on The Home Team to put on some Rogers people, which we did as guests. But yeah, I was able to, I used all my connections.

You know, our first guest was Don Cherry. Get out of here. Don came in a limo to the Rogers Cable 10, Community 10 channel studios at York Mills and Leslie. He came in a limo and he was our very first guest. He came in studio. And then, you know, I was able to go down to the um you know the gardens uh because they're still playing there and get interviews with some like top drawer guys i mean i remember i had an interview with joe sackick so we'd go down with a camera yeah um you know down to the

ballpark we had some really good guests but uh certainly don don cherry was right at the top and i remember all the volunteers rogers was just like lining up get his autographs and one of them yeah roger and i had a lot of fun doing that show on the Community 10 channel. Sadly, like yesterday, I was reading a whole bunch of Cable 10 outlets, like the one in Mississauga, the one in Durham region, shut their doors. Oh, I didn't know that. So they don't do their volunteering anymore. Right. And I was thinking of the guests I've had that cut their teeth.

Like so many people, be it Ed the Sock or Mike Wilner, or you name it, these guys, they put in their reps doing Cable 10. Yeah, that's how you learn how to work all the equipment. I'm sorry to hear that. I wasn't aware of that. It's unfortunate. I don't think it's all of them, but I definitely read about the Mississauga one shutting their doors, and then

somebody mentioned Durham region as well. There's a whole bunch that shut down yesterday. I'm sad to hear about that because that was a great vehicle for folks to get a career started, Somebody mentioned Durham region as well. So there's a whole bunch that shut down yesterday. Wow. Yeah, I know. I'm sad to hear about that. It is sad to hear. Because that was a great vehicle for folks to get a career started, whether, you know, behind the scenes or on the air. Even people like you here, like Kate Burness,

when she wanted to get her, she was behind the scenes at Sportsnet. I think it was Sportsnet. And she needed experience in front of a camera. Well, she did stuff for Cable 10, and that's, you know, for years. That's how a lot of folks got started. And obviously she's developed a heck of a camera. Well, she did stuff for Cable 10 and that's, you know, for years. That's how a lot of folks got started. Obviously, she's developed a heck of a career. She's all over TSN now, yeah. Hey, so I remember the Hammerhead alerts.

We talked about that. I remember your love of Wendell Clark. I'm wearing the t-shirt right now. I remember the Motor City Dead thing. Do you want to know how the t-shirt thing started? Tell me, and tell me why you have none for me. I would love a Hammerhead t-shirt. you know what mike i don't even have one for god's sakes i gave them all away okay i do not have a hammerhead alert shirt at home i do not

i seriously do not now part of the thing was you know it was brian green his company was plain and simple he would give me the shirt so i would give him promotion uh you know as part of that so it was a nice little exchange and so the way the the shirt thing got started was brian green and rob mcdougall who was the sketch artist for the sports section of toronto sun were hearing me you know doing my yelling at callers thing yeah and they faxed in this is 95 faxed in a sketch of what i was talking about meaning a character yelling over the phone but they rob drew up the character like so it looked like a guy with a snout nose and prongs. So it looked like a hammer. So it was like a person's head, but with a hammer on the front and the two prongs in the back, right?

And then yelling hammer and alert. So they sent the fax and they offered, hey, would you like this on a shirt? And it won't charge anything. I said, sure. Anyway, long and short of it was so that was around 94 yeah it's about 94 95 spring of 95 i'm at some charity function was children's wish and who do i meet for the first time i knew he was but i met for the first time paul molliter so he says oh you're the voice behind that or you're the face behind that voice well Well, we developed quite a good rapport, and baseball started a little bit late in 95 because of the strike.

I think it started a month later. Anyway, I gave him these shirts and said, hey, you never know, why don't you wear this shirt? Maybe it'll bring you some luck. Well, honest, this is gospel truth. Paul Mulder came up to me like a month or two later, said he wore the hammerhead shirt under his uniform at a double header in kansas city and went 8 for 8 at the plate so i kept wearing it now

you know how superstitious jocks are right yeah so i told that story to every other athlete i met i mean every other one i got photos like a mile long like the other one who helped me a lot i wouldn't say we're buddies now because i i don't really see him anymore but the other guy went out of his way to take a photo for me. Wearing the shirt and holding up was Allen Iverson. Oh, nice. So I got a whole bunch of... We're talking practice, Norm.

Yeah, we're talking practice. Practice, exactly. I don't know if he gave one to Coach Larry. Did he wear it during practice is what I want to know. No, but he made the rest of the media wait until I could get a photograph of him wearing the shirt before he would do the one-on-one interviews with the rest. I'm sure the rest of the media were pissed off, but whatever. I'm glad you mentioned Paul Mulliter real quick.

I remember him for being the Blue Jay who didn't leave the minute the season ended. No, he was one of the... I think he's about... In terms of Americans or guys who aren't Canadian-born, playing for the Blue Jays, I think he's the only one that resided in Toronto for a whole year. And he did that for about two or... Well, he was here for about three years. I think he's the only one that resided in Toronto for a whole year.

And he did that for about two or, well, he was here for about three years. I think he definitely, I know he definitely resided in Toronto because he had a home up around Bayview and his daughter was going to school in Toronto. So, yeah, he lived full time in Toronto and one of the nicest guys I ever met. And, you know, twice when I was doing this show called The Players, it was a documentary. I don't know if you remember that it was around 95. They were documentary type interviews. I had some really, really heavy stuff in there. Like, you know, Dwight Gooden talking about how addicted he was to alcohol and drugs and how he missed his daughter's birthday because he was so hung over. And anyway, but Paul Moller came down to the studio, not over the phone, came down to the studio twice to do these one-hour interviews with me on that show, The Players.

I still have those shows on CD. I'm so glad you're telling me a positive story about Paul Molitor because you mentioned you worked with Marty York for a while. Yeah. He came on my show and told a horrible story about Paul Molitor. Well, I mean, look, Marty can have his opinion, but Marty, I think, had some, you know, I mean, I don't know. Let me ask you this then. He had a different perspective on working with players or talking with them, and some he liked and some he didn't.

But, no, and, you know, the players knew I was not doing the typical, you know, well, tell us about your game type thing. I was the guy who was trying to do something. You know who does stuff like a little bit differently in that same vein, but it's not radio, but TV, but Cabby. Yeah. Cabby, like the players like talking because he's not going to give them, well, you know,

well, did you give 150% last night? And, you know, how about that bad hit? You know what I'm saying? Yeah. So, but I was doing this. So the players were a little more relaxed. So the personality comes out more. Well, the players are a little more relaxed around me because I wasn't going to ask them what they usually get. I was going to so the players were a little more relaxed. So the personality comes out more. Well, the players were a little more relaxed around me

because I wasn't going to ask them what they usually get. I was going to talk about other things. So that's why I did these documentary-type interviews on the players. I had Joe Carter talking about the Oklahoma City bombing because his parents had a gas station there. So we spent the whole time talking about his religious devotion. He's a devout Christian. And his whole thoughts, and he's very, very articulate.

He gave me a great interview stemming out of the Oklahoma City bombing in 95. That's real talk. That's great. Chris on Twitter, this is tied to that Marty York statement, but he wants to know what you think about what's happened to Marty York. It used to be a big part of your show, and now it's considered, and this is his words, Chris,

I'm just reading it, considered a joke by most. Are you aware of the heel turn that Marty York has taken, to borrow a wrestling term? Well, I haven't seen much of him. I mean, he's been on the show, and we had a great conversation, but on Twitter particularly, he just seems to be unnecessarily negative towards any fans of the Blue Jays, for example. Well, you know, I haven't followed him on Twitter.

I bumped into Marty at a Leaf game about two, three years ago, but I haven't really kept in touch. And, you know, I know he's, you know, there's some people he hasn't seen eye to eye with that he had tough relationships with. And I guess that's his style. And I thought when I first, you know, brought him into work with me that maybe our contrasting styles, I was the homer

and he was quite the opposite in terms of his attitude. Yeah, it is an interesting dynamic. Yeah, and I thought it was good radio, but eventually there were some things I can't say. There were some conflicts with other people at the station, and it's not my business to kind of tell. No, it's not your story to tell. But yeah, so he ran into some conflicts and eventually he was released. And so that's where I ended up.

If people want to go back to the Marty York interview, I think we do talk about this. I was aware that he'd been through some jobs and I'm not really sure what he's doing now. But I mean, I'm aware of what the fellow you're... Chris. Chris said on Twitter. Sorry about that, Chris.

But I haven't really kept in touch with Marty and I haven't seen him probably in about three years now. So, unfortunate. I hope he can get things turned around. But yes, I've heard that from other folks as well. Elias on Twitter says

he wants to know, are you the one who first brought Leo Roudens to the Toronto media? Because he first heard Leo on your show. I did. And the connection, you know how that happened? You might remember I used to bring on my professor from Syracuse University, Dr. Rick Roosevelt Wright Jr.

I would do these specials on Dr. Martin Luther King Day about racism in sports. I'm proud of that because I don't think anybody did it before. I don't think anyone's done it after. So every year on, was it January 21st, 22nd, on Dr. Martin Luther King Day, I would have Dr. Wright on. He was the one who taught me radio, TV, announcing at Syracuse. He's now retired. But he basically said, hey, why don't you put Leo on your show?

Because I met Leo at Syracuse when I was a student there, but just like in the hallway, hi, how are you? Because we're both from Toronto. And then he put me in touch with Leo and said, why don't you put him on your show? Do some basketball. And Leo, I must say, he's always helped me out, but even now he gives me credit for, not for his career, obviously. I'd be not like that. But just because I used

to have him on my show, he needed a little bit of experience in terms of just getting used to doing radio and talking for long periods. I would put him on, seriously, 92, 93. We would do hour and a half NBA previews. Hour and a half. And it was great. I would just, because obviously I was kind of novice in my basketball knowledge back then. And I could ask him anything.

We would talk about every team, every player. And he would give me an encyclopedic-like answer. So Leo did kind of get his feet wet. But to be fair, he was eventually doing analysis of NCAA games, I think, on radio and TV, you know, stateside. He was doing some, I'm sure, for Syracuse because, you know, that's where he lived, you know, his kids and his wife.

So he still has a residence in Syracuse, and, you know, I think he drops in and keeps in touch, obviously, with Coach Boeheim and Mike Hopkins. The assistant will probably take over from Jim when Jim retires. But, yeah, I did. I did. I think I was the first one to put Leo on as a regular guest and do these long, long previews and analysis of NBA games. And back then, there was no rules on how long we could go. I could keep a guest as long as I wanted.

And that went on for several years. It just, they let me do my thing. Those are my rules. Yeah. If I want a guest for an hour, I kept them for an hour. But now they, I think they've changed. Now they go by strict clocks. Very structured.

All very structured. Yeah. So, I mean, occasionally, well, I'll put it this way. I'm sure Bob also keeps guests for as long as he wants to. You know, that's just the way it goes. Right. Right. But yeah, Leo's just the way it goes, right? Right. But yeah, Leo did, I think I can fairly say,

and he's always been nice to me ever since. I want an interview. He'll get it done. And when I'm down in Syracuse, he'll come see me when I'm visiting the campus. But yeah, he did get started, as far as I know, by doing regular hits with me. Leo, I've had interaction with Leo Roudens because my son played for a Lithuanian basketball team.

My son's not, we're not Lithuanian, but he was on this Lithuanian basketball team. And that's his heritage, yeah. Yes, and his son was playing as well. And we'd see each other at the... No. He's got three boys. Yeah, the youngest, I believe.

Okay. I knew Andy because Andy played college ball with the Cougs also. Sure, I remember. He was great, yeah. Yeah, and now he's playing in Turkey, professional basketball. Okay. Spent one year with the New York N also. Sure, I remember. He was great, yeah. Yeah, now he's playing in Turkey, professional basketball. Okay. Spent one year with the New York Knicks.

Well, he had the, was it the ACL? What is it that he had? He was having a very promising season, I think, at Syracuse when he had an injury, right? Yeah, he did. I can't remember the nature. Blew an ACL or something terrible like that. Yeah, and he was a pretty popular player, and he had himself a good run. I know they were in the tournament and probably at least a Sweet 16. And then, like I say, he did

spend one year on the New York Knicks roster, but then eventually, and since, has been playing, as far as I know, he's still playing professional basketball in Turkey and from what Leo tells me, not far from the Syrian border. But anyway, he's, you know, he's making a living, or a good living, and

so I wish him the best of luck. Good guy, too, just like his dad. Good, good. I will be rapid-firing now because we only have 15 minutes before my hard stop here, so we've got some more stuff to get to. So, DartGuyNation, that's a great handle. DartGuyNation wants to know how much time you spent at the

Rippers. Oh, the Rippers. That's a great question. I love that question. Okay, so here's what happened. Some friends of mine introduced me to one of the guys who was, you know, like a partner or like was in the family of the folks who owned at the time, in 98, the Whiskey A Go-Go. A Go-Go. A Go-Go.

Remember the ad? Yeah. Jackie Delaney did this. I'll tell you the story about the Ripper joints. But anyways, the best, the funniest ad ever was a an ad for the whiskey a go-go so they have the the boombox voice guy you know the whiskey a go-go and then you know the echo sound i'll go go i'll go go and they have jackie delaney and it was just a very simple very simple tagline but funny as hell. So she would say, come see Norm

and all of his friends! But Jackie did it so well. Anyway, but the Whiskey A Go-Go, I knew, I'll just say Mario, his brother was the owner of the club, and so Mario made the deal, and they wanted me out there,

and the deal was they bought ad time on the fan. And I was paid to go there twice a week on Thursday. And it was Thursday or Friday? Yeah, Thursday and Friday night. Tough gig, right? But somebody had to do it. Well, yeah. I mean, you're really...

And, you know, it was easy enough because I wasn't married. I'm not married. So there wasn't going to be any kind of, you know, conflicts or whatever. Okay, but that's another discussion. But it's not cheating to go to a strip club. No, it's not. But people were kind of like,

because I think other guys at the fan wouldn't have been comfortable. Oh, I guess it depends on your way. Exactly. So it was easy for me because there was not going to be any potential problems. So I would get paid to go there. And all I had to do was I'd voice their ads on the fan,

and I would go on the mic once an hour for five minutes, talk a little sports. I would give... Now, this was funny. Yeah. You can do the visuals. I would give the shirts to the girls to give away. And just because this is a family show, I'll just say...

No, it's not a family show. Oh, okay. Well, okay. I'm just saying because this is what happened, okay? So I'm just like being a reporter. You're just reporting show, I'll just say... No, it's not a family show. Oh, okay. Well, okay. I'm just saying because this is what happened, okay? So I'm just like being a reporter. You're just reporting facts. I'm just reporting. If I can say so, the girls, some of them,

would use the shirts like a towel and then throw them over to the... The guys probably liked that. They did. They were screaming their heads off. I can imagine. I'm not generalizing, but the guys who like strip clubs... Because my wife would be fine if I went to a strip club, but I don't have any interest. This can imagine. I'm not generalizing, but the guys who like strip clubs, because my wife would be fine if I went to a strip club, but I don't have any interest.

This is the dilemma I have. The guys who would enjoy a strip club would probably enjoy that. I didn't tell the gals what to do, but I just said, hey, here's the show. So, of course, the feature girls would use them in their routine, you know. Hammer head alert. It's like, okay, the DJ there,

his DJ name was Flipper. It's funny as hell. So he would say, well, I better ask you, am I allowed to use the language? Yeah. Okay. All right. So Flipper would say, all right,

the motherfucker who screams the loudest gets this shirt. So it was funny as hell. I love Flipper. He was one of the best. He could have been a DJ anywhere. I don't know if he's still there, but he's good. Okay, we got to go fast. I'm going to play, by the way.

Oh, by the way, Whiskey A Go-Go was from 98 to 2002, and then the station approached me, the sales rep. What I do the same for a new account was Treasures Gentlemen's Club. So Treasures Gentlemen's Club, I was aligned with them from, let's see, it was the year of the lockout, so 2004-05, the NHL lockout, until 2009 when I left. I got paid to go there one night a week, and the same thing, and the same routine.

It was awesome. So I got paid to hang out with these lovely ladies. Great. I have a clip here of Howard Berger talking about the day he learned you had been let go, I guess, with Nelson Millman. So this is about 40 seconds. Let's hear that and let's talk about how it all came to an end at the fan here. Okay. One of the worst days I ever spent at the radio station was the day that Norm got let go. It was about a year, year and a half before I was let go. So I would say probably sometime in early 2010. And it was also maybe

the worst day of Nelson Millman's career at the radio station. Nelson was my boss for many years. He was the program director and he had to let someone go. And it turned out that after meetings, it was Norm. and I remember in those days you were given memos you know and nowadays everybody sends an email there were memos and everybody's mail slot and you'd pull out the piece of paper it said memorandum on it and I remember Nelson's memo saying we lost a bit of our soul yesterday it's one of the toughest decisions I've ever made in my life let's just carry on and do the best we can Wow yeah so they lost a bit of their soul that day yeah you know someone

someone had told me that with one of the sales guys that you know after I was let go that you know Nelson knew about it maybe a week or a couple weeks ahead and that he was kind of like you know the guy was saying the guy who told me that was you know you can tell he was in a rough and a bad mood and he was going through a lot of seemed to be going through a lot of internal conflict and he knew he had to do this and so it sort of backs up what Howard was saying and you know it's uh uh with um you know I remember Nelson would quietly do things you know like like we like any boss you know, employee or, you know, it's almost like a family thing. You know, we would have areas of disagreement. But I remember if I was really having a hard time or trouble with something, he would go to bat for me.

I mean, one time, you know, the late 90s, we went through some, a few of us had to take some pay cuts. I won't say the other. There's like three or four or five of us, whatever. I remember a time I was struggling financially. But I remember Nelson, when I told him I was struggling, he orchestrated something so I could get find a way, like even on a freelance base, get some more money. So push came to shove. Like I say, it was like family. You know, we would we would have times when we agree, times when we disagree. But push came to shove. He certainly went to the wall for me on a few occasions on some pretty serious stuff.

So I'll always be grateful. But it's nice to hear that. I mean, it's nice to hear that it affected him or that he felt that strongly about me, that he was affected in that way. So it's nice to hear from Howard. Nelson sat in that seat. We spent 90 minutes talking. I am certain of one thing, which is that Nelson Millman was,

he enjoyed coaching people and hated, despised having to let anybody go. And, you know, this was not, yeah, he's, you know, we joked about how you have to be sort of a sociopath to enjoy, you know, firings. But Nelson was there to coach, not to release.

And that's the thing. Sometimes program directors, not sometimes, they take marching orders from bosses too. Of course. Sometimes they have to do things they don't like or things that they hate. Oh, by the way, can I mention my podcast? Yeah, definitely, definitely.

Because I want to hear it. So in my last 10 minutes here, I want to hear post-fan. I know about a few things, for example, and I'll run them down and then I want to hear what you're doing. But I remember latenightvampire.com. Yeah, that was, I was doing a blog website for about a year just so I could keep my name out there the year after it got released. So I did that.

That was just to, like for that purpose, just to keep my name out there so it didn't just vanish. You've got to keep the mug using the muscle so you don't lose the muscle. Yeah, I was writing. And actually, you know, the nice part of that story was I didn't know, like, what kind of a writer am I? So get this. Talk about nice guys. Yeah.

God bless them. The late Randy Starkman, Toronto Star. He knew me, and we had a good rapport. I put him on the air. And Dave Feschuk, now, of course, TSN, also the star. Yeah. They both agreed to kind of read my blog and give me some tips. You know, what do you think of it?

Is it well-written? What could I do better? They both, on their own, you know, free time, just read it and said, hey, you know, I mean, basically, they said, you know, it's fine. You know, just like some smallish things, just like, you know, a little less of this,

a little more of that. Yeah. But they did that on their own, just to be nice. Randy Starkman and Dave Fester, just to help me out. So I just wanted to give those guys an extra. Well, I was reading LateNightVampire.com.

You mentioned the return for a brief period. So I guess it was in 2011 where you came back to the fan? Well, it happened. I read an article in the Globe and Mail that Don Collins, who had taken over for Nelson, put some names out to fan listeners. Obviously, they had their website. And I guess you'd be a fan. I don't know what they call it, but you'd subscribe or whatever it was to be an insider

or something like that. Anyway, so the story said that Don put out a few names. The article said big names in Toronto radio just to see how the fans reacted to him. My name was amongst them. Now, I hadn't heard from Don or even met him, but when I read that in the Globe and Mail, I said, well, I'm going to get in touch with him.

Actually, Howard Berger gave me the email. So I sent Don a note and said, hey, I read my name that you were doing some research on. Can I come in and talk with you? So the conversation led to, well, okay, we're hearing that TSN is going to go with an all-sports radio station. So if they do and they're doing late night or overnight radio, we want to have live local then. That was the condition. Well, they did go. And so in April 2011, Don Collins brought me back. And until TSN stopped doing late night local radio, I had about a two-year run. And I must say, one of the things that will always stick out for me,

it's not something you put money on or get money from, but it's one of those experiences that stays with you for life. So when I came back officially, I came back and there was a meeting for all the fan staff, producers and on air in a boardroom. And so I come in there and Don Collins formally reintroduces me as being back at the fan. And I got the equivalent, a corporate equivalent of a standing ovation. Awesome. I mean, that was like, for me, unless you've experienced that, I'm talking about people, some of them I didn't even know,

because I was told there were staff, guys who I wasn't friends with, but were 20 years younger than me, who were really pissed off when I got let go. Like, really pissed off. That memo from Nelson Millman called you the soul of the station. Yeah, well, I didn't know. I mean, I've talked to Howard since, but I didn't know it was quite in that sense that I was referred to that way. I mean, I'm very touched that Nelson would reference me in that way. But hearing that is certainly inspiring now, even now.

But that welcome I got, like I said, like half the people at the fan two years later, there's a lot of them I never even met before. But to get in a corporate boardroom from, let's say, about 20, 25 people, you know, like a lengthy applause was, even Don was a little surprised by it. So I'll never forget that. That was awesome.

That's great. And I'm always going to be grateful for Don for finding a way to bring me back, you know. That's great. And I'm always going to be grateful for Don for finding a way to bring me back. That's great. Norm at Night with Norm Umack was on SiriusXM Canada. Basically, that was an arrangement where I had sponsors, and the sponsors would pay me, and SiriusXM, Joe Thistle, wanted some sports content at night,

so that was the deal. I didn't get paid, but they gave me the studio and a producer, and I had a run there from May 2013 till September 2015. What happened there was, like a lot of radio stations, media outlets now, Sirius XM decided they wanted to trim expenses. Not from me, but the producer I had there, Phil DeLand, they were being paid whatever it was. I shouldn't quote the figure.

Let's say whatever it was, $400 a week as an op, as a technical producer. Well, they decided instead of having live, because there was not just me. Gabe Morenci had a show there. Several other guys did too. They decided they wanted to save that money that they would pay for a technical producer to be there after 9 o'clock at night. So everything that was on from 9 o'clock on got cut in favor of other than reruns. They carry live CFL football. at night. So everything that was on from 9 o'clock on got cut in favor of other than reruns. They carry live CFL football.

But still, I'm just speaking as a guy who likes original content and live content. Anyway. That's what companies like. Yeah. That's disappointing. They trim wherever they can. It was disappointing. Then I started doing some podcasting and I was grateful because my sponsors came with me.

Roger and I were doing some for about a year. He had a site. I think it's still up, but we haven't done it because he's—Roger has 10 jobs. He does have a lot of jobs. He does, including working with that AHL team that's moving to Belleville from Binghamton, the Senators farm team. So he's heavily involved in that, including doing, of course, he sold those fan shifts and scores Blue Jay games as an official score.

So he's not in teaching. But anyway, so I did a podcast with Roger for a while on a weekly basis. It was allothersports.com. And at that time, and then since then, I've been podcasting

with my friend Joe Pasek. It's T-S-P-N, not E, but T like Thomas. So T-S-P-N dot C-, but T like Thomas. So T-S-P-N.ca. We do a podcast several times a week. He has one every day and he covers everything, all the main sports. And he's a big MMA and wrestling follower, knows a lot of the big names. So I've done that for about more than a year now. And also recently I'm working with my first fan producer, Todd Hayes. He's paired up Chris Zelkovich and I, where

we do a weekly. We've done three of them, so we just started really about two months ago. The Canadian Sports Media Podcast. You can find that on SoundCloud. And also my friend Mr. Pasek carries the Canadian Sports Media Podcast. You can also find that at tsbn.ca. But it's the Canadian

Sports Media Podcast. Chris Zeljkovic and I. A different role for me because now I'm acting as like a media analyst. Yeah, you're sort of like the moderator or what would you call yourself? Well, yeah, I'd be the host. I mean, Chris, obviously, that's his area of expertise. He's done it forever and he knows the ratings. And he's very good.

Well, sure. I can't quote ratings. I don't get that kind of information. But Chris knows them and he's been doing it forever. So, I mean, I give my thoughts on whatever station, do you have going right now? Well, now it would be... The Chris Elkovich one is called Canadian Sports Media Podcast. And the other one is just TSPN.ca with Joe Pasek. So that one is almost every day. Now, you know, it depends on my schedule and his.

But basically, and we have a lot of the great guests on TSPN.ca that I used to have with me on the fan. So John Nelson from Georgia, Steve Carney with the flagship for the Tampa Bay Rays. There's a lot of fellas, you know, a lot of fellas from the Toronto area that you've read in the local papers. So anyways, yeah, it's kind of like a traditional radio show, but done on a podcast.

So again, if you... Are you still doing anything with Frank D'Angelo? Not... Because you did some Next Sports Star stuff with him. Yes, I was hosting that. He's cut back to twice a week, so I'd say I'm an occasional guy. I haven't been on in quite a while,

but now he's Tuesdays and Thursdays. And when I do join him, it's over the phone, but I haven't been on in quite a while. But yeah, when he first started that, 2012, I had some different time slots, including 12 to 2. I did with Eric Cohen. And for a while, I was doing 4 to 7.

Just with a lot of different guests joining me. But that was when it was a Monday to Friday gig. But now, basically, Frank has that. And Bill Waters and Phyllis Bazzito. Who was on these? John Gallagher was on. Yeah, Gallagher is on that show. He said he was doing stuff with, and Marty York used to do

stuff with. Marty was there for a time, you're right, when we were Monday to Friday. That was about 2012. Okay, so I'm dating myself here. The people need to hear the Frank D'Angelo updates. You've got to know what's coming next. I'm very interested, personally, here, but I always, you know, the people need to hear the Frank D'Angelo updates. You got to know what's coming next. But so the one, so I'm very interested personally in the Canadian Sports Media

Podcast. Okay. For starters, I'm quite like the producer, Todd Hayes. He used to work on Off the Record. Yeah, well, he got started with me. What happened was when I started the fan doing my zany stuff, you know, he wanted to write an article on me.

I can't remember the name of it. It was a publication. It wasn't a newspaper. It was like a magazine, a relatively new magazine. He did an article on me in my, you know, kind of rough style of dealing with people. And, you know, but I got a nice front page cover right in a photograph on his particular story. But then he called me about a year later. Apparently the magazine, whatever, the publication had folded. Could I help him, you know, get some kind of a gig at the fan?

I said, well, if you want to come in as a volunteer, sure. So I passed his name along to, I'm not sure if it was Rick Hart, whoever it was at the time. And then Todd, to his credit, volunteered for a year. So like no money, he volunteered. And they set him up as my producer, and he did a great job. So I think after a year, they started paying him. And he was my producer for about, excuse me, about three years. Oh, great. Yeah.

So I've had some dealings with Todd. And he's done very well. He seems like a good guy. Yeah. And he was the one who came up with the idea of doing this podcast with Chris Zelkovich. It's a great idea because what Zelkovich does seems to be missing. Sometimes David Schultz does it for the globe. But, and I mean, I've told this to Zeljkovic when he was here,

but that whole media watchdog for sports media, like that seems to be missing. Well, you're right. And I think it's, I mean, especially more so with Chris, because that's what he's done. That's his expertise. And he doesn't, you know, he doesn't throw any softballs. He'll just tell you what he thinks.

So I'm subscribing. Canadian Sports Media Podcast. My last question, Norm. Hammerhead alert. Go Leafs go. Wendell Clark is God. All of this. And then I remember distinctly tuning in one night and you had turned to a Sabres fan.

Well, here's what happened. What happened there, Norman? A lot of people go way overboard in making this like it's a felony. This is a heel turn, speaking of heel turns. Well, by the way, I can tell you this much. First of all, the players, like the Maple Leaf players, if I bump into Wendell or Doug Gilmore or anybody else, they couldn't give a rat's ass who I cheer for.

I mean, the fans go nuts. Like I said, one of my listeners, I see him in the neighborhood. You mentioned him before. Stu Hyman, Zach Hyman's dad. Like, Stu Hyman couldn't give a rat's tuchus, if I can use that word, whether I cheer or don't cheer. It's like he liked listening to my radio. He tells me, like, me and my buddies, we miss you on the fan.

Like, they don't care, but I know there's some people who do. Okay, so what's the story? Yeah. The story was this. I could get Sabres season tickets. I couldn't get Leafs season tickets, right? And so after the spring of 2006, I finished with Roger. We were number one in our time slot.

We were number one in men 25-54. That's quite an honor. Sure. It's not easy to achieve. I don't care what time slot you're in. The second best one I had was God forbid after the terrorist attacks in 2001 in the fall of 2001

we finished number two we couldn't believe it people were actually listening more devotely because they wanted a familiar voice maybe they wanted an escape from the reality of the world but we had great ratings then anyways but 2006 we finished number one so I wanted to reward my fan listeners the realities of the world. Well, it could be, but we had great ratings then, and, you know, anyways, but 2006, we

finished number one. So I wanted to reward my fan listeners. What did I do? My expense, people. My expense. I bought Sabre season tickets, and what did I do? The fan gave me the okay to give them away as prizes on my show. Well, you know, Mike, nobody was

complaining when they were getting free Leaf tickets from me as a prize, regardless of who was the opposition. And so it happened that obviously there was like, what, three Leaf games there a year. So this is 06, 07. I gave away every pair of Sabre season tickets I had as a prize. Wow. So, but, you know, after that, I wanted to be able to at least sell some, like the next year. I kept them for about three, four years.

Sell them and just get my money back. So of course I'm not stupid. It's like the stock, you know, the stock market. I want my stock to do well. Cause if the Sabres perform well, guess what?

I get my money back. Like, come on, like guys and gals, really? It's like, yeah, I wanted the Sabres to do well so I can make some money,

like make my money back off my tickets. To tell you the truth nowadays, I don't really care who wins or loses because Rick Dudley is a friend, Montreal Canadiens. Mike Futa, Los Angeles Kings. I know they're friends. Don't you guys, like in gals, I'm not yelling. You know what I'm saying?

You want your friends to succeed. Of course I want them to win. I want Zach Hyman to have a great career because I'm friends with his dad, Stu. So I don't cheer so much for teams, but I cheer for individuals because they're friends and they're buddies. And I like my friends to succeed. So that's the whole story. So folks, don't take it to heart so much about the Sabres.

I wanted to get my money back. I'm still pissed off about it. By the way, I bought Washington Capital season tickets and I wanted them to do well so I could make my money back. I don't have either pair of season tickets anymore. You're the reason Sidney Crosby's out with a concussion. No, no, no. Okay, good.

Not me. So do I like, I'll always worship the Leafs I grew up with from the 60s and Wendell and those guys. So that's always going to be a part of my life. But yeah, you can't take it too seriously. Whether I cheer or I don't cheer, it's like, come on. Hammerhead alert. Yeah.

Hammerhead alert. Mike, thanks for having me on, buddy. This has been great. And thanks for playing that clip from Howard. I hadn't heard that before, but thank you for doing that. And thanks to all of you. Even if I was yelling and screaming at you, it was for entertainment purposes. I hope you enjoyed it.

I certainly enjoyed speaking with you folks, and thanks for being part of the show, whether you listened or called in. And I'm grateful to Alan Davis and all the staff who worked with the fan for that 20-year career I had there. I can't even put it into words. And that brings us to the end of our 235th show. Say it ain't so, Mike! Say it ain't so!

You can follow me on Twitter at Toronto Mike. Norman, not Norm, I'm calling him Norman, is at Norman Rumak. That's right. R-U-M-A-C-K just in case you didn't know. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer and propertyinthesix.com

is at Brian Gerstein. See you all next week. Brian, we love you. Brian Gerstein, we love you. Thanks for letting me mention my brother Marty Rumack. I appreciate it. For me and you

But I'm a much better man For having known you Oh, you know that's true because everything is coming up rosy and green yeah the wind is cold but the smell of snow