Menschwarmers

The recent FIFA World Cup match between Egypt and Argentina became a surprising battleground for—what else?—the Israel-Palestine debate. The Egyptian coach, who had been waving a Palestinian flag during the competition, grew frustrated when Argentinian fans began waving Israeli flags at him. It's the latest culmination of a longstanding anti-Zionist (and weirdly antisemitic) dislike of Argentinian...

The FIFA World Cup has taken over Toronto, Vancouver and cities across the United States and Mexico. Here in Canada, its early days were marred by pro-Palestinian activists protesting Israel's membership in FIFA. Our sports podcasters ask: Do these people know Israel isn't competing in the World Cup? FIFA head Gianni Infantino, meanwhile, is once again moving in the opposite direction, pushing to...

The Menschwarmers received an anonymous tip last year that a rising star in the NBA has Jewish heritage. We dug into it, and are the first to report that it is true: basketball star Chet Holmgren is ethnically Jewish. Holmgren, the seven-foot centre for the reigning league champions, the Oklahoma City Thunder, comes from a long line of deeply involved Jewish community members in Minneapolis, by wa...

On a podcast last year, Wayne Gretzky quietly—almost meekly—revealed his "grandfather was 50 percent Jewish", and fled Eastern Europe at a time when having any Jewish blood was a good reason to get out. Now that this news is out in the open, our Jewish sports podcasters need to dig in. The most pressing question: is one-eighth of Wayne Gretzky the greatest Jewish hockey player of all tim...

Alan Shipnuck is one of the most celebrated golf writers in the industry. When he began penning a biography of Rory McIlroy in 2024, he assumed he had some time to work on it—until McIlroy won the acclaimed Masters Tournament just a few months later. His publisher called him and said they needed the book in the fall. Shipnuck's book, Rory: The Heartache and Triumph of Golf's Most Human Superstar ,...

Curling is consistently one of the most-watched Winter Olympic sports, pulling in millions of viewers worldwide. But when the athletes return home—and curlers return to their day jobs—audiences don't have much opportunity to keep up with the sport, even if they wanted to. Nic Sulsky wants to change that. This week, the Toronto-based entrepreneuer is debuting Rock League , the world's first profess...

In 2024, the image of Jake Retzlaff—the only Jewish quarterback ever to play for Brigham Young University’s football team—adorned special editions of Manischewitz matzah boxes. That brand deal, to showcase a promising Jewish pro-football prospect, was the inspiration for a company co-founded by former Montrealer Jeremy Moses. His sports-marketing company is called Tribe NIL. (NIL stands for Name,...

The 2026 Winter Olympics ended on a very Jewish note with an overtime goal scored by NHL star Jack Hughes. Brother Quinn Hughes, also a member of the gold-medal winning American team, has a legitimate chance to lead his team, the Minnesota Wild, to a Stanley Cup this year. With the Winter Olympics behind us, there’s so much more to catch up on in the world of Jews and sports. The World Baseball Cl...

Last week, millions of people watched one of our own stand behind a podium on  Jeopardy!  — and win. Toronto lawyer James Hirsh, co-host of The CJN’s long-running  Menschwarmers  podcast, became the latest Canadian contestant to compete and succeed on the iconic American game show. Hirsh says it was “the thrill of a lifetime” to be selected, to fly down to the Alex Trebek studio at Sony Pictures i...

What is a very special announcement from Jamie? Credits Hosts: James Hirsh and Gabe Pulver Producer: Michael Fraiman Music: Coby Lipovitch (intro), chēēZ π (main theme, " Organ Grinder Swing ") Support The CJN Follow the podcast on Twitter @menschwarmers Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to Menschwarmers (Not sure how? Click here...

Alfred Nakache is a famous athletic icon within France—but outside the country, his story is not well known. Born in 1915 to a Jewish family that fled Iraq for Algeria, Nakache rose to become one of France's top swimmers, breaking records and competing in the 1936 Berlin Olympics in Nazi Germany—he even finished fourth, beating the German team. By 1944, however, Nakache, his wife and their young d...

The 2026 Winter Olympics start this week, taking over northern Italy from Feb. 6-22. But while Jewish sports fan might be eager to root for their fellow members of the Tribe... there just aren't that many this time around. Canada isn't sending any Jewish athletes that we could find (having snubbed some key hockey players ), which leaves the United States and Israel as the only visible representati...

The Menschwarmers return after a lengthy winter break! In this mid-January catch-all catch-up, Gabe and James get started looking at arguably the biggest trade of the NHL season last, involving two Jewish players—Quinn Hughes and Zeev Buium—who were swapped with predictable results. Then they start looking at Winter Olympics rosters, starting with Olympic hockey: which Jewish players got snubbed?...

As far as Jewish filmmakers go, the Safie brothers could well be the GOATs (Greatest Of All Time) when it comes to Jewish sports cinema. One of their earliest collaborations was a 2013 documentary on high school basketball star Lenny Cooke; their breakout feature, Uncut Gems , was a sports-adjacent thriller featuring a Passover Seder with Adam Sandler and Idina Menzel; then younger brother Benny S...

It's taken the Menschwarmers several weeks of mourning to get over the Toronto Blue Jays' World Series loss against the Los Angeles Dodgers, and no amount of broadcast cutaways to 89-year-old Sandy Koufax in the crowd during that intense seven-game series can help. But now, weeks later, after the shivas have ended for that miracle run, The CJN's sports podcasters are back—and they have a lot to lo...

Even though the Toronto Blue Jays traded away Spencer Horwitz , their only recent Jewish player, there are still multiple Hebraic angles that our Jewish sports podcasters are celebrating as the team charges into the World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers this week. The father-son team of Dan and Ben Shulman will be calling the Jays' broadcasts; macher Mark Shapiro sits as team president and...

After a tumultuous season, international cycling team Israel–Premier Tech, co-owned by Canadian-Israeli billionaire Sylvan Adams, is officially going to change its name and remove the word "Israel". The decision comes after repeated anti-Israel protests across Europe disrupted the team—whose international roster of 31 cyclists includes just three Israelis—during their open-road events, w...

Canadians who've never before heard of the Davis Cup, a men's team tennis tournament, grew outraged when they discovered Canada was hosting Israel in a match on Sept. 12 and 13. Anti-Israel activists demanded a ban on the Israeli athletes over their country's war in Gaza; pro-Israel advocates insisted the sport remain free of political interference. In the end, nobody won: Tennis Canada announced...

In July, the New York Yankees drafted a Canadian shortstop from Wyoming, Ont., named Core Jackson. They did so despite knowing that Jackson, as a 17-year-old freshman at the University of Nebraska, had drawn a swastika on a Jewish student's dorm room while he was, he later told The Athletic, "blackout drunk." But this isn't a run-of-the-mill case of antisemitism. By all accounts, accordi...

Jake Retzlaff has earned a spot as one of America's top college football quarterbacks, rising with the Brigham Young University Cougars as the first Jewish quarterback to ever play at the Mormon university. But it's precisely that religious juxtaposition that got Retzlaff in trouble with the BYU Cougars, after a brief legal action in May 2025 saw an anonymous accusation of sexual assault lobbied a...

From July 18-20, Torontonians everywhere in the city heard the thunderous roar of racing cars running circuits around the downtown Exhibition Place. The Ontario Honda Dealers Indy Toronto brought drivers and racing fans from around the world—including at least one (but maybe two) Jewish athletes. Robert Shwartzman, the Israeli rookie who stunned the world by taking pole position at the acclaimed I...

On the first night of the NBA draft on June 25, the most surprising team was undoubtedly the Brooklyn Nets. They had five first-round picks—and, for the first time in NBA history, kept all of them. They picked Egor Demin earlier than anyone would have predicted. And they used two of their picks—back-to-back at numbers 26 and 27—on this year's only Jewish prospects, Ben Saraf and Danny Wolf. Saraf,...

In March 2025, Josh Goldenberg had all but given up his dreams of playing professional golf. Using his finance degree from the University of Pennsylvania, he took a job at Goldman Sachs. But when he saw an opening to play in a qualifying tournament for the RBC Canadian Open, he signed up and flew up north on a Sunday—so he wouldn't have to take work off—and ended up earning a spot on his first PGA...

Jewish racing fans were thrilled to see rookie Robert Shwartzman win what's called "pole position"—the starting spot, ahead of all other racers—at this week's forthcoming Indy 500 competition. The surprise victory vaults Shwartzman into rare company as one of the only rookies to earn the feat, and sets him up to possibly become the first Jewish winner of the famous race since the 1940s....

Yeshiva University's men's basketball team rose to prominence during a Cinderella run in the 2021-22 season, earning the league's longest winning streak under star Ryan Turell and snatching the number-one seed in Division III basketball. Now, the team is back in the national spotlight for a different reason: a new documentary that follows the boys as they navigate their 2023-24 season in a post-Oc...