The Show for Sept. 11, 2026: Friday NewsCap, Arizona Cardinals season preview and more

An Arizona Congressional candidate in a swing district addressed the GOP’s midterm convention. Friday NewsCap panelists analyze that and the rest of the week’s top stories. Plus, we’ll preview the upcoming season for the Arizona Cardinals.

Transcript

ANNOUNCER: KJZZ’s original production The Show is supported by Banner Health, Arizona’s largest nonprofit healthcare system. Last year, Banner reinvested more than $1.1 billion in community health and charity care. Banner Health, nonprofit for Arizona. bannerhealth.com/nonprofitforaz.

MARK BRODIE: Hi, I’m Mark Brodie, co-host of The Show, an original production from KJZZ. Every weekday, we bring you the latest news and culture from across the state. You can find much more at theshow.kjzz.org. Here’s today’s episode.

MARK BRODIE: Good morning. It’s The Show here on KJZZ 91.5 in Phoenix. I’m Mark Brodie. Coming up: remembering 9/11 with Phoenix firefighters who deployed to New York City after the attacks. And the NFL season is officially underway — how are the Cardinals expected to do?

But first, it is time for the Friday NewsCap and some voices from the news this week.

JUAN CISCOMANI: Listen, we’ve been 18 months into this administration trying to get out of the Biden inflation that we had in the last four years before then, and it hasn’t happened as fast as we all hoped it would have happened.

JOANNA MENDOZA: If we look at tariffs, my opponent voted nine times for tariffs — tariffs that are raising prices everywhere we go.

JAY FEELY: America’s best chapter has not been written yet. So stand up! Stand together! Stand for freedom! Stand for opportunity! Stand for the American Dream! And stand up for the greatest nation the world has ever known!

ADRIAN FONTES: We really want to make sure that when one of these knuckleheads goes out there and starts saying dumb crap about our elections, we’ll have already had sort of the facts laid out about how this actually works.

LORENA AUSTIN: I guess my first thought was a little shocked, but not surprised, because being deceptive and deceitful is what this group kind of does.

YASSAMIN ANSARI: With arbitrary quotas constantly that they are trying to hit, we know that rules have been broken and norms have been broken left and right.

MARK BRODIE: And with me to talk about the GOP’s midterm convention, a political deepfake video and more are Lorna Romero Ferguson of Elevate Strategies — Lorna, good morning.

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: Good morning.

MARK BRODIE: And Dawn Penich of Agave Strategy — Dawn, good morning to you.

DAWN PENICH: Good morning.

MARK BRODIE: So Lorna, let’s talk about the GOP midterm convention the last couple of nights in Dallas. Only one Arizona candidate that we know of was there to speak, that was Jay Feely, who is of course in a competitive congressional district in the Scottsdale/Fountain Hills area. Good call for him to go and try to get himself in front of a wider audience and maybe just in his congressional district?

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: You know, I don’t think it necessarily is a bad thing. Is it always better to be in your home district, especially in a competitive race like he’s facing and actually campaigning and knocking doors? 100%, I always say that’s the case. If his strategy was to get in front of a broader audience for fundraising purposes, that makes sense.

But his speech was fine, it was a do-no-harm situation, it was kind of more like a pep rally. So I don’t think any of the content of what he said would be problematic, but it’s just a question of: Is he going to be able to bring in dollars from that? If not, then he probably would have been better off just staying in his home district and talking to voters.

MARK BRODIE: How is he doing in terms of getting national — you know, like the National Republican Congressional Committee or other national groups getting money? This is a very competitive district.

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: It is a very competitive district and it’s one of the top priorities for both Republicans and Democrats. And so he is getting a lot of national support, but I do think that Republicans see that obviously Schweikert had this amazing ability the past few election cycles to survive every cycle where we thought that he was going to be potentially taken out, or that was the rumor, right?

So when you have an open seat like this, it’s a crapshoot at this point. And so there are national groups that are taking this seriously, Feely’s campaign is taking it seriously, and it’s really going to come down to — well, we know that Amish Shah, he works that district. He knocks on a lot of doors, right? And ground game is very important.

And so to be able to counter that, financial resources are important as well. And so I think Jay Feely’s team is looking at every opportunity to make sure between now and Election Day they stay on TV, they’re able to hit Amish Shah with whatever attacks that they have between now and then, and see if Republicans can maintain that seat.

MARK BRODIE: So Dawn, one of the attacks that Jay Feely used in his speech was calling — which I guess is not surprising in this election — calling Amish Shah a socialist. Which is interesting, because during the primary, like the criticism was he was too much like Trump, and in the general it’s that he’s a socialist. Is that an attack that you think is going to stick?

DAWN PENICH: No, I don’t think so. I mean, that is clearly, you know, socialism and communism are the marching beat of the Republican Party right now. We heard it being the dominant theme of the Trumpapalooza.

But Amish Shah, unlike Feely, is a well-known quantity in that district. He’s been working hard over the last several years, former legislator. And if anything, he has a reputation for being more moderate, more centrist than what most Democrats like, which is exactly where you want to be for that district. And so I don’t think he’s going to take a lot of bruising from the way he’s being painted. It’s going to in the end just come down to how many people care enough to actually vote their ballot, send it in and, for the first time, it really is a toss-up.

MARK BRODIE: Do you think that Feely benefits from speaking at the midterm convention? To Lorna’s point, is it possible that could bring in more cash to his campaign?

DAWN PENICH: Well, what it does for Democrats is give them a great talking point of: This is the only Arizona candidate who had a speaking position. He’s here trying to tell us that he’s going to care about Arizona residents, but in fact he’s a loyalist to Trump, that’s why he went. We’re just going to get more Trump, and this was proof of it. So he gave a gift to Shah and Democratic talking points about who he really is and where his loyalties will be if elected.

MARK BRODIE: I feel like you just wrote a campaign commercial right there.

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: She’s been working on it since the speech! But there is, I think, both sides of the party are dealing with this, especially here in Arizona, about exciting their base, right? And for Republicans to be successful in that district, they’ve got to drive out more voters. And without Trump being on the ballot, are Trump voters going to turn out? That’s a question mark, especially not in the droves that they were before.

So Feely has to generate that kind of excitement within the base to come out, and then also make sure that he still has the coffers to be able to run a campaign between now and Election Day. So yeah, is there potential downside from having that talking point of, “Oh, he stood on stage and supported Trump?” Sure. But that’s been the talking point since the primary because he was a Trump-endorsed candidate as well. So that’s a known factor.

So, yeah, it really does come down to resources and to see who’s going to run the stronger ground game between now and Election Day.

MARK BRODIE: Which kind of raises the question, at least in this race and maybe more broadly, does this become a base election? Or is it maybe more sort of won at the margins, as we saw, for example, four years ago in some of the top-of-the-ticket races?

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: You know, it’s really interesting because typically you look at these — and obviously every district is different, right? But the way that CD1 is configured, it’s mainly appealing to the more moderates, Democrats and Republicans, those who are independents in that district. But I think Republicans are seeing statewide that they really do have a motivation issue potentially amongst their base. And so they have to kind of run a two-prong approach in a general of making sure that those Republicans turn out and actually care this cycle, and then also appealing to the moderates more in the center. So it’s an interesting dynamic this year.

MARK BRODIE: That is interesting. Dawn, let me ask you about a political deepfake which we saw this week. Some Turning Point activists posted a photo and video that with a sign that said “Democrats for Biggs.” And one of the people in this was a state representative from Mesa named Lorena Austin, who is a Democrat, a very progressive Democrat, self-identified. Problem: wasn’t them. They say was not part of this. So is this sort of a harbinger of what we’re expecting down the road now?

DAWN PENICH: Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, I think more on the right than on the left, AI videos and kind of deepfakes are just ubiquitous already in political stuff. Thankfully, this was a very local, very micro, relatively innocuous, not a lot of harm done example.

But I think it connects very much to a topic that the entire world has been talking about this week, which is regulation of AI. What are we using it for? What are the ethics around it? What’s legal? The problem with that post is that we have laws in Arizona. Just passed in the last couple years, that was illegal and it has been taken down. Rep. Austin has said that they are considering filing a lawsuit.

But we’re going to continue seeing this, it’s not going away. And the question just becomes: Where are we going to see regulation? The federal level, the local level? It’s something that we have to get used to in this reality, unfortunately.

MARK BRODIE: Do you see a difference between something like that, Dawn, and for example, President Trump is known for posting AI images, but like, we all know that he’s not sitting in the Oval Office with George Washington. That’s very obviously AI.

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: Seriously?

MARK BRODIE: I mean, Washington looks great for being a few hundred years old! But like, is there a difference, you think, between that, which pretty much anybody looking at can tell is not real, and this, which for all intents and purposes could be?

DAWN PENICH: Yeah absolutely, and that’s kind of the problem with an utter lack of regulation, is it’s so subjective. Because to someone who doesn’t know what people really look like or certainly, you know, to most voters are in their 60s and 70s in Arizona. And, you know, if I look at my own parents, they believe videos that to me look very obvious.

And so that subjectivity and that question of what are people really taking from this and what are they not, that’s I think where kind of this scary factor is, where we kind of ask: What was the point of this, and what harm might it cause?

MARK BRODIE: Lorna, why? Like why would Turning Point folks post this? What’s the benefit?

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: I don’t have an answer to that! And that’s a fair question: What is the benefit and why, what was the point? If you wanted to put up “Democrats for Biggs” signs around the Valley, around the state, by all means, go ahead. People do that all the time. If you want to create a Democrats for Biggs coalition, do that, actually get Democrats.

But to pick this specific legislator that’s not — we know who this legislator is, but the broader public does not. It’s just kind of strange. Are we talking about it? Maybe it was for attention because we’re all talking about it.

But Dawn raises a great point: This is going to continue to be an issue. And AI is getting much more sophisticated, much more advanced. These are not situations where, yeah, it’s Trump riding a unicorn up into outer space, you know? It’s very difficult at times to see what’s real and what’s fake. And if people are using that to kind of manipulate voters and sentiment, that’s problematic. And so this is going to be a broader issue. But I wish I could speak to the why, but we are discussing it, so maybe that is why.

MARK BRODIE: Well, and presumably as the technology becomes more sophisticated, maybe even later this election or by the next one, it’ll be maybe harder to tell what’s real and what isn’t, what’s AI-generated and what actually happened.

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: 100%. I mean, I see sometimes going through my social media feed, if you’re just scrolling through quickly and you don’t actually take time to look at something, or you just see the quick headline or whatever, you might think that something is actually real or true. We deal with this all the time. Dawn mentioned her parents — mine too! And I feel like I’m getting older, too, so I probably don’t have as sophisticated of an eye, but it’s going to continue to be problematic, and it’s going to be like: What is real, what is fake? And it’s just going to turn into this interesting conundrum for politics.

MARK BRODIE: And guys, obviously today a very solemn day around the country. It’s the 25th anniversary of the terror attacks of Sept. 11. And I don’t want to spend too much time talking about it here, but I am kind of curious to get both of your perspectives on how the politics in Arizona have changed, or maybe evolved — or maybe haven’t — over those 25 years.

Because obviously we were very polarized right before that, right? The 2000 election was a pretty polarizing election, and those attacks happened and the country really came together. So Dawn, let me start with you. I’m really curious how you’ve, especially in Arizona, how have you seen things maybe evolve over the last two and a half decades?

DAWN PENICH: You know, something I’ve been thinking about all week is, it’s odd to say, but looking back, it almost feels like it was a simpler time. Like it was the tragedy of this country’s history, and yet you look back at that and there were still not just rare, but moments of bipartisanship, moments of unity, moments of kind of coming together on political matters.

And you look back at that and you just don’t see it anymore. And the tenor of conversation and the complexity of the lives that we lead now are just so much more complex. So it was this tragedy. It kicked off so many cultural, social and political changes, and yet I think in some ways it’s a time that a lot of people look back at longingly for the ways that we were able to unify then that we just don't see anymore.

MARK BRODIE: Well, that’s sort of the big question, I think, to your point, that a lot of folks have been asking this week: Can we get back to that, right? Can we get back to a time where you can disagree with somebody on an issue, but not demonize them elsewhere? Do you think we can?

DAWN PENICH: Well, that’ll be something to start to listen for. We’re just weeks away from this midterm election, but really it’s already the next general election as well. We already know who’s eyeing the presidential tickets from both sides, and it’s something to start to listen to. Will a Vance or a Cruz carry kind of the Trump rhetoric, or will they come back to a place of saying that they want to work together with a President Kelly or that kind of thing? So I will be listening for that.

MARK BRODIE: I think you just drafted Mark Kelly into the presidency, by the way.

DAWN PENICH: I’m going to be sending out a lot of invoices this week!

MARK BRODIE: Writing campaign commercials, drafting people. Lorna, what do you think? How have you seen Arizona politics evolve in the last 25 years?

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: Yeah, I do think there’s obviously been a lot more divisive rhetoric. And I do think that’s translated into the types of leaders that have been elected. Obviously there were people who criticized President Bush at the time and his response to 9/11 and that. But he continued to lead. I don’t think anybody would question the way that he conducted himself as a human being, right? Same thing with his Democratic colleagues. And I think that lasted for a good while where we had leaders here in Arizona who were statesmen and stateswomen, you know, that really put their country first and looked at everything in a global context, right?

And you fast-forward to today, and a lot of politicians or people who want to run for office, it’s a lot more self-absorbed, unfortunately, and it’s a lot more catering to the extremes on either side and the social media keyboard warriors that are attacking people that they feel like they need to appease, that they need to keep happy. And much more of this isolationist kind of protectionist policy that we have in the United States, right?

And so it’s a completely different dynamic. I hope we can get to the point where we can go back to having those types of leaders on the national, state, local level that truly care about the entire well-being of the electorate, not just the small segment of their party, but that’s going to take the will of those types of individuals to jump in the arena and do that. I think a lot of folks on the right and the left have been a little intimidated or scared to jump in given the climate that we’ve been seeing, you know, the past few election cycles. And so I’m hoping that someday the tone and rhetoric will go down, but we’re in a different era of social media and the way people consume information different than 25 years ago. So who knows what the future holds.

MARK BRODIE: Yeah, a lot of differences. So another sort of somber anniversary this week was the one-year anniversary since the assassination of Charlie Kirk, of course, the founder of Turning Point, he was killed in Utah. Lorna, let me stick with you in terms of, like, what do you see as his and now his group’s legacy sort of a year on since his death?

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: Oh, definitely. I mean, obviously incredibly tragic, and I think for anybody who’s in this space, it really was a wake-up call of again how divisive and scary things have gotten in politics. Unfortunately, we’re too familiar with that here in Arizona with what happened with Congresswoman Gabby Giffords years ago.

But I think with Charlie, it’s a reminder to everybody, and especially those on the right, not to be fearful of what they believe in, right? And to continue to fight for the direction that you think your state, the country, the world should be going in. But I do think it’s a reminder that folks need to kind of take a breath at times and think: Is this going too far? Obviously, somebody was killed in a very public manner and they have a wife and a family and kids that are dealing with that repercussion.

And I think Turning Point has the opportunity to really move forward and use that as motivation to elect Republicans that they think are aligned with their ideals. But I think from the Charlie Kirk situation individually, it’s a reminder to all of us that we all need to be better when it comes to interacting with people that you disagree with, and that violence is never the answer.

MARK BRODIE: Well, Dawn, that kind of goes back to what you were talking about in terms of, like, thinking about the 25 years since 9/11, sort of the way that we talk to and about each other and the way that we treat each other. Do you see that as some of the legacy of Charlie Kirk and Turning Point a year on?

DAWN PENICH: Well, I don’t know. It’s tough, you know. Since his killing, Turning Point has been kind of a mixed bag. I think that they’ve in many ways kind of marched forward with their own rhetoric, which can also can often be pretty hostile and pretty aggressive, you know. We were chatting earlier about road signs that are up all over town and different actions by different activists.

Turning Point has had very strong fundraising since his assassination, and yet despite very strong fundraising, they’ve also had some very high-profile losses indicating or suggesting that maybe either the policy positions or the way they’re explaining their policy positions to voters is not landing. So I’m thinking of big losses in the SRP election recently, big losses in some municipal candidates that they’ve been backing such as in the East Valley.

So it’s kind of unclear to me at this time. You know, you see strength in Turning Point in, like I said, some fundraising numbers, but then you also see losses. I think it’s an organization that is figuring itself out in this transition moment, and we’ll see. I predict they’ll have some outsized influence because they have so much more funding than the Arizona Republican Party itself right now. And so we’ll get to see what policy and rhetoric is coming out of that group because they are the ones with the money to get their message out there.

MARK BRODIE: Interesting. So one more question I want to ask you guys about. The candidates for the 6th Congressional District, the Southern Arizona one, Juan Ciscomani is the incumbent, they had their debate this week — last night, actually. And the big issue, one of the big issues was the economy. And we keep hearing that, you know, the economy, affordability, tariffs are going to be really important on voters’ minds this year.

And yet, like when you look at commercials and you see some of the signs — Dawn, you mentioned signs — you’re not seeing a ton of that. This debate really seemed to focus on the economy. And Lorna, I’m curious, like how much you see that ultimately when voters go to the polls in — I mean, when they maybe go to the polls in November, sit at their kitchen tables in October and vote at home, like how much will affordability, the economy, cost of living, how much is that playing into it?

LORNA ROMERO FERGUSON: Oh, that is the top issue across the board, and that is going to be how voters are going to make their decisions. When you look at any of the polling that’s even been public or any of the internals that I’ve seen, it is by far the leading issue. Especially when you compare it — looking at Republicans, right? When you compare it to last election cycle, especially in a state like Arizona, border security and immigration always is a top issue, right? That was probably a very close second to the economy.

Now that a lot of those issues, with the Trump administration and some of their policies is not a daily news story, you’ve seen that drop significantly. And just general cost of living and affordability is the top concern. So, yeah, that’s how voters are going to decide. And in a race like that, Juan has the opportunity and the advantage to talk about things that he’s done. And obviously Mendoza is attacking him on votes that he’s cast before, but it’s really going to be who’s going to be able to tell that story to voters. And that’s a very, very interesting district, very competitive. But Juan’s been able to squeak it out before, but affordability, cost of living, top issue across the board anywhere.

MARK BRODIE: Dawn, do you see this as an election that is based on “It’s the economy, stupid”?

DAWN PENICH: Yeah, absolutely. And I was thinking a cycle or a few cycles back, I will criticize my own Democratic colleagues in saying that we have sometimes made the mistake of not caring about what voters care about, and caring more about like kind of these meta high-level cultural issues, right? And I see in watching kind of the Republican convention this week, I saw that happening. They’re over at the convention kind of beating the drum on socialism and communism.

Meanwhile, gas — fuel has hit $100 a barrel this week, highest ever. And people are being asked by the Republican Party to not believe their own eyes, not believe their own math. To worry more about this specter of communism than the fact that their groceries have never been higher, their gas bill has never been higher, their electricity bill has never been higher. And so regardless of what they’re hearing coming out of Dallas or Washington, they’re going to be paying those bills, and those bills are sitting on the same kitchen counter as their ballot. And those two things are going to be connected.

MARK BRODIE: Very interesting. All right, guys, we’ll have to leave it there. Dawn Penich, Lorna Romero Ferguson, thanks to both of you for the conversation. I appreciate it.

DAWN PENICH: Thank you.

MARK BRODIE: Good morning. It’s The Show on KJZZ 91.5 in Phoenix. I’m Mark Brodie. Coming up: Delis aren’t exactly known for being vegan-friendly — until now. We’ll hear from the Valley chef behind a new vegan deli concept.

But first, the NFL season got underway this week. For the first time, the season began on a Wednesday, with the defending champion Seahawks beating the Patriots in Seattle. Then last night, the 49ers beat the Rams in Melbourne, Australia. Closer to home in this hemisphere, the Cardinals start their new campaign on Sunday in L.A. against the Chargers.

The preseason rankings have not been kind to the Cardinals. They generally have the Cards finishing last in the NFC West. With me now to talk about what the upcoming season might look like is Josh Weinfuss. He covers the Cardinals for ESPN. Josh, good morning.

JOSH WEINFUSS: Good morning, how are you?

MARK BRODIE: I’m doing all right. So are you pessimistic about the upcoming season, or should Cardinals fans maybe be pessimistic about the upcoming season?

JOSH WEINFUSS: Yes and no, right? Everyone, like you said, has this team ranked at the bottom of the NFC West. A lot of the predictions and projections have them at the bottom of the league overall.

But I think this team’s going to be better than people think or believe, and here’s why: I think their offensive talent as a — in the skill players, which when I say skill players, it’s quarterback, wide receiver, tight end, running back, is probably among the best in the NFL. And if they can utilize that, and if they can keep them healthy and protect them with the offensive line, I think that this offense could really get going this year and surprise a lot of people.

To me, the biggest question mark is the defense. It wasn’t very good last year, especially at the end of the year. They brought back the same coordinator, a few different position coaches, and they got some guys back from injury from last year, but overall we don’t know what kind of steps they’re going to take from last year.

Like this year, new head coach in Mike LaFleur, he brought his own offensive scheme, like they’ve upgraded some of the talent, so we can see the noticeable improvement on the offensive side of the ball. To me, at least, we just haven’t been able to see the noticeable improvement on the defensive side of the ball.

MARK BRODIE: So what will you be looking for — you mentioned the new head coach — what will you be looking for early in the season to sort of get a gauge of the kind of impact the new coach is having?

JOSH WEINFUSS: Yeah, you know, he’s an offensive-minded coach, he’s going to be calling the plays. So if we’re going to look at how he’s impacting this organization, it’s going to be on the offensive side. So how good is this offense, how efficient is it, are they putting up a lot of points?

Yards don’t necessarily matter, it’s more about the points, right? So just kind of how good of an offense is he bringing with him. The last time he called plays was with the New York Jets in like 2020, 2021-ish, and it didn’t go well, right? I’m sorry, I think it was 20 — yeah, 2020, 2021-ish, just did not go well.

So this is his second chance to do it. I’m sure a lot of coaches learn from their prior experiences, so we’ll see how that carries over to this year.

MARK BRODIE: So Josh, you kind of alluded to this, but I want to ask you about the division that the Cardinals are in, because they’re in the same division as the Rams, the 49ers, the Seahawks, who of course won the Super Bowl last year.

So it kind of sounds like what you’re saying is maybe the Cardinals will finish last, but some of that is maybe a reflection of who they have to play twice a year.

JOSH WEINFUSS: 100%, right? This is by far the hardest division in football. I mean, you just named them, right? That’s a gauntlet right there of six games a year. But then you add in the rest of their schedule for the first nine, 10, 11 games-ish, like it’s not an easy go.

So they could have a good year and still finish at the bottom of their division, and I think that could be considered a success this year, right? It might not look like it in the standings, but when you’re playing, like you said, the defending Super Bowl champions, the Rams are predicted to win the Super Bowl this year by a lot of people, but then the Niners did what they did last night to the Rams, so really, it’s a great division.

And I do think the Cardinals have the skill and the talent to steal a game or two, I just don’t know how many.

MARK BRODIE: So what then to you would success look like for the Cardinals? Is it a matter of like having a better record than last year, or scoring more points than last year? Like how do you think they should be gauging success?

JOSH WEINFUSS: Yeah, it’s a great question, right? And I think the baseline from last year is not very — I guess the bar, I should say, the bar is not very high, right? They won three games last year. So you win four games, it’s a better season overall.

I think honestly, it’s staying competitive. I’ve said this before: If they can be competitive in games to the last minute or two, make it a — be competitive in one-score games, and be in a position to win those and steal those, I think that’s considered a good season.

Because anytime you have changeover at head coach, and they went through a turbulent offseason as an organization, anytime you can get through that and just have a consistent season, I think is a win, and I think that would be success for this team this year.

MARK BRODIE: OK. Let me ask you about the quarterback position, because, you know, there was a lot of talk about what should they do with Kyler Murray. He’s of course not there anymore. Jacoby Brissett will be the starting quarterback. Is he — and they drafted a quarterback in the NFL Draft. Do you anticipate that Brissett will still be the starting quarterback, let’s say, midseason?

JOSH WEINFUSS: Midseason, yes. I think end of the season is going to truly depend on how the year goes. If this season ends up like last year, I can see them at some point — and when I say “them,” the Cardinals — benching Brissett and playing Carson Beck, who was a rookie they drafted in the third round, just to see what they have in him.

Because if you’re going to have that bad of a season, you’ll most likely be drafting pretty high in next year’s draft, and next year’s draft class is loaded with quarterbacks. So before you go and take one of those guys high, you want to see what you have in Beck because you obviously invested some serious draft capital in him. And he’s good, right? He’s talented, he’s young, but he had a lot of college experience. He played in college for six years, so his learning curve is a lot shorter than a lot of other guys coming out of school.

So I wouldn’t be surprised if they benched Jacoby Brissett at some point if the season kind of goes off the rails, but if they’re competitive and they’re winning games, then I would expect Brissett to play the entire season.

MARK BRODIE: Is there a player or players that you are looking for to sort of have breakout seasons, to maybe — if the Cardinals are going well, it will be because of this guy or these guys?

JOSH WEINFUSS: Yeah, that’s a great question. I think the first name that comes to mind is Marvin Harrison Jr., right? He had a injury-riddled season last — wide receiver, yep, a lot of injuries last year, but still was productive in the games that he played.

So I think this is a type of season, the type of situation with Jacoby Brissett at quarterback where I think he could take that next step in his career. And to me, that next step is 1,000 yards, right? I think he could be a 1,000-yard receiver. And then you look at all those receivers as a whole: Michael Wilson, he’s coming off his first 1,000-yard season, I think he could be part of that equation; Trey McBride.

But another name that I think a lot of people need to pay attention to is the Cardinals’ first-round pick this year. They took Jeremiah Love, a running back out of Notre Dame, with the third overall pick, and he is dynamic, right? He could do everything. He’s super quick, super fast, great hands. I think he could be a game-changer this year.

MARK BRODIE: All right. It’ll be interesting to see. The Cardinals kick off their season on Sunday against the L.A. Chargers. That is Josh Weinfuss, covers the Cardinals for ESPN. Josh, thanks, I really appreciate it.

JOSH WEINFUSS: Yeah, thanks for having me.

MARK BRODIE: Good morning. It’s The Show on KJZZ 91.5. I’m Mark Brodie. Next up this morning, meet chef Damon Brasch. Brasch has owned and operated Green New American, a vegan restaurant in the Valley, for two decades. But he doesn’t serve your average crunchy vegetarian fare. He thinks vegetarian and vegan food should just taste good, and it’s OK if it comes with a side of fries.

Green was pretty groundbreaking in the Valley when it opened, and now Brasch is out with the next new thing: Motherboard Analog Meats, a vegan deli serving up classic Italian subs using entirely vegan ingredients.

Brasch came into our studios recently to talk to my co-host, Lauren Gilger. He said he worked in a deli early in his career and hated it, but he has fond memories of homemade salami hanging in his grandfather’s basement and deli meats on crusty bread with pickled hot red peppers. And that, he said, is exactly what he’s trying to do with Motherboard — just without the meat.

DAMON BRASCH: It better taste good. I mean, we love cooking for people. I take it very seriously and, yes, you want to be healthful about everything that you do, but it’s really got to deliver something special. We’re doing it right, I think, because it tastes delicious and it doesn’t matter what your diet is.

LAUREN GILGER: Which is always kind of an interesting idea and probably was pretty groundbreaking at the time 20 years ago, huh?

DAMON BRASCH: To have it taste good, I think so. I mean, there were a few vegan restaurants around, but, you know, they were very, very kind of hippie and crunchy.

LAUREN GILGER: Yeah, right. And this is definitely not that. And the idea of doing a vegan deli is certainly not crunchy granola kind of vegan food, right? Like, you’re trying to take something that is really based on meats, right? Like, that’s the whole point of a deli.

DAMON BRASCH: Absolutely.

LAUREN GILGER: And making it vegan.

DAMON BRASCH: We’re trying to embrace our Midwest heritage. I grew up in a big Italian family, like my grandpa’s, like, dank basement where he had all kinds of crazy rusty tools and salami, homemade salami, hanging from the rafters. The food that my grandmother would cook, and those meats were just so delicious. And it makes me really nostalgic to have that again, but a different version of it.

LAUREN GILGER: Right. And so I’m guessing, as a vegetarian or vegan for a very long time now, did you miss that? You can’t have those kind of cold cut sandwiches you grew up on.

DAMON BRASCH: I definitely missed the nostalgia of it. Yeah, there’s just something about a sandwich, you know? I mean, it’s just in its — I mean, it’s not rocket science, I guess, but you got to make it good. It starts with the bread, you got to have killer bread. Obviously the lunch meats are everything, and the ratios of lettuce and tomato and onion and the sauce and — it’s just, it’s really important!

LAUREN GILGER: It can be a revelation! 100%. OK, so let’s talk about how you did this, because the idea for it is pretty original, and it definitely doesn’t exist here, a vegan deli. But you have to make the meat right, and it sounds like this has been a long process for you.

DAMON BRASCH: Yes, myself and our amazing team spent a lot of time doing R&D on the meats. And we kind of cracked the code for what we were looking for when we introduced nuts into the seitan.

LAUREN GILGER: Hmm.

DAMON BRASCH: It’s basically, it’s a whole protein and it’s vital wheat gluten, basically.

LAUREN GILGER: OK.

DAMON BRASCH: And the traditional way to make it is just to mix water with it and spices, and then you can boil it or braise it or fry it and do all kinds of stuff to manipulate it to get the kinds of textures and flavors that you want.

LAUREN GILGER: OK.

DAMON BRASCH: Ours is a little different because of the cashew milk that we make. So we make fresh cashew milk and incorporate it into the vital wheat gluten, which gives it a — just a more true and delicious flavor. The meat kind of like yields correctly to the bite of the sandwich.

LAUREN GILGER: That’s interesting. It’s like the feel of it almost has to be right. It’s the texture.

DAMON BRASCH: Exactly. It’s textural, absolutely. And that cashew, it just makes it — and I don’t know anyone who’s — I’ve never seen a cashew seitan deli meat or any other kind of meat, so I don’t know if we’re the first, but it definitely makes ours unique.

LAUREN GILGER: And that was sort of a eureka moment for you, it sounds like, in trying to make this happen.

DAMON BRASCH: Yes it was. And like most wonderful recipes that I come up with, I dream about them, strange as that is. And I woke up that morning and I was like, “Cashews!” And we went and we tried it, and that was the winner.

LAUREN GILGER: I want to ask one more question about this, and then we’re going to try some of this deli meat of yours. But when you’re talking about spices, how do you spice something to taste like ham, or, you know, a meat that just tastes like the meat itself? What spices are in there?

DAMON BRASCH: It’s trial and error for sure, and that’s why we love having meat eaters sample our stuff, because — oh yeah, absolutely, a lot of our staff eats meat. Like, we don’t care, we just want people to enjoy the food. And it’s great when you get somebody who is, you know, a full-blown meat eater who’s like, “Oh damn, this is really good.”

LAUREN GILGER: Yeah, yeah. All right, so let’s try it. You brought two sandwiches, and I have to say, these are massive. What’d you bring for us?

DAMON BRASCH: We brought for you the Jersey Boss, which is our homemade seitan with — it’s a capicola ham and our turkey, and it’s got melted cheddar cheese on it. Everything is vegan on it. The other one is the Uncle Alan, which is kind of like our Italian version of a cold cut sandwich. It’s got salami, mortadella, capicola on it, hot and sweet peppers on there and all the fixings.

LAUREN GILGER: That’s the stuff! OK, let's try it. Mm, this is so good.

DAMON BRASCH: Thank you.

LAUREN GILGER: And the cheese is not cheese?

DAMON BRASCH: No, the cheese is not cheese.

LAUREN GILGER: You have made, again, a trick of the mouth, I guess, for lack of a better phrase. What do you think people like about that? Is it that they’re interested in vegan cuisine? Do you think people are interested in vegetarian, they want to like test it out and say, “Maybe I could be a vegan one day, maybe I could be a vegetarian one day”?

DAMON BRASCH: Well, I mean, let’s be honest. I mean, vegans can be kind of preachy sometimes, you know? And nobody really wants to hear that. I don’t even want to hear it, and I am vegan. But there are just so many great benefits to eating a plant-based diet, and it goes well beyond one’s own personal health. It goes well beyond the water table and animal welfare and the climate.

There’s just a lot of great things that it kind of solves. And nobody wants to eat, you know, a sprout burger or, you know — people want real food and they want it to taste good. And that’s always just been my mission and our mission at the restaurant. And, you know, we’ve been around for 21 years, so we must be doing something right.

LAUREN GILGER: And over that time, in a couple of decades there, you’ve seen the trend of the idea of vegetarian or vegan food kind of go up and down. It hit a real high with the Impossible Burger and lots of things like that just a couple years ago. What do you think happened after that?

DAMON BRASCH: I don’t know. I have a lot of interesting takes on that. I think it’s a combination of a lot of different things. You know, after the pandemic, everybody kind of was like, you know, YOLO! I’m going to eat what I want to eat, and I totally get that, you know?

But I think that there’s still room for vegan restaurants. I think there’s still room to change minds, and I think it’s wonderful that we have so many great vegan restaurants here in the Valley that are still thriving. And, yeah, I hope we’re on an uptick.

LAUREN GILGER: Do you think that mock meat like this has come a long way in the course of a couple of decades?

DAMON BRASCH: Yeah, for sure. I mean, there are so many wonderful products out there. You know, we’re just one of many, but yeah, it’s never been more easy to eat plant-based foods.

LAUREN GILGER: Damon Brasch, chef and owner of Green New American, the founder of Mother Board Analog Deli Meats, joining us. Damon, thank you so much for coming in, I appreciate it very much. Thanks for the sandwich!

DAMON BRASCH: Our pleasure, thank you. Thank you so much.

MARK BRODIE: Today, of course, is the 25th anniversary of the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. As part of the observance, Phoenix last night hosted a ceremony at Steele Indian School Park. As part of that event, members of the Phoenix Fire Department and Arizona Task Force 1, who deployed to New York City after the attacks, answered questions from members of Outstanding Phoenix Youth Leaders — none of whom were alive 25 years ago. Let’s listen to a few of the questions and answers.

AMANDA HOGLUND: Can you tell us about a moment of hope or human connection that stands out from your experience?

TIM HILL: Yeah, I mean, when you talk ... about hope, to talk follow up on what Brian was talking about, is one of the things that would impress me every day, where there weren’t just hundreds of flyers and posters up of families looking for loved ones. There were — they’d line the streets on the approach to Ground Zero so that every time you went in there, there were hundreds of people holding up their flyers trying to get it as close to you as they could.

And while ... loved ones did not see rescue come to fruition, there certainly was a lot of hope there. And the way the members of FDNY and Task Force 1 and all the task forces as they came in from across the country worked, they were working under the premise that there was hope. That there was somebody that they could find.

And even though those efforts weren’t unsuccessful — not because of their efforts, just because of the damage to the building, which made it unsurvivable — the fact that people will work and work and work on the fuel of hope is something that’s important, I believe, to mankind, that I hope we never lose. And certainly the younger generation, I hope that you can continue to use the fuel of hope, whether it’s a disaster or childcare or fixing the world’s bigger problems. Hope is an enormous fuel. I think I learned that there.

AMANDA HOGLUND: What do you think people who weren’t there might not understand about the way people came together during those first few days and weeks?

BRIAN TOBIN: Well, the old fire chief in Phoenix before Bob was the fire chief used to say to us that, "If you want to know how people will act to one another after a tragedy is see how they’re acting to each other the week before." So that’s deep, right? But I think we had such a swell of patriotism because our country was attacked and everybody was — had a common cause.

And before 9/11 wasn’t perfect, that’s for sure, right? There was a lot of division as well. But it did bring us together for a common cause and to feel and to try and give comfort to those in New York and in Washington and in Pennsylvania, the people that were involved.

So I would say that we came together at a very important time to do some really important work, and then we tried to keep that going patriotically. And there was a — I mean, there was a lot of people that were organized and felt like they needed to serve their country. There were there were people that also came into the law enforcement and fire service as a result of these type of things. So I think what we see that happening after an event like this is important, right?

VALERIA VENZOR: Hi, thank you all for being here. My question is: What is something about your experience that you don’t think people fully understand from the pictures and stories we’ve seen over the years?

BOB KHAN: When I think about that, I think I go right back to when we first got there. And we drove past the Bear and the Bull on Wall Street, and it looked like somebody took a bag of flour and dumped it into the Grand Canyon, which was the World Trade Center. But on the streets, there were shoes everywhere of people that ran out of their shoes, right? And you don’t know if they made it or not.

There were fire engines and fire ladder companies that were mangled like they were kids’ toys that got run over by a car. We were disoriented. And every pair of shoes to us, that was a soul, that was somebody in there, you know?

So when you saw the towers collapse — being in the business, that’s a big fire department. So you knew it was going to be hundreds of firefighters that were in there, and they were doing their jobs.

So it’s just — still is. It’s just a very vivid image of all that together, the humanity of it. And then the power of everybody coming together to help. I mean, there was, like the guy said, the community there rallied around us. We felt like we were unworthy of being there. We couldn’t do enough. They couldn’t do enough for us. It was America’s finest moment in a long time.

MARK BRODIE: Those were some of the voices from a 9/11 observance held last night in Phoenix, featuring members of the Phoenix Fire Department and Arizona Task Force 1 who deployed to New York City after the attacks, in conversation with a group of young leaders, all of whom were born after 9/11.

MARK BRODIE: Thanks for listening to The Show’s podcast. The Show is produced by Sativa Peterson, Nick Sanchez, Amber Victoria Singer, Athena Ankrah and Aiyana Hamilton. The Show was created by Jon Hoban. Our executive producer is Amy Silverman. You can find more of The Show and sign up for our newsletter at theshow.kjzz.org. You can also find us on Instagram @kjzztheshow.