Cobra Kai's Ron Thomas, Tom Smith and Dan Murphy of Gold Shields, and Math Guru Vanessa Vakharia

This edition of The Neil Haley Show opens with a Celebrity Interviews simulcast from the Grotto, co-hosted by Greg Hanna, welcoming actor, author, and martial artist Ron Thomas, who played Bobby Brown in The Karate Kid and returned to the role in Cobra Kai. Thomas shared the story he loves to tell, that he was already a second-degree black belt when he auditioned and was told to keep quiet about it because producers wanted actors first, and that stunt coordinator Pat Johnson later trusted him to choreograph his own tournament fight scenes. He described Bobby as the good bad guy who knew when a line had been crossed, pointing to a cut scene in which he throws his belt at Kreese's feet and walks out, and explained how the Cobra Kai creators reimagined Bobby as a pastor still trying to do right. A favorite memory was driving Pat Morita across the valley to surprise the students at his old dojo. Thomas, a former world-champion sport jujitsu competitor, also discussed his kids' TED Talk on focus and screen time, inspired by prying his daughter away from her devices, his book The Hidden Life Lessons of Mr. Miyagi, and a new children's personal-development series. His message: never stop growing and creating. Find him at SenseiRonThomas.com.Neil then welcomed retired NYPD detectives Tom Smith and Dan Murphy, hosts of the Gold Shields podcast, in a Criminally Good with Sherrie and Jen simulcast presented by Storehouse Media Group. With more than fifty years of combined experience, the two met on the Bronx Gang Squad some twenty-five years ago and built a guest-centric true-crime show, now past 170 episodes, that keeps the focus on the detectives who lived the cases rather than on themselves. They traced its origins to a desire to restore respect for law enforcement, recalled meeting Neil's hosts at CrimeCon, and singled out standout episodes, including a challenge from former Chief of Department Louis Anemone that led them to the 1940 World's Fair bombing, the only unsolved line-of-duty homicide in NYPD history, and the Emanuela Orlandi Vatican case, recorded in English and Italian. Guests have ranged from Bundy survivor Kathy Kleiner to Taya Kyle and a Navy SEAL who led a team on the bin Laden raid. The pair also introduced Impact, their patent-protected, food-grade alternative to pepper spray now used by more than a hundred departments, at carryimpact.com. Find the show at thegoldshieldshow.com.The hour continued with a back-to-school conversation with Vanessa Vakharia, the Toronto-based Math Guru, on setting students up for a distraction-free year. She urged parents to be intentional about tools, choosing devices that do one thing well, and noted that many states are moving to limit phones in schools. Her practical advice included studying at the kitchen or dining table rather than the bedroom, and starting school-year routines a good two weeks early. In a segment tied to Texas Instruments, she praised the new TI-84 Evo graphing calculator for its familiar, icon-based screen and, above all, for what it lacks, no AI and no internet, so students stay on task and build the tool familiarity that research links to better test performance. Vakharia stressed that math anxiety is not a life sentence, that confidence grows through consistency, and that math, like life, is about the step-by-step journey rather than the destination, a theme Neil echoed from his own years teaching math. Details are at education.ti.com/evo.The program closes with a GildaGram simulcast where co-host Dr. Gilda Carle, author of Real Men Don't Go Woke, turned to men's health, arguing that men too often avoid asking for help and should be viewed as a whole system rather than just muscles and testosterone. She began walking through her ten ways men can optimize their health, starting with annual checkups and knowing your key numbers.