New Season Comes With Some Whine

One of the attractions of covering hockey has always been the basic decency of down-to-earth players. Sadly, greed is beginning to creep into the game, leading some to whine as much as some of their counterparts in other sports.

As examples, we offer Detroit Red Wing forward Keith Primeau and Hartford Whaler left wing Brendan Shanahan, who may be traded for each other in a multi-player Detroit-Hartford deal.

Primeau has long been hailed as a potential superstar because of his size, 6 feet 4 and 210 pounds, and skill. A 31-goal season in 1993-94 made him one of the NHL’s most coveted players, and his 27 goals last season enhanced that. His habit of disappearing in the playoffs was overlooked until last spring, when he was a liability as the Red Wings lost to Colorado in the Western Conference finals.

He got plenty of ice time. He got plenty of chances. He has no one to blame but himself--but he couldn’t endure playing for a record-setting team loaded with skill players and refused to report to training camp.

Then there’s Shanahan, who asked to be traded because the Whalers’ future in Connecticut looks bleak. A season-ticket drive last spring spurred sales of 8,500, but the club may move in two years, when its agreement with the state of Connecticut ends. Shanahan, who gave up the team captaincy, wants to go to a contender but won’t take a cut in the $3.9-million salary he will earn this season or the $4 million he’s due to make next season.

An agent who requested anonymity said the Whalers used Shanahan to sell tickets and then decided to dump his salary to cut their losses. This way, he’s the bad guy.

That’s unlikely because Shanahan has said management wanted him to keep quiet and put on a happy face, which he refused to do. Even if it were true, he could have shown some class and refused to go along and committed himself to making the Whalers successful in Hartford. If he is traded, who can guarantee his new team will win?

Worse than these mewling millionaires is the Mighty Ducks’ David Karpa. A tough but marginal defenseman who might not be in the NHL except for continued expansion, he recently got a raise of $260,000, to $425,000, and had the gall to declare, “Sometimes life isn’t fair.”

The day his words appeared in The Times, Travis Roy was in town to attend a King exhibition game at the Forum. Roy is the Boston University hockey player paralyzed 11 seconds into the first shift of his first game.

Although he lacks sensation from his armpits down and depends on a $20,000 wheelchair to get around, he’s back at school. Smiling, he joked that his new voice-activated computer lets him type reports faster than he could before his injury.

How fair has life been to Roy? Karpa walked away from training camp. Roy will never walk again, but he wastes no time on self-pity and makes the best of his situation. Every professional athlete should be required to spend 10 minutes with Roy.

COFFEY TALK

Detroit defenseman Paul Coffey, who was refusing to go to Hartford, is now relenting. However, there are other obstacles to completing the deal, chiefly that Primeau saw that Petr Nedved signed a two-year, $5-million deal with Pittsburgh and now wants a two-year deal instead of the three-year, $5.2-million contract he had previously accepted contingent on the trade going through.

If the deal is called off, look for the Washington Capitals to offer Steve Konowalchuk as part of a big offer for Shanahan, whom they nearly pried away from Hartford on draft day.

As currently structured, Detroit would send Primeau, Coffey and a first-round draft pick to Hartford for Shanahan and Brian Glynn. The Red Wings would pay $600,000 of Coffey’s salary this season and next, and $900,000 in 1998-99.

The deal solves neither team’s problems, however. Shanahan would add zest to the Wings’ attack, but their biggest potential problem is defense. Glynn, waiver-draft fodder twice, wouldn’t help much. The Whalers love Primeau, but his performance last spring suggests they’re overestimating him. And they already have a power-play quarterback in Jeff Brown, so they may deal Coffey before the trading deadline.

The New York Rangers, who have a big payroll and a big collection of former Edmonton Oilers, deny reports that they will take Coffey. However, not many other teams can afford him, financially or defensively.

TWO REFS MAY BE BETTER THAN ONE

The NHL experimented with a two-referee, two-linesman officiating crew in six exhibition games. Those games haven’t been analyzed, but Bryan Lewis, the league’s director of officiating, said the two games he saw were positive.

“From the general managers I talked to, unless you looked close, you didn’t even notice [an extra official],” he said.

With players getting bigger and faster--and replays used only in certain circumstances, using two referees may be the best way to police games. It works in the NBA. In the NHL, the biggest obstacle could be finding enough qualified refs to satisfy the demand.

HOLDING THAT LINE

The Chicago Blackhawks could be waiting awhile for holdout center Alexei Zhamnov. His agent, Ron Salcer, said there has been “not a whole lot of progress” in talks with the Hawks over the Russian center, whose rights the Hawks acquired for Jeremy Roenick.

Salcer wouldn’t comment on reports that his client is asking for $4.5 million a year, which is outrageous for someone who peaked at 65 points in the lockout-shortened 1994-95 season. But he criticized the Hawks for being cheap.

“You’ve got Chicago, which is the third-largest market in the NHL and one of the wealthiest franchises. I believe they’re cheating their fans, because instead of paying players, they’re losing players,” Salcer said. “They didn’t get Roenick done and they lost [Joe] Murphy and [Bernie] Nicholls for nothing. And it looks like they don’t want to keep Alexei Zhamnov.

“With an attitude like that, they won’t be able to keep Eddie Belfour [whose contract expires after this season]. Unlike the other tenant of that building [the Bulls], the Hawks don’t keep their players happy. The other tenant knows the value of keeping players who are important.”

THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER

You’ve got to love the NHL’s reason for the new rule, charging game misconducts against players who remove their jerseys to free their arms in fights. According to Senior Vice President Brian Burke, it was instituted because of “the unsightly nature of this conduct,” which left players--gasp--bare-chested or in their long johns.

So that’s considered too horrible for public view. But it’s acceptable to start fights that leave opponents bloodied, because another change decreed players can get two instigator penalties in a game before being ejected.

SLAP SHOTS

Today is the 50th anniversary of Gordie Howe signing his first NHL contract with the Red Wings. Here’s to Gordie, wherever he is. . . . Shanahan was loudly booed Saturday in Hartford’s home opener. But one fan best expressed his feelings after the game, by tossing a suitcase with Shanahan’s name on it onto the ice. . . . The Blackhawks, weak up the middle, have scouted Ottawa’s Alexandre Daigle and Tampa Bay’s Chris Gratton. They have also talked to Montreal about Brian Savage.

Four thousand fans in Colorado paid $200 each for the privilege of getting on a waiting list for season tickets. The Avalanche capped season ticket sales at 12,000. . . . Keith Tkachuk, stripped of the captaincy in Winnipeg last season because of a contract holdout, regained the C this season with the Jets’ move to Phoenix. Kris King was wearing it.

The Lightning fears Paul Ysebaert’s serious abdominal muscle pull may end his career. . . . Boston Bruin goalie Bill Ranford, who lost a salary arbitration case, talked to club executives about adding incentives to his one-year, $1.75-million deal, but they couldn’t agree on terms. . . . Watch out for the Philadelphia Flyers’ “Three Dan Line” of Dan Kordic, Daniel Lacroix and Scott Daniels, all bruisers.

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Milestones

Several NHL players are within reach of significant career milestones:

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Player Team Achievement Joe Mullen Pittsburgh Needs five goals for 500 Brett Hull St. Louis 15 goals from 500 Dave Andreychuk New Jersey 24 goals from 500 Ray Bourque Boston 30 assists from 1,000 Bob Carpenter New Jersey Three games from 1,000 Phil Housley Washington Nine games from 1,000 Bernie Nicholls San Jose 10 games from 1,000 Ron Hextall Philadelphia 14 appearances from 500

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