The NHL / Chris Baker : Oilers Attract Pair of Special Fans in L.A.

The Hollywood stars come out when the Edmonton Oilers come to Los Angeles.

Actor Rob Lowe, wearing a pair of Curt Rambis-style glasses, and David Foster, Grammy-winning record producer, skated with Edmonton at practice Tuesday morning at the Forum.

Lowe stars in a new hockey movie called “Youngblood,” which should be released sometime next fall. He said he spent seven weeks learning to skate before filming began.

Foster, who earned a Grammy for producing the latest album by Chicago, is a big hockey fan. He said he wanted to thank the Oilers when he won his Grammy in February, but couldn’t think of a way to work it into his speech.

When the Oilers won the Stanley Cup last season, captain Wayne Gretzky said hello to Foster, who was watching on TV in Los Angeles, during the postgame interviews.

Foster owns a minority interest in the junior hockey team which was recently bought by Gretzky.

At the All-Star game in Calgary last February, Foster included the hockey players in a video for “Tears Are Not Enough,” a song recorded by Northern Lights, a group of Canadian artists for Ethiopian famine relief. A brief shot of the hockey stars was included in the final version of the video.

Bob Miller, who has been the radio voice of the Kings for 12 seasons, was guest of honor at a surprise roast last week.

The dinner, planned by King video coordinator Bob Borgen, had been in the works for a month, but Miller said he’d had no inkling of what was happening.

“I thought we were going to a birthday party for Marilyn Demers (wife of King trainer Pete Demers),” Miller said. “But when we got to the hotel the whole team was in there.”

All of the color men whom Miller has worked with attended the dinner. Miller was given a team jersey by Marcel Dionne.

Shades of 1920s baseball. The St. Louis Blues initiate their unsuspecting rookies every season by taking them on a “snipe hunt.”

What usually happens is that they take the gullible young players out into the countryside, direct them to a field where the elusive snipe are supposed to be, hand them gunny sacks, then leave them there.

It’s a practical joke, of course, since there are as many snipe around as there are unicorns, but it’s supposed to be good, harmless fun, and it usually is.

Last month, however, center Doug Wickenheiser suffered a ligament injury in his knee after this year’s snipe hunt when he was accidentally run over by a car in a restaurant parking lot. The players had just finished having dinner to celebrate the hunt when the accident happened.

Is Edmonton Oiler Coach Glen Sather superstitious? Well, the Oilers switched hotels after losing to the Kings at the Forum last month, but Sather says it’s not because he’s wants to change his luck.

“I’ll tell you why we switched,” Sather said. “One of our trainers had $150 stolen from his suitcase the last time we were here and the hotel wouldn’t take responsibility for it.”

Goalie Tom Barrasso of the Buffalo Sabres, the leading candidate to win the Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s best goalie, has been hospitalized since he suffered an allergic reaction on his left leg.

Barrasso is a questionable starter for the Sabres’ last four games of the regular season, but he should be back for the playoffs next week.

Barrasso leads the NHL with five shutouts this season and has posted a 25-18-10 record.

How popular have the Kings become this season? Well there was a big line around the Forum when playoff tickets went on sale at the Forum Tuesday morning.

The club has also announced that Channel 9 will televise all of the Kings’ playoff games on the road live, beginning next Wednesday in Edmonton.