He Says the NHL Is Becoming a Bit Drafty

Jeff Jacobs of the Hartford Courant on the National Hockey League’s waiver draft: “It is designed to help weak teams. It is supposed to free young players trapped in the minors.

“But the waiver draft actually is a used-car sale with only the lemons and aged gas-guzzlers available. For a while, it was a way for teams to stock up on goons at the last minute. Now that the NHL finally has taken steps to curb brawling, even that avenue has dried up.

“Only about 10 players actually move each year. But if you are a veteran with a wife, a kid starting the first grade, and own a home in the city you play in, how would you feel? A player accepts the capriciousness of the trading game when he enters hockey, but systematically uprooting guys two days before the season to send them to Winnipeg often strikes one as inhumane.

“What the draft does is give general managers until the last minute to play games with their rosters. It gives the media three days to write about how a team no longer wants a fading player with a big salary. And, then, only a few players actually move. It needlessly embarrasses professionals.”

Face in the crowd: Tony Kornheiser of the Washington Post, in a story on the obscurity of the Capitals’ lineup, conducted a random survey during which he asked respondents to name two players on the club’s roster.

Washington Redskin lineman Dexter Manley said he only knew two Capitals: “Rob Langway, and that guy they shipped out, the guy whose father is an actor, the guy who does Mazda commercials.” James Garner? Manley nodded. You mean Mike Gartner? “Yeah,” he said, “isn’t his dad an actor?”

Trivia time: What was the only National League team to win four consecutive pennants?

Curtain call: Sandy Keenan of Newsday quotes Coach Lou Carnesecca of St. John’s on the Big East’s experiment with six personal fouls instead of five for all league basketball games this season: “Now we can keep them in until they get three (first-half) fouls. It’s like an insurance policy for the better players, a luxury. Let’s face it, we’re in the entertainment business. People want to see the best players.”

Big Sky: After Idaho beat Northern Arizona, 41-31, on Oct. 7, the plane taking the Vandals back to Idaho was forced to make an emergency landing at San Francisco International Airport because of hydraulic problems.

Passengers braced for a crash landing, but the plane landed safely.

“We finally get a game where I don’t lose too much hair and then I lose a bunch on the flight home,” Idaho Coach John Smith said.

Sole man: Said former Kentucky basketball coach Eddie Sutton, now working for Nike: “I’ve talked to other people and they say how nice it would be to take a year off from their regular job. That’s basically what I’m doing.”

Sutton’s job includes watching practices and games involving college teams that wear Nike shoes this season. But don’t look for him at Kentucky; the Wildcats’ new coach, Rick Pitino, switched the team to Converse shoes.

Trivia answer: The New York Giants, 1921 through 1924.

Quotebook: Portland State Coach Pokey Allen, on quarterback Darren Del’Andrae of Calabasas: “Darren does a lot of things wrong. And most of them work.”