Disney Picks NHL Veteran to Forge New Ducks Team : Hockey: General Manager Jack Ferreira will pull the nascent Anaheim team together in less than six months.

The Mighty Ducks, the Walt Disney Co.’s fledgling National Hockey League team, took their first big step toward the ice Tuesday by naming veteran NHL executive Jack Ferreira as general manager.

It will be Ferreira’s job to put together a team, from hiring coaches and a scouting staff to making the crucial selections in June’s expansion and entry drafts. But with little more than six months remaining before the Ducks’ first game in early October, Ferreira has one major advantage over the 10 other candidates interviewed: He has done it before.

This will be Ferreira’s second experience with the challenges of starting an NHL team from scratch. Two years ago, he helped guide the San Jose Sharks through their formative months. The team was 17-58-5 in its first season before Ferreira was ousted in a front-office power play.

Though the Ducks will make their debut under different circumstances and a different set of draft guidelines than did the Sharks, Ferreira is prepared for certain similarities.

“The one thing that’s constant is that you have to have a lot of patience,” he said. “As far as the team is concerned, I’m certainly not going to sit here and tell you we’re going to be competitive with X number of wins or be competitive as far as the playoffs are concerned. But what I can promise you is that . . . we’re going to be a team that’s competitive. You’re going to appreciate our work ethic.”

Until Tuesday, many of the Disney NHL team’s actions concerned off-ice matters. Anaheim’s 1993-94 expansion companion, the South Florida team owned by Blockbuster’s H. Wayne Huizenga, announced Bobby Clarke as general manager on March 1 and already has scouts working, but no nickname.

Disney’s team, by contrast, has endured hullabaloos over the nickname Disney Chairman Michael Eisner chose in honor of the Disney hockey movie, and over some ticket prices that fans said were too high, specifically the $18 “cheap seat.”

The news conference Disney held March 1 to formally announce the team’s debut in the 1993-94 season was vintage Disney, complete with choreographed cheerleaders and hockey players as well as Mickey, Aladdin and the Beast. This second conference, with no such characters in attendance, signaled that Disney is serious about its hockey team, even if the ultimate goal is still, in Eisner’s words, “a hassle-free entertainment/sports experience.”

Still, Eisner has insisted that the first team should be competitive, and he took substantial time away from his duties as head of the global entertainment giant to spend about an hour with each candidate who interviewed at Disney’s Burbank headquarters.

The general manager he and team President Tony Tavares ultimately chose is well-regarded in hockey circles, and Tavares said Ferreira was recommended to him as one of the top three judges of talent in the game.

“Everybody thinks they have the ability to recognize talent,” Tavares said. “Not everybody has demonstrated the ability to recognize the talent it takes to perform in the NHL.”

Ferreira, 48, also was general manager of the Minnesota North Stars from 1988 to 1990. He was previously the New York Rangers’ director of player development and spent six years as a scout for the Calgary Flames.

Toronto General Manager Cliff Fletcher, who was Ferreira’s boss in Calgary, describes him as “an excellent judge of hockey talent,” and “a good all-around hockey man.”

Ferreira was chosen over a group that also included Bob McCammon, the former Vancouver and Philadelphia coach. But Eisner and Tavares also found another favorite candidate--Pierre Gauthier, 39, who is director of scouting for Quebec and has been given much credit for spotting some of the talent that has helped the Nordiques compile the third-best record in the NHL this season.

They solved their problem by hiring both. Gauthier accepted a position as assistant general manager, largely because of a relationship with Ferreira that goes back 12 years, when both were scouts.

Now they will pool their knowledge--Ferreira has been scouting the NHL and the minor leagues for Montreal this season, and Gauthier has focused on amateur players in North America and Europe--to try to draft the best possible group in June.

“Our company has always believed that talent is what drives our various businesses,” Eisner said. “We think, as you can tell by the selection process, that between Pierre and Jack we picked two men who understand talent.”

Ferreira will use some of the lessons learned from his first expansion experience with the Sharks.

“To expect young players to really carry you, that’s probably a mistake I made,” he said. “They might be OK for three, four or five games in a row, but over 84 games, everything seeks its level. It’s very difficult (for youngsters) to compete, especially as the season gets past the All-Star break and players start smelling the playoffs.”

The Sharks, troubled by injuries this season, have fallen behind their first year’s pace and have won only 10 games.

Tavares said he researched Ferreira’s ouster in San Jose and concluded that it should not prevent him from being hired.

“The San Jose thing, I think if you really delve into it, some personalities sometimes don’t work in some organizations,” Tavares said. “My investigation never led me to the conclusion that Jack and San Jose parted ways over ability.”

Said Sharks President Art Savage: “Certain people work in certain organizations. Coaches change all the time, general managers and so forth. Obviously this wasn’t the place for him.”

As for who will coach the Ducks, Ferreira said the picture might become clearer in six to eight weeks, as coaches now under contract complete their seasons.

After that, the Ducks’ first season will be on the horizon.

“We may not win 79 games our first year, that may take till our third year,” said Eisner, perhaps forgetting for the moment that the NHL record set by the Montreal Canadiens in 1977 is 60 victories in an 80-game season. No matter to Eisner.

“The Mighty Ducks in the movie, you’ll notice, didn’t start winning right away,” he said. “It took time.”

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