Hostetler’s Absence Makes the Raider Offense Ponder

Kansas City quarterback Dave Krieg, after stepping in for Joe Montana:

“I said: ‘Jeez, he pulled a hamstring? I didn’t know he even had a hamstring!’ ”

And Jeff Hostetler has a sprained ankle, Randall Cunningham has a busted leg and Bobby Hebert has a bum elbow--NFL facts of life. Any football team had better be prepared for a quarterbacking emergency, as the Chiefs were here Sunday and the Raiders were not.

Vince Evans, over the hill, and Billy Joe Hobert, who’s never even been to the hill, are all the Raiders have. They are a couple of earnest and enthusiastic individuals, neither of whom is remotely equipped to take this team to a Super Bowl, which means that the Raiders must spend the entire 1993 NFL season praying for Hostetler’s safety.

No wonder reports were floated last week (true or false) that the Raiders had made inquiries to the Indianapolis Colts with regard to Jeff George. Someone in this organization simply has to recognize that Hostetler, like Montana, does indeed have a hamstring, an ankle, an elbow, a thigh, a breast, a drumstick, all kinds of vulnerable areas, and that the Raiders absolutely cannot succeed without him.

Already, after four weeks, the still-skillful Montana has missed one game and been bodily removed from two others. He was bounced out of Sunday’s game with the Raiders well before halftime, on an out-of-bounds tumble that Montana did not blame on the tackler while his teammates strongly disagreed. (“Now there was a real cheap shot,” Chief defensive end Neil Smith said.)

Playing without their own quarterback, the Raiders for 60 minutes snapped the ball to Evans, who was every bit as ineffective as Krieg had been when Kansas City was shut out by Houston in his only start. Yet at least Krieg qualifies as a functioning pro quarterback, whereas Evans was making his first start in 10 years and Hobert has never set foot on an NFL field for a regular-season game.

Hostetler’s leg was twisted in Game 1, his ankle was sprained in Game 3 and he sat out Game 4. How willing are the Raiders to rely on stopgap measures, week after week?

Their personal affection for Evans is such that they tend to rally behind him, everywhere but on the field.

Even Marcus Allen, who must have been influenced by current events in Russia with his latest reference to Al Davis as a “totalitarian dictator,” said after Sunday’s game that it was Evans as much as anyone who “helped me to maintain my sanity” in his L.A. days.

Most everyone who has met Vince Evans thinks the world of Vince Evans. And he certainly did put the pigskin in the palms of Rocket Ismail when the Raider rookie finally was given a chance to show what he could do (and did it).

Otherwise, though, this game was a sorry mess. Evans had happy feet, scrambling from the very first play from scrimmage, a play on which he juggled the ball out of bounds. On this same series he was sacked for minus-13 after scrambling in reverse. He threw some wobblers and also threw a bullet in the end zone right into the hands of a Chief player, who bobbled it.

OK, say Hostetler returns. Opponents will go after him; it’s the nature of the beast. After watching what Aaron Wallace did to Montana--one of 16 penalties the reckless Raiders committed--offensive lineman Joe Valerio of the Chiefs said: “I think stuff like that should be avoided. But maybe the Raiders didn’t want to avoid it.”

Bootlegging, Montana bluffed a pass, gained four yards and veered toward the sideline. He went sprawling, entangled with Wallace, who drew 15 yards for unnecessary roughness, and was removed from the contest with 9:07 remaining in the second period, never to return.

Wallace said: “I don’t feel it was (a cheap shot). It’s forgotten. Both of us were making for the sidelines and he slid faster than I did. Whatever happened to him happened before I got there.”

Montana judged Wallace innocent.

“No, he didn’t fall on it. They say it happened when he grabbed me, but I don’t remember,” Montana said. “All I know is right before I got to the sideline, I felt it (the hamstring) go. I was going to keep running so I didn’t get hit. It was a little pop.”

Not so sure of Wallace’s motives were Chief players such as cornerback Albert Lewis, who asked:

“Who knows what’s in a man’s heart?”

Nobody does. Who knows what was in Raider tackle Nolan Harrison’s heart when he bumped umpire Dennis Riggs, earning ejection and risking suspension. Griped Harrison: “I just put my hands on him--you know, like when you’re just talking to someone. You know if I was to maliciously hit a ref, his (butt) would have been on the ground.”

And who knows which opponent could maliciously put Jeff Hostetler on the ground, leaving the Raiders in agony? This team needs quarterback insurance now or it will pay later.

* CUNNINGHAM OUT: The Eagles’ quarterback suffers a broken left leg during 35-30 victory over the Jets. C4