Kariya to Test His Patience in Training Camp

There is no running for Paul Kariya. No riding the LifeCycle.

And certainly no skating.

Kariya reported to Mighty Duck training camp in good spirits Saturday, but he won’t be on the ice until late this month according to a schedule designed to get him ready to play as close as possible to the start of the season.

Kariya is cautiously rehabilitating an abdominal muscle injury and has been on nearly complete rest for more than a month. He started with two weeks of inactivity, and now is receiving treatments and electrical muscle stimulation as well as doing some exercises supported by what amounts to a giant medicine ball.

“It’s getting a lot stronger,” Kariya said of the tender and inflamed muscle in his lower abdomen that led him to withdraw from the World Cup. “I just have to try not to get frustrated.”

Kariya will start lifting weights and swimming Monday, but management is not planning for him to play in any exhibition games. Whether he’ll be ready for the first regular-season game (Oct. 4 at Toronto) is uncertain, although that’s the goal.

“If you don’t take care of it properly, this can become a chronic situation,” Kariya said. “I’ve had pulls and strains in my stomach and groin, but when this didn’t go away, I knew it was serious.”

The injury apparently happened when he began to favor one foot late last season after blocking a shot with the other, and was exacerbated by competing in the World Championships and failing to properly rest the injury.

“There are some positives,” Kariya said. “I learned I have to take proper rest, and I learned it’s important to stretch after a workout, too.”

There’s at least one other thing.

“My shot-blocking technique,” he said with a laugh. “Don’t take it in the foot; take it in the shin pad.”

*

The contract situations that have kept right wing Roman Oksiuta, defenseman David Karpa and center J.F. Jomphe out of camp aren’t likely to be resolved quickly--and one reason is that the team has almost all of the leverage and isn’t likely to give in much.

“I would think it would be weeks rather than days,” said Oksiuta’s agent, Rich Winter. “We’re a fair ways apart.”

“I don’t see any end in sight,” said Karpa’s agent, Jeff Solomon, saying the sides are not close.

The three players are in weak bargaining positions because they are restricted free agents and none is truly irreplaceable, though Oksiuta and Karpa play solid roles.

Even if another team made a contract offer, the Ducks would only have to match the offer to keep them.

Because of that, the agents said, teams aren’t likely to bother, leaving the players with no option except to take the Ducks’ best offer or play outside the NHL.

“They’ve got no leverage,” Duck defenseman Bobby Dollas said. “But the players have got to voice their displeasure and management has got to voice its displeasure. If the team needs a player, it’s one thing, but if they don’t they can hold on forever. The player doesn’t get any money and the team is without a player. Which can last longer? The company.

“I told Dave, what’s the worst thing that can happen. He said, ‘Get traded,’ and I said, ‘That’s it.’ ”

Oksiuta, 26, made $250,000 last season and was the third-leading scorer on the Anaheim roster with 23 goals and 51 points.

Karpa, 25, made $215,000 and was second on the team with 270 penalty minutes. Jomphe, 23, had two goals and 14 points in 31 games after being called up from the minors last season and would have made $160,000 had he been in the NHL all season.

“His career could be over before it starts,” Duck General Manager Jack Ferreira said.

Assistant Coach Tim Army said the players’ absence hurts in more than the obvious ways.

“Look at other sports where there are more players in that situation,” he said.

“You watch football, there’s a contract dispute. Somebody holds out, then comes in and he’s behind schedule and they often get hurt. Sometimes they rush it, and at this level of athletics that can make you susceptible to injury.

“The other thing is your state of mind. Your mental focus has been on negotiations and not mental and physical preparations when you come in late.”

*

The “routine physicals” at training camp will never seem quite so routine again after defenseman Milos Holan’s blood test last September revealed he had a high white blood-cell count, a symptom that led to the diagnosis of his leukemia.

A year later, his cancer is in remission seven months after a potentially life-saving bone-marrow transplant.

However, Holan--who probably would have been on the Czech Republic’s World Cup team--is still struggling with some digestive disorders related to the transplant and is hospitalized at the City of Hope National Medical Center in Duarte.

“He is making slow, steady progress,” said Dr. Stephen Forman, director of hematology and bone-marrow transplantation at the City of Hope. “We’re just trying to change his medication right now to make it easier. From a physical perspective, he’s made a lot of progress the last few weeks. It gives us reason to think he’ll recover all his physical strength.”

Five months from now, Holan, who received marrow from an anonymous donor, will be given the opportunity to meet the person who saved his life. Regulations regarding the transplant delay such meetings for a year because of concern about emotional stress.

Duck Notes

Training camp sessions will be open to the public today through Friday at the Disney ICE facility at 300 W. Lincoln Ave. in Anaheim. Practice times are approximately 9 a.m.-1:15 p.m. Seating is limited . . . Free agents invited to camp on tryouts are goaltender Craig Brown, left wings Bob Wren and Adam Young, right wing Barry Nieckar, centers Mike Hall and Chris Pittman and defenseman Keith Aldridge.