Chief Disciplinarian Duties Keep Him Busy

Between setting policy, watching games, reviewing tapes of offenses that might warrant suspensions and deciding how harshly to rap offenders’ knuckles, Colin Campbell rarely gets to sleep before 2:30 a.m.

“It’s been a hearing a day,” said Campbell, who replaced Brian Burke as the NHL’s director of hockey operations and chief disciplinarian this season.

The hearing du jour Monday was for King left wing Matt Johnson, who sucker-punched Ranger defenseman Jeff Beukeboom from behind Thursday and was suspended for 12 games. Beukeboom was knocked out and fell face-first to the ice, suffering a concussion that kept him out of the Rangers’ next game.

Alarmed by the number of concussions players have suffered in recent years, the NHL gave Campbell a mandate to severely punish offenders who inflict head injuries. Since his term began, he has imposed supplementary discipline on 20 players for a total of 67 exhibition and regular-season games for offenses such as high-sticking, elbowing, punching, physical abuse of a linesman and--this season’s favorite--slew-footing, or kicking an opponent’s legs out from under him.

Soft-spoken as a player and as coach of the New York Rangers, Campbell is carrying a big hammer. But he’s not sure players are getting the message that they will pay if they go outside the rules when they hit opponents in the head. He wonders if players, who are earning more money than ever and so have more at stake, are more inclined to be reckless and willing to do whatever it takes to stay in the NHL--including taking cheap shots that injure opponents.

“There’s 27 teams now,” he said. “Do they see what’s going on, or are they busy in their own little world? Do they understand? Do the dollars in our business give them security and lead them to say, ‘Screw it,’ or does competitiveness make players raise the bar?

“I think I’ll know in the next month or month and a half. Maybe they’ll see we will increase the penalties.”

Campbell seems tougher than Burke, but Campbell says the NHL planned to crack down on players who cause head injuries this season no matter who was the Lord of Discipline. He has consulted Burke about procedural matters, such as whom to interview when he investigated the racial slur allegedly uttered by Chris Gratton about Peter Worrell--for which he exonerated Gratton--but he relies on his own judgment in determining suspensions.

“I call it the snowflake theory,” Campbell said. “They’re all cold and white and wet, but they’re all different. None is alike.”

Campbell stirred some controversy when he didn’t suspend Flyer center Eric Lindros for a thumping hit on Ottawa Senator right wing Andreas Dackell that left Dackell woozy and cut all over his face. After seeing the hit from several angles and in slow motion--and agonizing--Campbell decided it was not illegal.

“You can’t tell me it didn’t hurt,” Campbell said. “Eric is probably the biggest, fastest player in the game. He’s mean too. He plays on the edge. But he also gets worked over by guys like [Rich] Pilon, [Shane] Churla and [Darius] Kasparaitis. He targets back.

“Will he be here in this office sometime? I don’t know. Maybe. But this was a tough one. There was a question of whether I was on a witch hunt, whether I was intimidated by Roger [Neilson, the Flyers’ coach], Eric and Mr. [Ed] Snider [the Flyers’ owner]. You have to wipe all those aside.”

He has done a good job sweeping aside doubts about his intentions.

OPEN MOUTH, INSERT FOOT

Owner John McMullen of the New Jersey Devils doesn’t often make public comments. Too bad he broke his silence last week, at a symposium on the “Business of Sports” at Montclair State in New Jersey.

McMullen, who formerly owned the Houston Astros, objected to an assertion blacks are underrepresented in management positions in major league sports.

“We continue to get criticized for this, and it’s not fair,” he told the New York Daily News. “I’ve tried to hire several of these people. They don’t choose to work. I’ve offered plenty of players jobs, but they say they can’t work for $25,000. Their retirement and pension money is so high.”

Maybe he should have offered more than $25,000.

He also revealed the extent of his arrogance when he added, “We’re the most successful franchise in the whole area, and no one ever says thanks. Instead, they’re in here banging me for not having a . . . woman coaching my hockey team.”

It seems he got thanks enough three years ago, when he got concessions on his lease at the Meadowlands to keep him from carrying out his threat to move the Devils to Nashville. If he wants more, he’s in the wrong business.

WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?

In an effort to improve ice conditions, the NHL on Monday began limiting the number of players who can skate onto the ice before the second and third periods to players starting the period for each team. All other players must go to their benches.

The league’s intentions are good, but the result might be bad. If players can’t loosen up, they’re more likely to pull a groin or leg muscle on their first shift. Why penalize players because teams can’t figure out how to maintain decent ice surfaces?

Other changes include having teams move toward the ice with one minute left before the period starts and not permitting TV broadcasters to delay the start of any period. Both are meant to speed up games, and both are commendable.

MORE THAN A NICHOLLS’ WORTH

The Sharks could have shown more class when they removed Bernie Nicholls from their active roster Saturday and asked him to retire and stay with them but didn’t have a specific job offer.

Nicholls, who was electrifying in scoring 70 goals and 150 points for the Kings in 1988-89 and ranks 32nd in NHL history with 475 goals, was past his prime when he got to San Jose. However, he was good at guiding young players and is considered a good influence in the locker room.

Nicholls, 37, may try to play elsewhere. But he seems more inclined to accept what the Sharks come up with, probably scouting or coaching as an assistant.

“What’s best for me in the long run?” he said. “If I take a job here and it’s for the long run, then it’s in my best interest to stay.”

SLAP SHOTS

There was something odd about the child carried by a woman at Pittsburgh’s Civic Arena last Saturday, when the Penguins gave Beanie Babies to children under 14 accompanied by an adult. The baby didn’t move. The baby didn’t cry. A guard took a close look: The baby was a teddy bear, dressed in an infant’s clothes. A Penguin spokesman said the woman did not get the Beanie Baby. . . . The Phoenix Coyotes have held opponents to two goals or fewer in 14 straight games, the longest such streak since the 1967-68 expansion.

Sheldon Kennedy scored a goal and got two standing ovations Friday as he began a 25-game tryout with the International Hockey League’s Manitoba Moose. Kennedy, the victim of longtime sexual abuse by former junior coach Graham James, has been out of the NHL since the 1996-97 season. “For a long time, people didn’t know how to react to me, and it was uplifting the way people were excited for me tonight,” he said. “People who are abused feel they can’t succeed at anything, and that’s one of the reasons I came back. I want to show them they can.” However, his chances of returning to the NHL are slim after so long an absence.

Goalies Byron Dafoe of Boston and Olaf Kolzig of Washington grabbed each other when their teams brawled Saturday, but neither tried to hurt the other. They’re friends and each was the best man at the other’s wedding. . . . Chicago Blackhawk General Manager Bob Murray called goalie Jeff Hackett “too sensitive” after he traded Hackett to Montreal in a six-player deal last week. Hackett was struggling and didn’t get along with fellow goalie Mark Fitzpatrick, so it was wise for Murray to get what he could.

The Rangers and Penguins discussed a deal to send Niklas Sundstrom or Alexei Kovalev to Pittsburgh for the rights to holdout Petr Nedved. But don’t expect the Rangers to throw money at the cash-poor Penguins. NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman has indicated he would veto a cash-heavy deal, as he would if the Kings tried to buy Jaromir Jagr out of Pittsburgh. And that has crossed the Kings’ minds.

Maurice “Rocket” Richard is feeling better than he was last winter, when doctors found a tumor in his abdomen. The tumor has shrunk and he’s able to get around more easily. . . . When the Detroit Red Wing plane was struck and damaged by a catering truck while sitting on an airport runway in Calgary, players had to take a three-hour bus ride to Edmonton. Instead of whining, they used the time to bond and won their next two games. It helped that Coach Scotty Bowman let them out at an A&W; stand for refreshments.