Selanne Eliminated From Ducks’ Plans

Welcome to Disney’s California Misadventure.

Once an exciting team with an apparently limitless future, the Mighty Ducks have fallen, fuzzy heads first, onto the NHL’s junk heap. Misstep by misstep, misstatement by misstatement, they have destroyed the promise they showed in their gutsy 1997 playoff victory over the Phoenix Coyotes and valiant loss to the eventual Stanley Cup champion Detroit Red Wings.

It’s bad enough the Ducks traded prolific right wing Teemu Selanne to the San Jose Sharks on Monday for center Jeff Friesen and goaltender Steve Shields, sapping what little joy remained in this miserable season. But they will pay about $3 million of Selanne’s $8.5-million salary next season, paying him to not play for them and, perhaps, keep them out of the playoffs again.

Think of it as a public service: By trading Selanne, the Ducks are sparing fans the expense of buying overpriced tickets.

Selanne is a dynamic, world-class player. He and left wing Paul Kariya were magical together, finding in each other the creativity, vision and skill that’s all too rare in the overexpanded NHL.

He added laughter to Kariya’s serious demeanor and was a leader in every sense, from looking after young teammates to signing autographs for every kid who thrust a pen and a scrap of paper at him. Long after meaningless games had ended, Selanne would be at the center of a mob outside the Arrowhead Pond, scribbling his signature. The team bus might have been ready to leave after a road game and he might have been shivering in a sport coat, but he made sure no child left unhappy.

In November, when the Ducks’ season threatened to turn sour, General Manager Pierre Gauthier said he would not trade Selanne. Of course, when Gauthier was general manager of the Ottawa Senators, he said he wasn’t leaving that city. After he left, he said he wasn’t going to take the job of his good friend, Jack Ferreira, in Anaheim. After he took Ferreira’s job, he said during the same speech in which he declared Selanne was safe, he wasn’t going to fire coach Craig Hartsburg.

After he fired Hartsburg, he traded Selanne. Several hockey executives say he told them he would not trade Selanne, which he denies.

After he rebuffed casual inquiries about the Finnish winger, he said he got “aggressive” offers and at one point it became his “duty to listen, and that’s where things evolved and we got to this trade.”

A warning to Kariya: Gauthier declared he won’t trade you, either.

“We want to keep a star player,” Gauthier said.

What if he gets a similarly “aggressive” offer? “I won’t even listen,” Gauthier said.

Gauthier insisted he hasn’t lied and if anything, he has been too honest.

“Things clearly change as the season goes along,” he said. “When I said to the team I wasn’t going to fire Craig or trade anyone, I meant that. I said, ‘If you think I’m going to bail you out by changing the coach or trading a player you’re wrong.’ I never said ‘Never.’ Things change all the time. If I had traded him the next week, then you could say something.

“There’s been a lot of water under the bridge since then, a lot of losses and injuries, and you’ve got to reevaluate things.”

Dean Lombardi, the Sharks’ general manager, acquired Selanne without diminishing his team’s depth. The Sharks, in their 10th season and seeking their first .500 finish, have been jockeying with Dallas for the Pacific Division lead but stumbled after Vincent Damphousse injured his shoulder and Owen Nolan was suspended 11 games for a dirty hit.

Friesen has been their cornerstone since 1994, when they chose him 11th overall in the entry draft. Since then, they’ve developed or acquired a strong enough ensemble to share the load and make Friesen expendable when the explosive Selanne became available.

“Since I’ve been general manager, our objective was to get better every year,” said Lombardi, who today marks his fifth anniversary on the job. “We hit this rut here, but hopefully, this will be our fifth year of improving again. . . . This isn’t a perimeter player. He commands respect in a lot of facets of the game.”

Selanne’s departure from Anaheim leaves a gaping hole.

Gauthier explained the trade as a need to move forward, an easy conclusion to reach. Last in the Western Conference and spared from being last overall only because of the ineptitude of the New York Islanders and Tampa Bay Lightning, the Ducks hardly could have regressed.

Gauthier’s secondary announcement about having put original Duck Guy Hebert on nonroster waivers with the intent of trading him, fits that plan. Hebert’s play had declined, the result of injuries and battle fatigue. He was a good soldier and was well compensated. But trading Selanne to get depth in goal is an unspoken acknowledgment of the shortcomings of the Ducks’ drafting and developmental systems. The Sharks turned one asset--Friesen--into a bigger asset, Selanne. That’s a trick the Ducks didn’t pull off.

Friesen is a solid, two-way player. He has speed that will mesh nicely with Kariya’s but lacks Selanne’s flair and quick hands. His production (12 goals and 36 points in 64 games) has dropped this season, raising doubts that he ever will be the 35- or 40-goal scorer he was projected to become. He had a 15-game goal drought earlier this season and has one goal in his last 17 games.

Shields will vie for the starting job with Jean-Sebastien Giguere, who supplanted Hebert as the No. 1 goalie a few weeks ago. Shields is streaky, a flopper rather than a classic stand-up goalie, and prone to leaving bad rebounds.

“Giguere is young,” Gauthier said, “and it’s totally unfair to ask him to play 60 or 70 games a year. I think a lot of teams will envy our goaltending position.”

The trade was his idea, he said, although he needed approval from Tony Tavares, the Ducks’ chairman, and Michael Eisner, chairman and CEO of The Walt Disney Company, the Ducks’ parent company. He also said the trade is not related to any potential sale of the club.

“I was told, ‘Pierre, do what’s right. If you think a deal makes sense for the franchise, and [what has been in place] hasn’t worked very well, do what you need to do,’ ” Gauthier said. “They’ve been very supportive of my building plan.”

After announcing the trade, Gauthier left for general managers’ meetings in La Quinta. This time, he might come back with a vial of sand and a handful of magic beans.