The King of Talk

By Bill Plaschke

Nov. 25, 2001 12 AM PT

In the ever-fascinating universe inhabited by the Kings, Saturday was a good day.

They played hockey for a full afternoon and, afterward, nobody got trashed.

Nobody was declared an insult to their parents. Nobody was deemed unworthy of a paycheck. Nobody was publicly asked whether they still wanted to be part of the team.

Nobody was an embarrassment, or an insult, or even a humiliation.

In a stunning postgame news conference at Staples Center, Coach Andy Murray didn’t have anything bad to say about anybody.

It may have been because of the 3-1 victory over the first-place San Jose Sharks.

Or maybe he finally ran out of breath.

“I thought we deserved to win,” Murray said, “In other games, we haven’t been as deserving.”

OK, so he didn’t run out of breath.

“Today is the reason you say those types of things,” Murray added. “This type of effort is what the organization expects. It’s what the fans expect. For it to not be there, that’s unacceptable.”

Well, maybe then ...

“What I said last week, I didn’t consider it ripping them,” Murray continued. “The way they played was an insult. That’s just the way it is. I was speaking from the heart.

“We, including me, played like amateurs who shouldn’t be paid.”

OK, so there was trashing.

But it was past-tense trashing.

As we said, a good day.

The embattled King players will take whatever hugs they can find from a coach who tosses encouraging words around like 100-pound weights.

Just last week, he called last season’s playoff darlings, “an insult to every parent that’s ever taken their kid to play in a hockey game at 5:30 in the morning, like their parents did for them.”

In the same interview, he added, “I can’t imagine Mr. [Phil] Anschutz sitting down and writing checks to pay some of these guys with the kind of effort they put in here tonight.”

That was after a 10-shot, 4-2 loss to the Detroit Red Wings.

Three days later, after 5-5 tie against the Calgary Flames, he told us how he really felt.

“I don’t think anybody would look at our team and say this is a highly skilled, talented team,” he said.

Not anymore, certainly.

He finished last season by publicly scolding his team’s difference-making players--the beginning of the end for Luc Robitaille.

He started this season by criticizing, by name, Glen Murray, who improved just in time to be traded.

In his third season in a job that some predicted would be over his head, Andy Murray has loudly quashed that criticism with his skate ... slicing 23 egos along with it.

The mild, kindly Murray has become the Ripper King.

He starts the sorts of fires that other coaches spend their careers trying to quell.

He invites the world into the dark rooms that other coaches will walk a dozen blocks to avoid.

He says more in one night than even forthright Phil Jackson says in an entire season.

“It’s the only way I know how to be,” Murray said. “Nobody told me I can’t say those things. If I can’t speak from my heart, then I can’t do my job.”

His quotes are great for the fans, who are surely pleased at hearing from someone in authority who thinks the way they do.

His quotes are great for us sports hacks, who have become so numbed by happyspeak that we’ll take one Jim Tracy adjective and turn it into a headline.

But one must wonder.

Is it great for his players?

Is public criticism the right tool for a team of lesser-known skaters whose success is built on the idea that they can only succeed as a family?

Do family members talk about each other this way in public?

“I don’t swear, I don’t scream at them,” Murray said. “If you lose a player because you are being honest with them, then there is something wrong with this profession and I’ll do something else.”

But in this era of the coddled athlete, can this honesty work?

It would not work in baseball. Chan Ho Park is torched, and Scott Boras runs in with a bucket of water.

It would not work in basketball. Shaquille O’Neal is criticized, and the Lakers rumble under the force of one large stomping foot.

So does it work here?

So far, the numbers say it does.

At the end of last year, the heavily criticized Kings lost only four of their last 22 games while storming to the playoffs.

Since Murray’s earlier insult-to-parents scolding this week, the team has gone unbeaten in four games.

Heck, it even seems to work in the middle of games, as the Kings have outscored opponents, 25-11, in the third period.

Some players have increasingly been grumbling under their breaths. There were several players upset about the treatment of Glen Murray, and that feeling could linger.

But publicly, well, yeah, the players say it works because, well, this is hockey.

You know, the sport where yelling is the least violent thing that could happen.

“You grow up hearing stuff like this,” said defenseman Aaron Miller. “I’ve been told I was bad my whole career. If you’re sensitive in this game, you won’t last long.”

The sport, also, where the only thing more prevalent than ice is personal accountability.

“Sometimes, a guy needs a finger pointed at him, it’s part of the business,” said veteran center Ian Laperriere. “A coach has his limits. We understand. Right now, what he says is OK.”

He was walking down the hallway toward two days off, fulfilling a promise made by Murray during the third period with the score tied 1-1.

“During a TV timeout I told them, ‘What do you say we take a couple of days off with our win today?”’ Murray recounted.

Two quick goals later, they had that win.

A good day indeed.

Bill Plaschke can be reached at bill.plaschke@latimes.com.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Murray’s Monarchy

A look at the Kings under Coach Andy Murray:

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YEAR RECORD POINTS FINISH 1999-2000 39-27-12-4 94 points 5th in West

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* Swept by Detroit in the first round of playoffs after missing the playoffs in 1998-99 under Coach Larry Robinson.