THE NHL : Just How Do Those Rumors Get Started?

‘Tis the season for trade winds. They seem to blow around the NHL constantly, but never more so than now, in the week before next Tuesday’s trading deadline.

Be assured, everybody is talking deals. Newspapers in every league city are filled with possibilities.

The problem is, many of those potential deals that appear in print never happen. And some come as news to everybody, including the clubs supposedly involved.

Where do these notions get started?

Example: The Hockey News, in anticipation of Tuesday, asked its correspondents to pretend they were general managers and make deals for the clubs they cover.

A King beat reporter said in jest in the Forum press room that he was going to trade goalie Kelly Hrudey. By the time he and several colleagues were done tossing names around, it was decided to send Hrudey to the Pittsburgh Penguins for forward Kevin Stevens.

It was all in fun. With their first division title nearly within reach, with perhaps their best club ever heading into the playoffs, it is inconceivable that the Kings would shake up their goaltending and tamper with their chemistry at this crucial point. A key to their success has been the two-man rotation in the net, allowing both Hrudey and Daniel Berthiaume to stay fresh and consistent.

But apparently not everyone got the joke. The rumor spread and, sure enough, a radio station aired a report that Hrudey was on the trading block.

Example II: Every team would be interested in obtaining the No. 1 draft choice this year, with Eric Lindros, predicted to be the game’s next star, becoming available.

The team that finishes last in the league will pick first.

One rumor that made the rounds of newspapers across North America, including this one, had the Edmonton Oilers offering three big names that have been with them through the Stanley Cup years of the 1980s to the Quebec Nordiques for their first pick. A similar offer was reportedly made to the New Jersey Devils, who own the Toronto Maple Leafs’ top selection.

Quebec and Toronto have the league’s worst records.

Such a deal seemed plausible, until an Edmonton reporter claimed he’d made the whole thing up in a bar.

Example III: The Kings’ Luc Robitaille, who, if you believe everything you hear, has been involved in more deals than Monty Hall, was rumored to be headed to the Hartford Whalers last summer for Kevin Dineen and Ray Ferraro.

Said who?

Said a Hartford television station.

Their source seemed solid. It was Phil Langan, the Whalers’ director of public relations. A caller, identifying himself as Langan, had called the station’s news director, Paul Frega, just before a scheduled sportscast to report the deal.

The station went on the air with the story and it spread across the country.

The problem was, it wasn’t Langan who had called. It turned out to be an impostor pulling off a hoax.

When he found out he had been taken, chagrined sportscaster Tony Terzi, the man who aired the story, said: “Now I’m left sucking pond water. . . . I feel like a big dummy.�

He’s not alone. Virtually everyone in the media is guilty on occasion of feeding off one another out of a fear of being scooped.

And hockey is certainly not the only sport subject to such problems.

A few years ago, during a Laker-Trail Blazer game at the Forum, a rumor circulated among the media about a blockbuster deal by Portland.

It turned out the rumor was started by then-coach Jack Ramsay on the team bus heading to the game. He wanted to see how far it would spread.

He wasn’t disappointed. It was picked up by at least one radio station.

Of course, not every trade rumor turns out to be false. Bernie Nicholls can verify that.

Add trades: One of the teams most likely to consummate a deal is Edmonton.

The Oilers would like to get Lindros. And with center Mark Messier out indefinitely because of a broken thumb, their need for depth at center is increased.

They have two possible ways to go:

(a) Trade a goalie.

(b) Trade the rights to wing Jari Kurri.

It was generally assumed that Edmonton would try to deal goalie Grant Fuhr once he came back from a suspension for drug abuse since fellow goalie Bill Ranford had come on so strong to lead the Oilers to the Stanley Cup last spring.

But with Ranford bothered first by back problems and now by inconsistency, and Fuhr making, at least initially, a successful comeback, the issue is more clouded.

Ranford at 24 is four years younger than Fuhr. But Ranford has a contract that is up next year, while Fuhr is already signed to a long-term deal.

The most likely scenario has the Oilers dealing the rights to Kurri for a player or players who can give them the push they need to defend the Cup seriously.

Kurri, who has spent this season playing in Europe, is being shopped around. Whether he is traded now or after the season seems to be the only question.

The Kings would like to have him, but if Oiler owner Peter Pocklington were to allow Kurri to reunite with his old linemate, Wayne Gretzky, in Los Angeles, Pocklington might have to leave Edmonton himself.

Asked if the Kings would still be interested in Kurri now that the line of Gretzky, Tomas Sandstrom and Tony Granato has been so successful, Gretzky said with a laugh: “Oh, I think we’d find room for a Jari Kurri.�

Quotebook: Phil Esposito, on how he got Japanese investors to put money into his Tampa Bay expansion hockey team: “They thought I said sake. “