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Friday, September 24, 1999
Rocky's prepared for Laraque-y II
He stormed right after Toronto scrapper Tie Domi, and promptly wound up with 14 minutes in penalties.
Tonight, he's apt to bump into another tough hombre, Georges La-raque of the Oilers.
"I'm not going to go out on my first shift and challenge him like I did with Domi," said Thompson following yesterday's tough, two-hour skate at the 'Dome.
"I know I have to be smarter. I have to be calmer. I put the guys in a hole by going after Domi right away and I don't want to do that again. But the last time I fought Georges Laraque, I won. So I wouldn't be surprised if he came out looking for me.
"I'll be ready. If he wants to, bring it on."
Laraque is willing to concede Thompson the first round of the war, but doesn't seem convinced Rocky means enough in the over-all scheme of things to warrant many more set-to's.
"I fought him one time in my second training camp, an exhibition game," he told the Edmonton Sun. "He wanted to fight. He had the way better of me. I stunk the first time. I totally underrated him. He was hitting with both hands and I went down when he switched to the left, or whatever he did.
"Exhibition may be different but during the regular season, I'm not going against a guy who doesn't play and is not a factor. Just because he wants to fight me doesn't mean I'm going to."
QUICK HITS: The Oil are apparently close to re-signing Ryan Smyth, who has been in camp without a contract. The news is not so good on Bill Guerin -- reportedly asking $3.5 million US and offered $2.5 million -- or Mike Grier --asking in the neighbourhood of $900,000 US, offered the 10% qualifying raise on his last year's deal of $400,000 Cdn. Defenceman Roman Hamrlik, meanwhile, is up in arms because the Oilers want to qualify him at his base salary of $2 million US (negotiated while he was in Tampa Bay) for last year, instead of the $2.6 million he made including signing bonus.
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