Report: Sean Avery Hospitalized

The NY Daily News is reporting that New York Rangers agitator Sean Avery has been hospitalized.

Rangers bad boy Sean Avery, unconscious and not breathing, was rushed to a Manhattan hospital Wednesday morning in cardiac arrest just hours after his team’s playoff loss, sources said.

Avery, 28, arrived at St. Vincent’s Medical Center about 3 a.m., according to the hospital source. The Rangers had just lost 5-3 a short time earlier in the Stanley Cup playoffs against the Pittsburgh Penguins at Madison Square Garden.

Update 1210pm: TSN is reporting that Avery has a lacerated spleen.

Update 1230pm: The Rangers have issued a statement:

He was taken to St. Vincent’s hospital after the game, and was admitted following a CT scan.  He is expected to make a full recovery during the off-season.

Update 1250pm: As people were clamoring for information before, I’m sure many went to ESPN.com.  Unfortunately, I think a lot of eyes went to the main story first, which contained a link titled: “Adios Avery?”, about Dallas Mavericks’ coach Avery Johnson’s job security.  I took a screenshot, with that link in blue, and the Sean Avery story link highlighted in yellow.

I’m not picking on ESPN, it’s simply bad timing, but they might want to rephrase given today’s events.

Also, in that ESPN story Scott Burnside is reporting the Rangers are denying facts from the initial NY Daily News report:

The team also denied a published report in the New York Daily News—which first reported Avery’s hospitalization—that the forward had been taken to a Manhattan hospital while unconscious and in cardiac arrest.

The Rangers said Avery was admitted to St. Vincent’s Medical Center following a CT scan and is expected to make a full recovery. Avery walked into the medical facility with team doctor Andrew Feldman, and the two took a car to the hospital, not an emergency vehicle, the team said.

Update 115pm:  The NY Daily News post about Avery is all sorts of different now.  There are subtractions, additions, and not one mention of an edit.  I understand a story like this breaks, and everyone can’t nitpick all the facts as there’s a race to report, but the original sourced story around the web right now is from the News and it looks like we’ve all quoted phantom material.  The timestamp is different, that’s about it.  It’s alright to post edits and updates, it doesn’t make your organization look weak, it makes you look like you’re continuously reporting, and certainly helps your readers understand what’s correct.  Comparison: now, original.

Update 330pm: Others have also taken issue with the NY Daily News’ method of reporting today.  Alanah over at Kukla’s Korner walks through today’s sequence of events and covers mainstream reporting in general.  Eric McErlain looks directly at the News and asks what happened.  Greg Wyshynski over on Yahoo’s Experts Blog does the same.

Side-note: I think that’s our first shout to Greg over at his new home. Have fun over there.