UPDATE 12:40 P.M. EST: Just another day in the wacky world of hockey journalism. An hour after the NY Daily News reported that Sean Avery of the New York Rangers had gone into cardiac arrest and was rushed to the hospital this morning, TSN ran a piece saying it was actually for a lacerated spleen. The New York Rangers announced the same news on their Web site regarding Avery. The Daily News then altered its original story, taking out any references to his having stopped breathing or cardiac arrest. Soon after, the Globe and Mail got an official denial from the Rangers on the "cardiac arrest" story, and reported that Avery actually walked into the hospital on his own -- pretty amazing feat for a guy who was supposed to be unconscious.

So was this the Daily News jumping the gun in a spectacular way? Will the paper explain how a lacerated spleen becomes an early morning heart attack through its sources? We'll keen an eye out ... in the meantime, here's our unedited original post on this breaking Sean Avery story:

EARLIER: Say what you will about the guy -- and Lord knows we've said a lot here over the last few weeks -- but this is as stunning and frightening as it gets. John Dellapina and Larry McShane break the story in the New York Daily News that New York Rangers forward Sean Avery had a brush with death this morning, according to their sources:

Rangers bad boy Sean Avery, unconscious and not breathing, was rushed to a Manhattan hospital Wednesday 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., a hospital source said. Five hours earlier, the Rangers lost to the Pittsburgh Penguins in a Stanley Cup playoff game at Madison Square Garden. He remained in the intensive care unit this afternoon, the hospital source said. Avery, traded to the Rangers last year from Los Angeles, lives in Manhattan.

The News reports that there's "no immediate word on what happened to Avery before he was taken to the hospital."

There are probably a few words bouncing around in your heads right now, because they're bouncing around in ours: "Karma," "tragic," and maybe even "inevitable." The how's and the why's of this story will be explained in due time; meanwhile, let's add another rather unexpected word to the conversations about Sean Avery: "prayers."

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