The league of extraordinary groin injuries

It seems nearly every NHL team has a player out with a groin injury this year, and I hadn't the foggiest why this was happening. Luckily, the Minnesota Star-Tribune ran a story on this yesterday.

Groin, abdominal and hip injuries are running rampant in the NHL. An NHL injury report Monday showed 21 players listed with these types of injuries.

Before Monday's practice, assistant coach Mike Ramsey reminded players to stretch their groins.

There could be several reasons for the rash of groin injuries: increased speed in the NHL because of the rule changes, inactivity during the lockout and bad ice.

Gaborik, like many of his teammates, blames poor ice for the groin epidemic.

"Ice has been bad everywhere," Gaborik said. "Sometimes you can't control where your legs are going."

Forward Brian Rolston said the ice in Chicago "was horrible. It was terrible. The thing is your legs start to get fatigued and the ice is so bad, you have to work harder to skate and that's when injuries happen."

Speaking of injuries, you have to feel for NHL players and the lack of privacy they get sometimes. Just look at the ailment keeping the Oilers Raffi Torres out tonight.

Couldn't they have just said it was his groin?