Fracture

Clippers' rookie power forward Blake Griffin, the No. 1 overall draft choice in June, has a stress fracture of the left patella, or kneecap, and could miss as much as six weeks of the season. The news, released late Monday, came on the eve of the team's NBA opener, and the blow was a significant one, meaning the Clippers will be starting the season minus the fresh new face of the franchise and might be without him in the lineup for the first 20 games of the season. Tests revealed the fracture and a second opinion later in the day backed up the results and conclusion of the first doctor.

The last we saw of Jered Weaver, the Angels ace was corkscrewing his lanky 6-foot-7, 210-pound frame into the mound at Texas on April 7, his left elbow buckling as he hit the ground to avoid a wicked line drive off the bat of Rangers first baseman Mitch Moreland. Weaver was considerably more upright Wednesday night, standing tall and sturdy on the Angel Stadium mound in his first game back after missing seven weeks because of a left elbow fracture. A 20-game winner last season, Weaver gave the Angels a huge shot in the arm, yielding one run and five hits, striking out seven and walking none in six innings of a 4-3 victory over the Dodgers.

Pope Benedict XVI waved reassuringly to well-wishers outside a hospital Friday where he underwent surgery to set his right wrist, fractured in a fall at his Alpine vacation chalet. The 82-year-old pope's accident was the first significant medical issue of his 4-year-old papacy, but doctors said he would suffer no long-term effects and would be able to return to playing piano and writing once the wrist heals. His cast will be removed in a month.

OCATE, N.M. - Sitting in the tidy living room of the home they built themselves, Sandra and Roger Alcon inventory what they see as the bounty of their lives: freedom, family, community, land, animals … and water. "We've lived off the land for five generations," said Roger Alcon, 63, looking out on a northern New Mexico landscape of high mesas, ponderosa pines and black Angus cattle. "We have what we need. We've been very happy, living in peace. " Wells are the Alcons' only source of water.

Lakers point guard Steve Nash was diagnosed with a "small non-displaced fracture in the head of his fibula," according to a statement released by the team. Nash underwent an MRI exam on his left leg, which was injured in Wednesday night's game against the Portland Trail Blazers. Team doctor Steve Lombardo made the diagnosis, which will keep Nash out for at least a week, when he'll then be re-examined. Nash was acquired over the summer in trade from the Phoenix Suns. The Lakers have started the season 0-3 after losing all eight of their exhibition games.

Brett Favre missed his second straight day of practice for the Minnesota Vikings on Thursday, but he walked around the team's facility without the oversized boot that had been protecting an injury that is putting his league-record streak of 291 consecutive starts streak in jeopardy. The 41-year-old quarterback limped through the locker room with a heavy wrap on his ankle, which was injured in a loss to the Green Bay Packers on Sunday night. Asked if he thought he could play against New England, Favre said, "I wouldn't put anything past me, to be honest with you. " Favre has a stress fracture in the ankle as well as an avulsion fracture in the heel bone, where a fragment has been torn away by a tendon or ligament.

It has been almost a year since Kendrys Morales broke his left ankle while jumping onto home plate in celebration of a walk-off home run. But it wasn't until this week that the Angels used the term "fracture/dislocation" to describe the first baseman's injury. That term provides insight as to why Morales was slow to recover from surgery last June and why he elected to have a second surgery that will sideline him for the 2011 season. "From a layman's perspective, it didn't seem right — a simple ankle fracture, you fix it and you're back in three months," said Dr. Tim Gibson, an orthopedic surgeon at Orange Coast Memorial Medical Center in Fountain Valley.

Cartoonist Berke Breathed, creator of the comic strip "Bloom County," was in satisfactory condition Friday in St. Joseph's Hospital intensive care unit after surgery to stabilize a fractured spine. Breathed, 28, underwent the 5 1/2-hour operation Thursday night to stabilize a compression fracture suffered in Wednesday's crash of his ultralight aircraft near Albuquerque.

The Lakers will try to win without Steve Nash, however long it takes. The team said Nash would be out at least one week because of a small fracture in the head of the fibula of his left leg, though that type of injury could take three or four weeks to heal. He won't play tonight against Detroit, Wednesday against Utah or Friday against Golden State. Nash was injured last Wednesday when he was kneed by a Portland player while turning to run down court. The Lakers initially thought it was a bruised shin but an MRI exam a few days later revealed the fracture.

Vitamin D may be helpful in protecting highly active pre-teen and teen girls, such as those who play sports, from stress fractures, researchers reported Monday. The study was surprising because calcium has long been considered the nutrient most vital to bone health in children. But, in developing children, vitamin D intake may matter more. Researchers analyzed data from 6,721 girls ages 9 to 15 at the start of the study. The girls' intake of calcium, vitamin D and dairy products was recorded along with stress fractures, which are common sports-related injuries.

Jered Weaver could rejoin the Angels' starting rotation next week, Manager Mike Scioscia said Tuesday. Weaver is set to pitch in an extended spring game Wednesday in Arizona, with Joe Blanton scheduled to start Thursday for the Angels. That could line up Weaver to replace Blanton when that turn comes up again Tuesday, against the Dodgers. Weaver, the Angels' ace, has not pitched since April 7 because of a fractured left elbow. Blanton is 0-7 with a 6.62 earned-run average, the most losses and highest ERA of any starter in the American League.

Ruling out foul play, federal investigators were looking at a fractured rail as the possible cause of the Connecticut train crash that left dozens of commuters injured and is expected to disrupt travel in and out of New York City for weeks to come. Earl Weener, a member of the National Transportation Safety Board, said in a media briefing that investigators had discovered that a section of the eastbound track was fractured at the rail joint. A portion of that track will be sent to a lab for analysis, Weener said.

Hydraulic fracturing, the process that involves shooting millions of gallons of water, sand and chemicals underground to crack shale formations and unlock oil and gas, would become more difficult under new rules proposed by the Interior Department. As The Times reported , the government on Thursday proposed new rules to regulate “fracking” on federal land. The process has been criticized for being environmentally unsafe; critics want to know what chemicals are being injected, and they want to ensure that air and water supplies are protected.

The Dodgers are sending Zack Greinke back to the mound Wednesday night, more than three weeks ahead of his scheduled return from a fractured left clavicle. But the right-hander said he'll be pitching with some restrictions. "I know they don't want me running into people," Greinke said. "But it's not a common thing that you run into someone. " The Dodgers' caution is understandable given that they signed Greinke to a $147-million free-agent contract in the off-season, then watched him go on the disabled list after his second start when he was knocked hard to the turf by the San Diego Padres' Carlos Quentin during a bench-clearing brawl.

Against the crummy San Diego Padres, in just the second week of the season, the Dodgers' title hopes took a difficult blow Thursday. Zack Greinke, the Dodgers' new $147-million starting pitcher, fractured his left collarbone in a sixth-inning brawl. After Greinke hit the Padres' Carlos Quentin with a pitch -- on a full count in a game the Dodgers were leading by a run - the outfielder took umbrage and charged the mound. The two rammed into each other with their shoulders.

NASCAR driver Denny Hamlin suffered a compression fracture in his lower back in the last-lap crash in Fontana, his team said Monday. Hamlin, who already had a history of back problems, damaged his L1 vertebra after slamming head-on into the inside wall at Auto Club Speedway during Sunday's NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race. Hamlin, 32, hoped to be released from a nearby hospital Monday to fly home to North Carolina, his team Joe Gibbs Racing said. The Cup series doesn't race again until April 7, at Martinsville (Va.)

Houston's Akeem Olajuwon will undergo surgery Monday to repair a fracture of the bone structure that houses his right eye, Rocket General Manager Steve Patterson said Tuesday. Olajuwon, who was elbowed on the right side of his face by center Bill Cartwright of the Chicago Bulls Thursday, might be sidelined for as long as two months, Patterson said.

While Jefferson Mays was performing in "A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder" in the fall of 2012 at Hartford Stage, he recalls, his wife kept overhearing variations on the same remark at intermission: "Isn't it wonderful how they got actors who all look the same to play the different members of the D'Ysquith family?" "It made me very happy and really depressed, simultaneously," says Mays, who was in fact the only actor cast to play all nine D'Ysquiths (DIE-squiths), aristocrats in line for a dukedom who get inventively bumped off one by one by an ambitious relative.

More than half of American women over the age of 60 take vitamin D and calcium supplements, but the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force said this week that they're probably wasting their money. In a new recommendations from the federal government's expert panel on preventive medicine, the task force says that most postmenopausal women should not take vitamin D and calcium to reduce their risk of bone fractures. The dosages assessed were 400 international units (IUs) of vitamin D3 and 1,000 milligrams of calcium per day. The conclusions are based on an analysis of six randomized trials designed to study the health effects of vitamin D and calcium supplements.