Sports Injuries

From wrestling to ice hockey to baseball, there are very few sports left in which women have not stepped up to participate, either competitively or recreationally. Major health benefits are accrued in women who participate in regular physical activity.

In recognition of Men's Health Month, sports agent Leigh Steinberg of Newport Beach talks with Times staff writer Martin Miller about safety in the increasingly dangerous world of professional athletics. Steinberg represents more than 100 athletes, including National Football League stars Steve Young and Drew Bledsoe and newcomer Ryan Leaf. * Question: Are professional sports more or less dangerous today than they were 10 years ago? Answer: I think there's no question they are more dangerous.

The Angel winning streak did not merely end at nine Wednesday night. It hit the wall about as hard as Angel center fielder Damon Mashore, who slammed face-first into the fence in pursuit of Jay Bell's run-scoring triple in the second inning of a 10-2 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks before 40,819 in Bank One Ballpark.

Dodger ace right-hander Ramon Martinez will miss at least his next scheduled start after an examination Monday revealed further damage to his throwing shoulder. Martinez, who missed 10 starts last season after suffering a partial tear on his rotator cuff, has an increased rotator cuff tear as well as a cartilage tear, which were discovered during an MRI exam by team physician Frank Jobe.

Hideo Nomo had just been traded for two New York bodies that couldn't elicit mania from a maniac. Todd Hollandsworth had just been found to have a possible season-ending shoulder injury, their third rookie of the year to leave the dugout in the last three weeks. The unsteady Dodgers were teetering, teetering, teetering toward another embarrassing crash into another light pole Thursday evening. When Jose Vizcaino stood up. Right there in the dugout, in the ninth inning against the St.

The Dodgers resolved the Hideo Nomo situation Thursday by trading him to the New York Mets along with minor league pitcher Brad Clontz for pitchers Dave Mlicki and Greg McMichael. But the upheaval at Dodger Stadium continued with word that left fielder Todd Hollandsworth will undergo shoulder surgery next week and is in danger of missing the rest of the season, leaving the Dodgers without three of the five former rookies of the year who started the season with the team.

While his team is playing in Japan, Paul Kariya works out on his own, far away. Haven't we been through this before? We're right back to where the hockey season began, when the Mighty Ducks and Vancouver Canucks made a promotional trip to Tokyo and Kariya, stuck in a contract stalemate, stayed home in Canada. Only this time Kariya isn't at fault. Not one bit. Blame the NHL, which lets goons take free shots at its superstars with only minor repercussions.

As the Mighty Ducks brace for the continued absence of Paul Kariya past the NHL Olympic break, club president Tony Tavares blamed the league for failing to safeguard its stars. Kariya completed a workout Monday without headaches or dizziness for the first time since sustaining a concussion Feb. 1.

Canadian center Joe Sakic, who led the Colorado Avalanche to the 1996 Stanley Cup championship, will be lost to Canada for the rest of the Olympics because of a sprained left knee. Canada is scheduled to face the Czech Republic in a semifinal game Friday. "We feel sorry for Joe because obviously he has put a lot into this, and you hate to see anybody knocked out of the tournament," said Marc Crawford, Canada's Olympic coach and Sakic's coach in Colorado.

A left wrist injury has forced a second postponement of Oscar De La Hoya's mandatory WBC welterweight championship fight against Patrick Charpentier of France. A new date was not announced for the fight, which had been rescheduled to March 14 in the Trump Taj Mahal at Atlantic City, N.J. It originally was postponed from Feb. 28 because of the injury De La Hoya sustained while sparring.