Derek Dorsett's neck and back were unusually stiff. The 30-year-old Vancouver Canucks forward had felt this sensation before, undergoing cervical fusion surgery to correct it. That it had returned was a cause of concern and, as horrible luck would have it, a justifiable one: Dorsett's surgeon informed him that he had sustained "a cervical disc herniation adjacent and separate to his previous fusion," which is as bad as it sounds.
Then his surgeon informed him that his hockey career was over.
No rehab. No comebacks. "There is no gray area," said Dorsett, who had to tell his wife and two young sons that he could no longer compete in the NHL, where the physical toll put him at risk for permanent injury.