One would like to think that Tedy Bruschi has been through enough.

The 12th-year veteran linebacker, often regarded as the heart and soul of the New England Patriots' defense, suffered a stroke only a few days after he played in the Pro Bowl back in February 2005. As if his road back to the playing field wasn't arduous enough, as a public figure, he also had to endure the indignity of fending off an occasionally overzealous media corps in its pursuit of any tidbit of news about his condition.

It was a very difficult time for Bruschi, his wife Heidi, and their three children. One would think that 2½ years after the fact, and with Bruschi having been the Patriots' leading tackler last year, those terrible memories could be compartmentalized and filed away as a time in their lives that need not be revisited.

Somewhere out there in the vast anonymity of the Internet, however, an individual found it necessary to dredge up those fears and use them to prey upon gullible individuals in the regional sports media.

Sometime Monday night, according to Patriots' Media Relations Director Stacey James, an unnamed reporter for a Boston media outlet received an e-mail from an individual claiming to have knowledge that Bruschi had collapsed and died. As James put it, the reporter contacted another reporter, who called another reporter, who called yet another reporter, who then started calling Bruschi's teammates to find out whatever they knew about the linebacker's condition.

James wouldn't reveal the identities of the reporters, only to say that they were from both print and broadcast outlets. Needless to say, the phone started ringing off the hook at Bruschi's North Attleboro residence. Panicky teammates, fearing the worst because of the shocking and unanticipated suddenness of Bruschi's initial illness, interrupted what had been a leisurely evening of television viewing by Tedy and his family - one of the few remaining evenings of football-free relaxation for him before the start of training camp on Friday.

James said that by the time he reached Bruschi at home, the veteran linebacker had already had his fill of the rumor.

"The first thing he said was, 'What's this all about?'" James said.

James said the rumor seemed to run out of steam by late Monday night. Teammates had been assured that Bruschi was absolutely fine, and James had managed to persuade media outlets to report nothing about the falsehood, fearing that even the slightest effort to dispel the hoax would lend unwarranted credence to its perpetrator. He hoped it would be a dead issue by Tuesday.

No such luck, however.

By Tuesday afternoon, the rumor of Bruschi's demise was again making the rounds of the area - even though Bruschi had been present as always at his morning workout session at Gillette Stadium. An employee of The Sun Chronicle, getting his hair cut at a Sharon establishment late in the afternoon, heard the rumor and dutifully called the news desk to report it. Moments later, I was on the phone with James seeking the truth.

Again, as he had with other media outlets, James asked that we consider not printing anything about the hoax - not because the Patriots are characteristically stingy with the news they want released to the public, but because he didn't believe it was right to give any satisfaction at all to the sick individual who sent the New England media off on a very disturbing wild-goose chase.

In consultations with Managing Editor Mike Kirby, it was determined that we'd comply with James' request as long as the rumor didn't get major play in other media.

But as much as we would have liked for this story to just go away, it wouldn't. A few individuals in the media found it necessary to talk on the radio about the rumor in thinly-veiled euphemisms, or post about it in precise detail on their Internet blogs. Not surprisingly, The Sun Chronicle's night desk editors received call after call Tuesday night from panicky fans fearing the worst about Bruschi. The same happened at newspapers and broadcast stations throughout the region well into Wednesday. As a result, Bruschi, his family, and those of us in the media who respect him for what he's accomplished on the field and admire him for the courage and determination he displayed to beat the odds and make it back, all had to relive a dark time in their history that did not need to be dredged up again.

Hoaxes have existed since the first humans painted pictures on the walls of their caves. Clearly, some individuals with e-mail accounts and too much time on their hands haven't progressed beyond that in their own personal evolution, which is how reprehensible rumors of this sort get started and gain legs.

Regrettably, in today's media environment, with some "news" organizations falling all over themselves to get the seamy details of Lindsay Lohan's latest arrest and the like, there just isn't room anymore for a reporter to make the right phone calls, dispel false rumors, and just file them away as news that's not fit to print.

The only good thing I can report from all this is that that Tedy Bruschi will be front-and-center at the Gillette Stadium practice field Friday morning, wearing his blue No. 54 jersey and leading his teammates in the quest to reach Super Bowl XLII.

It's just a terrible shame that someone with no credibility - and no decency - felt the need to suggest otherwise.

MARK FARINELLA may be reached at 508-236-0315 or via e-mail at mfarinel@thesunchronicle.com