Thanks for responding.  I wanted to give an update to respond to you all, and also to give some feedback in case someone reads this thread with a similar problem.

Quick review: a little pain/leg tweak feeling devolved into crippling and debilitating chronic leg pain (a deep throb), and then morphed into also crippling back pain.  It was mysterious because it started so slowly and for 2 months had not symptoms of back dysfunction.  

What I’ve found:  After 3 months of worsening pain, I tried conservative care (aka rest/super-light activity, PT, chiro, massage).  I got a lumbar MRI on Monday July 28.  I’m seeing a spine specialist August 4th, but from what I can gather from my chiro, my own eyes, etc. it looks at L5/S1 I have slight narrowing and a small bulging disc.  The pain this has causes is mind-boggling/life-changing, but that’s for another discussion.

What I’ve done so far: In the past week since receiving my MRI, the boat has turned around, and I think I’ve actually improved just a bit using: rest/light activity, chiro, and trigger point therapy.

I think the key here has been my work with the trigger point therapist.  She found a “perfect storm” or dysfunction in a multitude of muscle groups/fascial trains.  QL, psoas, glute min/med, quad, and TFL have created a hell of trigger point pain, and by addressing these trigger points through massage, I’ve seen a decent reduction in pain and regaining some ROM and strength.  Whether or not the disc is actually bulging, the pain is coming from these trigger points, and not dealing with them would lead to constant, and long-term pain.

What this turned out to be is hip dysfunction.  If you know your KStar, you know about the 4 horsemen of the hip: QL, rectus femoris, psoas,and illiacus.  Well, as it turns out, this Mr. KStar knows his shit, and he was spot on in my case.  Each one of these muscles was chock full of trigger points, forming a classic referred pain pattern.  It’s been an adventure to say the least.  

The moral of the story is:  guys, if you have pain, seek out a trigger point specialist.