Two pieces of interesting news from the Devils official website were posted today at devils.nhl.com.
Firstly, defenseman John Merrill had surgery on Monday that was successful. The surgery was to his injured right shoulder and Executive Vice President/General Manager Ray Shero had the following to say about it: “The procedure was performed at the Midtown Surgical Center in New York City by the club’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Jonathan L. Glashow. His expected recovery time is approximately four months.”
This recovery time should take Merrill up to training camp. He originally injured the shoulder in March and missed the remainder of the 2015-16 season.
In more uplifting news, there was a piece written by Eric Marin about actor Patrick Warburton, who played David Puddy on the TV sitcom Seinfeld, receiving his own replica of Scott Wedgewood’s goalie mask.
According to Marin, the mask was created by David Gunnarsson of DaveArt, who also created the original for Wedgewood. Marin mentions that Gunnarsson is a huge fan of Puddy.
The mask features Warburton, as Puddy, in the guise of “the Facepainter.” In this episode, Puddy, a Devils fan, goes to a Devils-Rangers playoff game at MSG with Jerry and the gang and with his face painted up in Devils colors. For the record, the Devils won that game, although Kramer is quick to note that the series was not over yet. Hilarity ensues as Puddy utters his famous catchphrase “You gotta support the team!” This catchphrase became a hashtag that Gunnarsson used in his Facebook post on the subject.
Puddy is arguably the world’s most famous fictional Devils fan and Wedgewood is a very real Seinfeld fan. Marin says that the 23-year-old Wedgewood became a fan of the show, which went off the air in 1998, when his older brother Mark got him into it. He has watched the entire run of 180 episodes since then.
Warburton, for his part, tweeted that “This is most awesome! Love it!” and, according to Marin, Warburton said “It will have a place of honor on my bar.”