Philadelphia Flyers: Gritty’s Living It Up In Switzerland

The Philadelphia Flyers mascot seems to be enjoying his time abroad.

As you likely already know, the Philadelphia Flyers are currently in Switzerland as they gear up for the NHL Global Series Challenge. They’ll face Lausanne Hockey Club on Monday, which is their final preseason contest before their opener against the Chicago Blackhawks in Prague, but they do have some downtime in between practices to enjoy the European country. One member of the franchise who seems to be loving Switzerland is none other than Gritty, who recently celebrated a birthday this past week.

The Flyers mascot spent the afternoon making Swiss chocolate at Durig Chocolatier in the city of Lausanne while sporting lederhosen. He was accompanied by Flyers forwards James van Riemsdyk and Tyler Pitlick, who toured the Chocolate Shop and also got the chance to make their very own Flyers-logo shaped chocolate. Gritty’s didn’t turn out as well as the others that were made, even when he tried to swap his design for someone else’s, but the orange creature gets an A for effort from me for merely being an icon.

Gritty didn’t leave the shop without showcasing a little bit of his personality, though. The NHL’s best mascot played pattycake, or at the very least tried to, with one of the chocolatiers and looked to get slightly upset with the guy when they couldn’t find a cadence. He also caught a piece of chocolate in his mouth off of a throw from JvR and promptly spit it back to the Flyers resident pidgeon as soon as he looked away.

The camera cut off before we could see if the chocolate hit van Riemsdyk, but using my #analysis skills; I think it ended up bonking van Riemsdyk on the upper side of his head. I can’t get over how much talent it took to accurately fling the piece out of his mouth, as it once again showed how athletic of a specimen Gritty is.

This trip is Gritty’s first time going international, and it looks like it won’t be his last if he has anything to say about it.