WILMINGTON -- The trade deadline had passed on Monday, and Wild defenseman Greg Zanon was in his basement playing Wii with his daughter. He thought earlier in the season that he might have been traded, but that clearly wasn't to be. He would ride out the end of his contract as a member of the Wild.

Then, at 2:15 p.m. CST, his wife came running down the stairs.

"All of a sudden my wife comes down and [says], 'You've been traded!'" Zanon recalled Wednesday. "I'm like, 'Shut up, no I haven't. Who told you that?'"

"My sister said it's all over Twitter!" she responded.

"I was like, 'Obviously it's rumors. It's way past the deadline now,'" Zanon said. "Two seconds later, [Minnesota general manager] Chuck [Fletcher] called and said, 'You've been traded, I wanted to let you know before you found out on Twitter.' I was like, 'Too late.'"

And just like that, Zanon became a member of the Bruins. The shot-blocking veteran got to Boston Tuesday morning and was kept out of the lineup on his first day with his new team. Instead, he sat up in the press box, minding his own business. He doesn't tweet, so Monday's episode figured to be the last time Twitter made him the center of attention. 

Then, at around 8:15 p.m., it happened again. Sitting in the Garden press box, Zanon was shown on TV by the Senators' feed of the game. He was wearing something on his wrist, and Twitter exploded with fans wondering what was wrong with the Bruins' new defenseman. 

It turns out Zanon had gotten a cortisone shot in his elbow and was wearing a brace to keep it immobilized. Nothing serious, but when Twitter quickly erupted with murmurs that he was wearing a cast, he got a phone call. 

"My mom called I think halfway through the second [period]," Zanon said. "She was like, 'What's on your wrist?' I'm like, 'What do you mean?' She's like, 'We saw you on TV, you've got a cast!'"

"I don't have a cast, I've got a brace," he responded. "It's just for off-ice. It has nothing to do with anything that's going on on the ice. I'm healthy. I'm all OK, it was just for this cortisone shot, just to immobilize it till it kicks in."

After all the hoopla of Monday and Tuesday, Zanon had his most normal day as a Bruin on Wednesday. Still wearing green pants, the color of his old squad, Zanon practiced with the Bruins for the first time. 

With seven defensemen, Claude Julien used a pretty mixed rotation of his defenseman. The new system will take some getting used to for Zanon, but after watching the Stanley Cup finals as a Vancouver native (he rooted for the Bruins), he thinks he should fit in. 

"It's my style of hockey," Zanon said of the Bruins. "They play that tough style, they like to get up and down the ice. Good D zone, good defensive team. It's just the way I play my game. Hopefully I can fit in nicely when I get in the lineup and do anything I can to help out and just grit it out with the boys."

Zanon won't light it up on the scoring sheet (he has two goals and four assists for six points in 39 games this season), but he is one of the game's best shot-blockers. Last year, he finished second in the league with 212 blocked shots.  

"I don't know if it's just shot-blocking in general, it's more of a defensive style," Zanon said of the way he plays. "I'm not too offensive, so anything I can do to help the team win -- if you don't allow any goals on your side and you get one, you're going to win the game. 

"My focus is just on positioning and doing anything I can to help out Timmy and the team. Obviously the less shots they see, there's a good chance they're going to stop all of them. If they're taking 40 opportunities and we can block 10 or 15 of those, it's going to help Timmy and [Tuukka] Rask."

When Johnny Boychuk is healthy, the Bruins will have eight defensemen. The likes of Zanon, Mike Mottau and Joe Corvo all figure to compete for one spot. It’s a competition Zanon knows exists, but one for which he’s ready. 

“I can't control how the lineup's made,” he said. “The only thing I can control is going out in practice and working hard, and hopefully Claude sees I have some value and can help the team win, and I'll be in the lineup. That's the way it goes. 

“Everybody's a good player. You wouldn't be here if you couldn't play in the league, so it's up to Claude and the management [to decide] who plays, so you just keep your head up and cheer the boys on when you're not in the lineup.”