ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. – Flyers general manager Daniel Briere had trouble getting to sleep on Thursday night, wondering about how things would go in the first round of Friday’s NHL Draft.
Turns out the evening’s events turned into sweet dreams for the next day.
Briere not only was able to grab the highly rated Porter Martone, a right wing, at No. 6 but later was fortunate enough to be able to package his No. 22 and 31 picks into a No. 12 (from Pittsburgh) and nailed center Jack Nesbitt.
Chances are he was going to get a good night’s sleep when he turned in late Friday.
“We’re ecstatic to have the chance to draft those two guys,” Briere said after the completion of the first round at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino. “Trying to get some sleep last night, it wasn’t easy.
“I tried to sleep this afternoon and I wasn’t able to get a minute. If I would have known those were the two guys we ended up with, I would have slept a lot better last night and this afternoon.”
As for starting to fill the “holes” at forward spots, Briere gave a rueful smile when someone asked if acquiring Trevor Zegras in a trade on Monday and the drafting of Martone and Nesbitt might calm his nerves a bit.
“I wish they (Martone and Nesbitt) were ready to play now,” Briere said. “I wish we had a center we didn’t have to wait for.
“The reality is they are very rarely available, top six or top nine. In the short term, it really doesn’t fix our problem. But I think in three, four, five years from now we will be in much better position.”
Honestly, the Flyers are pretty thin in the middle.
“Sean (Couturier) is in his early 30s,” Briere said. “Five years from now, is he going to be as effective? We don’t know. We have Noah Cates. Hopefully Trevor will help. But it’s not like we’re overloaded with centers at the moment. We’re still going to be on the lookout in the short term to get some help there.”
It turned out to be a bit of a coup landing Nesbitt. Although he was rated No. 20 by The Hockey News, there were a number of teams interested in his services at a much lower number than that. Which is why Briere was willing to pull the trigger on the 6-foot-4 player.
At the same time, Central Scouting had him ranked 15th.
“Jack was going to go pretty soon right after our pick,” Briere noted. “We tried to trade up to try to get quality over quantity. It’s a nice bonus that they’re both tall and will bring us size as well.”
Briere believes Martone is on a fast track to make it to the NHL. Much like last year’s No. 1 pick, Jett Luchanko, who began the season with the Flyers, Martone has already shown poise and maturity beyond his years.
While the Flyers need centers, Martone’s talent was just too good to pass up. He shows promise to be a dynamic player at right wing.
“Even though he’s not a center, we knew it would be tough to go by him,” Briere said. “It’s not a secret, I’ve said it from the get-go, we wanted centers. Porter was the one guy in that range we just felt we couldn’t let go by.”
Martone was a bit of a Flyers fan even before he was drafted. He had a poster of Claude Giroux and he’s been compared to another “yapper,” Travis Konecny.
“It’s all part of the package,” Briere said. “He’s got some grit, some physicality. He likes to yap a little bit, like TK. We all know Claude liked to yap as well. Porter’s got a real good shot, he can make plays. I think it’s all part of what makes him special.”
Briere still has three second-round picks in Saturday’s final rounds of the draft but he says in all likelihood he’s going to hang on to those and use them to select players at their designated slots.
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