July 03, 2025
Nick Tricome/PhillyVoice
Forward prospect Porter Martone skates through drills at the Flyers' development camp in Voorhees on Tuesday.
Porter Martone has his sights set on the NHL, sooner rather than later, like in just a few months sooner.
"For me, my mindset is playing in the NHL next year," the Flyers' sixth overall pick said during development camp on Wednesday, in response to a question of whether he might opt for college instead of returning to junior hockey.
"If the management staff here thinks otherwise, that's when you kinda have a talk with my agent and me, but right now my goal is to make the NHL and have a big summer," Martone continued. "Really gain some strength in the lower body, then come into camp and try to earn my spot."
It's an ambitious goal for the 18-year-old wing prospect, whose high draft selection last Friday night in LA lined him up as one of the next key pieces to the Flyers' future.
But there is a potential path for him now.
Tyson Foerster is recovering from an infection in his elbow, and the Flyers are still trying to figure out whether he'll miss time to start the season and, if so, how much.
If the Flyers do have to fill Foerster's spot in the lineup for a stretch, general manager Danny Brière said the organization would look internally and see if that might be a chance to give a prospect an early look, naming Alex Bump, Devin Kaplan, and then Martone as the possible candidates off the top of his head.
Martone, as one of the Flyers' new top prospects, would definitely bring skill from off the wall, immediate excitement for the fans who want to see the team keep getting younger and more talented, and, as was notable throughout the team's run of draft picks last week, size at a listed 6'3" and 208 pounds.
He's also been fitting in well across the organization quickly, which was a ball that got rolling back at the IIHF World Championship in the spring, when he skated for Team Canada alongside Foerster, Travis Konecny, and Travis Sanheim.
"He's a really outgoing guy," Riley Armstrong, the Flyers' director of player development, said Wednesday of Martone. "I can see why when he played at the World Championships with Team Canada, TK, Tyson, Sanny, they took a liking to him right away. He has nothing but great things to say about those three and how they treated him during the time, so it's kinda like he's already fitting into the group just by having that connection with those guys.
"Then once you get him out on the ice there, he's a pretty confident kid. He reminds me a lot of Tyson when I was coaching him with [the Lehigh Valley Phantoms]. He has that little bit of swag to him, like he knows that he's a good player, and I think that's a good thing. You want a player that has that, and that confidence within himself."
Further linking Martone to Sanheim and Foerster, as well, is a common knock they each had against them when they were trying to find their way as pros. Sanheim wasn't known as a particularly great skater along the blueline coming in, and neither was Foerster up front, but they each got better and faster as they got older and stronger to take up vital roles in the Flyers' lineup.
So skating will be Martone's main area of improvement to focus in on if he does intend to make a serious chase after an NHL roster spot in camp, even if he'll still be far from a finished product as the Flyers are expecting him to be.
"I think his first three steps when he comes out of the block is probably elite," Armstrong continued about Martone. "I would say once he gets going, in his high-end speed, I think he's only gonna get faster, and that comes with strength and being able to stay down a little bit lower. He's a big kid, and once he has to bend down and stay down in that position, that takes a lot of strength in the legs.
"I think once that comes, and then we lengthen his stride a bit, once he gets a little bit lower, he's gonna be faster than what he is right now. Just gotta give him a couple years if you can be patient with him."
The organization, and most fans, are willing to wait – if not a bit anxiously.
Martone, though? He seems set to try and create a shot for himself right now.
"Obviously, when you come into camp, you're gonna have to earn your job," Martone said. "You're not just gonna get it given to you. If I get the opportunity to come in, I want to give it my all and try to earn my spot on the opening night roster, and if I do, that's a dream come true to play with the Flyers organization.
"But that doesn't come without the work that needs to be put in. I still gotta do some stuff throughout the summer to get me ready for training camp in September and get me ready to play in the NHL next season."
He's going for it.
A few other running thoughts from Flyers development camp in the past couple of days...
The young skaters out on the ice this week at the Flyers Training Center in Voorhees were noticeably much bigger compared to the past few summers, marking an obvious shift that Armstrong saw play out right in front of him while he was at the draft stage for the team in LA.
"When I met them out in LA, I was looking up at them and I thought, 'Wow, these guys are pretty big,''" Armstrong said Wednesday of the Flyers' new wave of prospects. "Then John LeClair walked up and then he looked up at them, and I really thought, 'These guys are pretty big,' so I think it was kind of the theme going on out there.
"I know the panel of Sportsnet, TSN, I think...I was getting clips sent, and they were like, 'Well, they're getting another guy at 6'5."' So it's definitely a change of the dynamic from those small, speedy wingers and just adding more size. And you look at these guys, they all skate fairly well, and they're only gonna get better as they get stronger and continue to develop into their bodies."
Martone, Jack Nesbitt, Shane Vansaghi, Jack Murtagh, Matthew Gard, and Luke Vlooswky made up the group of 6-foot-plus 2025 draftees who were on the ice making the Flyers prospects look a lot bigger, and Armstrong joked on Thursday that fifth-round pick Max Westergard is a 5'10 forward who plays like he's 6'1".
Second-round pick Carter Amico, the heavy-checking 6'5" defenseman, is at camp, too, but isn't skating as he continues to rehab from a knee injury suffered early last season.
The perspective from 6'4" blueliner Hunter McDonald, who has been on a bit of an island in the past couple of years as a big, physical defensive prospect: "We laugh about it a little bit. A lot of big boys out there, and they're all playing hard against each other. So it's good and competitive. We're all enjoying ourselves."
This development camp has had some real physicality to it so far.
Contact drills along the wall have featured some pretty loud crashes into the board, McDonald and Vlooswyk have used their size to their advantage in either closing out space or shielding the puck away from checkers in dump-in corner drills, and there have been spots when you can see the strength and maturity in Vansaghi's game that have been developing at Michigan State in how he protects the puck.
There was also this rep on Thursday between Westergard and fellow prospect Sawyer Boulton, as captured by Nasty Knuckles producer Travis Ballinghoff:
Up close and personal pic.twitter.com/MsP3OGY2al
— Travis Ballinghoff (@travieballin26) July 3, 2025
But the real standout moment was later into the first group's on-ice session on Thursday. In an offensive zone drill, the puck slipped out from behind the net and to Nesbitt in the slot, but before he could even think about getting a shot off, 2024 fifth-round forward Noah Powell closed in and crushed him, getting a rise out of everyone at the rink watching.
Powell checked on Nesibtt after the drill. He was fine. They laughed it off, and got right back to it.
"Obviously, I love Nes," Powell said after. "He's a great guy. I just met him a couple days ago, and we're all hanging out playing paintball together and stuff like that. But yeah, like just kind of getting out there, being physical, competing against each other, and then laughing about it over a Chipotle bowl later on after practice, and then getting back after it the next day.
"I feel like that's kind of the role that I want to practice and get better at doing."
Hey, you can't say the kids aren't taking this seriously.
Goalie prospect Carson Bjarnason has a Flyers-painted mask now.
The 20-year-old, after finishing his final junior season in Brandon last year, reported to the Phantoms in Lehigh Valley to finish up the AHL schedule and join them for their playoff run, though he never played.
Bjarnason said Thursday he was dealing with a knee injury through the latter half of last season, which factored into why he didn't, but added that he's feeling good again after some "intense rehab" for a couple of weeks once the season for him finally did end.
He's expected to begin the new season in Lehigh Valley, and in two days of camp so far, he's seemed to be a real headache for shooters, using his 6'4" frame in net to cut way down on angles and direct shots either wide to the boards or straight into his pads.
Bjarnason, a second-round draft pick from 2023 at 51st overall, posted a .913 save percentage through 40 games in Brandon last season, and is now moving up to the next level and just a step away from the NHL, all while the Flyers have no current long-term commitments in the crease.
Bjarnason said he isn't reading too much into the Flyers' goalie situation above him, but he does seem aware that he could work his way into the picture.
"It's something, you know, if I look into it a little bit more, it makes you feel better," Bjarnason said Thursday. "But, yeah, just proud to be a Flyer, and happy they kind of want me around here."
A quick observation to wrap up.
Jack Berglund, who has been coming along as an increasingly key center prospect, showed off a pretty sharp shot on Thursday, picking a top corner and firing a laser straight to it at each end of the rink that none of the goalies would've had a chance at stopping during drills.
Both times, roars and a wave of stick taps from the other prospects and coaches followed.
Berglund and his shot might be something to keep an eye on the rest of the week and later on.
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