Briere: From Late-Blooming Player to Fast-Rising Executive

As a National Hockey League player, Danny Briere made a career out of proving doubters wrong, in an era when teams leaguewide were trying to build their own version of the :"Legion of Doom" and smaller players often had a hard time getting noticed, Briere made himself impossible to ignore by racking up 163 points for the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League's Drummondville Voltigeurs in 1995-96.

He was selected by the Phoenix Coyotes in the first round (24th overall) of the 1996 NHL Entry Draft. However, success did not come instantly for Briere. He spent his first four professional seasons shuttling between the NHL's Coyotes and the American Hockey League's Springfield Falcons (now defunct).

Briere tore up the AHL but largely struggled in the NHL. Through his first 83 games, he posted 25 points (10 goals, 15 assists). Through 112 games, spread across parts of four seasons, Briere had defensive issues while producing a modest 21 goals, 19 assists and 40 points (0.36 points per game).

On October 18, 2000, the Coyotes placed Briere on waivers to open a space on their active NHL roster. Thirteen days after celebrating his 23rd birthday, Briere cleared waivers and headed back to the AHL. For the vast majority of players in his situation, this would be the all but the death knell to their NHL dreams.

Briere was far from done, however. He earned another NHL recall, finished the 2000-01 season strong and put in an outstanding offseason. In 2001-02, the 24-year-old player had his NHL breakout (32 goals, 60 points) and never saw the waiver wire or the minor leagues again.

When he held his retirement press conference in Philadelphia in August 2015, Briere reflected on the tough times, and the reward of coming through on the other side.

"There were a few articles, and I don't want to go back on who said it, but NHL executives or experts or ex-players who made some comments and had seen me play, Most of the people all said that I was too small, too fragile to play in the NHL. I had a lot of those cut-out in my room. I had a little box that I kept by my bed, that anytime things would get tough a little bit, that I would open and read. That was kind of my motivation at the time to prove them wrong, Briere said.

"There was a lot of tough times, tough moments -- clearing waivers when nobody picked me up, That's another thing that I'm very proud of, that I fought and I never quit, and I kept working hard to achieve my dream."

The rest of the story is familiar: Briere went on to enjoy a total of seven seasons with 25 goals or more (four with 31-plus) and, with 116 points in 124 career Stanley Cup playoff games, built a reputation as one of the top postseason performers of the 2000s. A fan favorite wherever he played, the best years of Briere's playing days came with the Buffalo Sabres and the Flyers.

Many opponents learned the hard way not to underestimate Briere. Despite his small stature, youthful countenance, and friendly off-ice demeanor, Briere is fiercely competitive and ambitious. He was driven to win and refused to let himself get pushed around. He was also a consummate team player.

Briere always had a good head for the game, thinking the offensive part of the game at a high level. He was a master of using the back of the net to his advantage, emerging in scoring position, and making the right decisions on when to shoot or when to pass to an open linemate.

Even during his active playing days, Briere envisioned a future for himself on the management side of hockey. He recalls studying how successful general managers built their teams with an eye toward acquiring players with diverse skill sets.

"From the time I started playing, I always saw myself more in the management role than a coach. I was always more interested in how teams were being built," Briere said during his introductory press conference as the Flyers' new general manager.

"I probably started that when I was with Buffalo, Darcy Regier had an influence. Then I came here and saw how Paul Holmgren was building his team throughout my stay here. Then I went to Montreal with Marc Bergevin, followed him there and we got to the Conference Final. I saw how Joe Sakic started his rebuild in Colorado. I was there early on when, probably the second year, maybe, of his rebuild, so I saw how he was doing it. I've always been studying that. That's always an area that I was passionate about. I was not doing it expecting to be a GM one day, but that was certainly something that I hoped that one day I'd have the chance to build my own team."

After Briere retired as a player in the summer of 2015, he formally turned his attention to working toward a new career in hockey management. He returned to the Flyers, serving at first as an intern of sorts. Subsequently, for four years, he became the general manager and vice president of hockey operations for the ECHL's Maine Mariners.

As he continued his hands-on development in the hockey operations side, Briere worked for the Flyers as a player development consultant. Perhaps most notably, he worked directly with Travis Konecny to offer suggestions for improvement. Briere also worked with Morgan Frost, whose early NHL playing career followed a path reminiscent of Briere's. Both players have credited Briere for helping them with advice they could apply to their respective games.

To sharpen his knowledge of the business side of hockey, in addition to his management role with the Mariners, Briere took courses at the prestigious Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

In some respects, Briere's higher educational pursuit in his management training was reminiscent of something he did during his playing days with the aim of bolstering his strength and conditioning regimen. Back in 2002, Briere enlisted Hugo Girard to be his off-season personal trainer. Girard was the winner of Canada's Strongest Man and a regular participant in the World's Strongest Man series of televised competitions.

The Flyers were not the only NHL team who took notice at how rapidly and diligently Briere was building his managerial knowledge base and stockpiling real-world experience. In 2021, with permission from the Flyers, the Montreal Canadiens interviewed the former Habs player for their vacant general manager job, Briere was one of the "short list" finalists before the position ultimately went to Kent Hughes.

On February 8, 2022, the Flyers promoted Briere from an organizational consultant to full-time special assistant to then-GM Chuck Fletcher. Briere became part of all major meetings conducted by the Hockey Operations department. He worked side-by-side with Fletcher and assistant general manager Brent Flahr, as well as the team's internal staff.

Over the past year, Briere also gained his first managerial experience in international hockey, serving as Team Canada's assistant general manager at the annual Spengler Cup tournament in Switzerland (Dec. 26-31, 2022). Old friend and former Coyotes teammate Shane Doan was the squad's general manager. Another long-time friend, Ray Whitney, was also part of the team management group.

Late this past season, when Fletcher was dismissed as general manager and president of hockey operations, Briere was simultaneously named the Flyers' interim general manager on March 10, 2023. Although he held the "interim" tag, the organization did not consider any alternative candidates.

"When the transition in leadership was going on in hockey [operations], I was simply just trying to find my way around the building. Dave Scott was really great about educating me as he and others were thinking about who's the next leader from a General Manager perspective. I got to know Danny, I can tell you from a personal point of view, watching him as a leader, as a well-organized, experienced person in the space, interim tag or not, I can tell you from the first day that we really interacted, I viewed him as the next GM of the Philadelphia Flyers. So, the process went on in my head, conversations with Valerie, just watching how he and Torts interacted, we just felt strongly there was no need for a process. We had our general manager," said Dan Hilferty, Comcast Spectacor Chairman & CEO and Governor of the Flyers,

Now that interim tag has been removed, general manager Briere will have the final say on all roster-building matters, including trades, signings as waivers. He'll work closely as part of what Hilferty has deemed a "triumvirate" with head coach John Tortorella and newly hired president of hockey operations Keith Jones.

"I have the ultimate confidence that Danny Briere is the right man for this job. I have had many conversations about hockey with Danny. What impresses me the most about Danny is his mind. What I'm also impressed with is he stayed here. He selected the Philadelphia Flyers to come play for as an unrestricted free agent - could have went anywhere in the league. That tells me a lot. What tells me more is he stayed, and that's what's probably something when I look at Danny Briere that stands out to me. He wanted to be a Flyer. He put the work in, as Valerie [Camillo] mentioned earlier, to eventually become the Flyers general manager. He's ready for it. I look forward to working with him, and I'm overly impressed with how well prepared he is. We're going to have a lot of discussions in the coming days. I've been away, I've been working. Danny had no idea that I was going to be the guy. So, we're going to get to some real conversations here in the next little while, and I so much look forward to getting to those conversations," Jones said.