The circumstances under which Pat Verbeek was hired are probably unique among NHL general managers.

There was wide agreement, no matter what you thought of how predecessor Bob Murray did the job, that the Ducks were very much headed in the right direction. While their success this season is maybe a little bit of an overstatement of where they are in their rebuild process, the fact is that this is a team on the verge of being at least somewhat competitive.

Murray’s dismissal, and therefore Verbeek’s hiring, came at a time when the team was winning a lot more often than it was losing but when there were also some difficult roster decisions that a rookie GM would probably rather not make.