IRVINE, Calif. \u2014 Now that he\u2019s in the general manager\u2019s chair, the Anaheim Ducks\u2019 Pat Verbeek has earned a reputation around the NHL as a tough negotiator. The Athletic recently polled 20 agents who represent hundreds of players across the league, and seven pointed to Verbeek and his assistant, Jeff Solomon, as driving hard bargains in contract talks.<\/p>\n
That is evident in extensions for his top restricted free agents. Troy Terry reached the arbitration hearing stage before getting his seven-year deal. Lengthy contract battles for Trevor Zegras and Jamie Drysdale resulted in three-year bridge deals before both were traded. Last September, Mason McTavish went into training camp without a contract before the Ducks arrived at a six-year extension.<\/p>\n
A week after ending the McTavish standoff, the Ducks announced an eight-year contract for Jackson LaCombe that doesn\u2019t begin until the 2026-27 season. It was a max-term deal worth $72 million, the largest contract in Anaheim\u2019s history in terms of total money. Verbeek could have gone down a familiar route with LaCombe and gone into the summer, or all the way through it. This deal was hammered out well ahead of any pressure point.<\/p>\n
Maybe he was onto something. As the 25-year-old LaCombe is enjoying an eye-opening first-round playoff series against the Edmonton Oilers, the Ducks are witnessing the birth of a franchise defenseman they once envisioned in what is becoming a steal of a second-round pick in the 2019 draft.<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, it\u2019s insane,\u201d said McTavish, thinking of LaCombe\u2019s growth since his rookie season. \u00a0\u201cI think he\u2019s probably our best player. He just does everything. Even in practice, trying to pass against him. He\u2019s defending a two-on-one and it\u2019s so hard to pass through every time. Just his skating. He\u2019s so smart out in the O-zone. He skates single-man breakout. He literally does it all, so it\u2019s been really fun to watch him step into this role.\u201d<\/p>\n
Connor McDavid might know now about the difficulty in getting a pass through LaCombe on an odd-man rush. The Oilers superstar is already having a difficult series but in Game 3, he finally gained some open space to rush up ice with Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and only LaCombe back to defend. LaCombe went legs-first to the ice and, as he read McDavid\u2019s wish to feed Nugent-Hopkins on the back post, swung his stick around to break up the pass.<\/p>\n
It was one of the highlights of a special Game 3, which the Ducks won, 7-4, to take a 2-1 series lead over the Oilers into Game 4 on Sunday in Anaheim.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s so fast and hard to defend so I tried to just slide and make a play,\u201d LaCombe said Saturday. \u201cAnd then obviously he kind of worked around me there and I just kind of swung it around and got pretty lucky, to be honest.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou got to be careful in those plays. You never know if it could bounce off your stick and go in or something. Just happy to get the puck on that one.\u201d<\/p>\n
The tone in which LaCombe spoke was as modest as his words. But his game Friday \u2014 and the first three in the series \u2014 have been a loud statement.<\/p>\n
McDavid got his first points in Game 3 with a power-play goal and an assist on a Nugent-Hopkins goal. But LaCombe has made things hard on him. LaCombe\u2019s stellar defense pushed a rushing McDavid into the wall during the third period that sparked a change in possession. The Ducks cashed in at the other end, with LaCombe joining the play for a shot on goal and Jeffrey Viel ending it with a key insurance goal.<\/p>\n
Right now, there isn\u2019t a better player in the series. With his six points, LaCombe is the only defenseman on the playoff scoring leaderboard. After a stellar night where he played 26:49 and added an empty-net goal from across the ice, Ducks coach Joel Quenneville proclaimed, \u201cOh my god, was he good tonight. He was special tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n
The discussion about LaCombe online is a far cry from the moment he signed his big extension last October.<\/p>\n
Two questions often followed: Who? How much?<\/p>\n
It was a big bet Verbeek made. But it\u2019s paying off as the Ducks make noise in their return to the playoffs after eight years.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think he\u2019s kind of hidden a little bit,\u201d said Jacob Trouba, who has been LaCombe\u2019s regular defense partner. \u201cI\u2019ve said this before, but I didn\u2019t really know much about him before I got traded here. I\u2019ve watched him over the past year and a little bit and how he\u2019s evolved and continues to grow. The contract is obviously well-deserved. And I think it\u2019s kind of coming out a little more of who he is and how good of a player he is on more of the, I guess, national stage throughout the league. \u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s a guy that you want to build around for a long time and lucky to have him here.\u201d<\/p>\n
LaCombe chuckled at the memory of being an unknown to those who haven\u2019t followed his trajectory from the University of Minnesota \u2014 where he played on a star-laden Golden Gophers team that had the Minnesota Wild\u2019s Brock Faber on the same defense corps \u2014 to an up-and-down rookie campaign in 2023-24 to his breakout in 2024-25 with 14 goals and 43 points.<\/p>\n
The true glow-up has come now. After increasing his point total to 58 in the regular season, LaCombe is having a star turn as a force at both ends for Anaheim.<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like I\u2019ve seen that the whole year when I\u2019ve been here,\u201d said Mikael Granlund, who has played with Ryan Suter, Roman Josi, Kris Letang and Miro Heiskanen over his 14-year career. \u201cHe\u2019s such a rock back there. He can skate, he can make plays. He just looks so calm and confident. In my opinion, he\u2019s already one of the best in the league. And I think he\u2019s only going to get better.\u201d<\/p>\n
The accolades are coming to someone who doesn\u2019t seek them. The path to becoming a top NHL defenseman isn\u2019t always linear. LaCombe played forward through much of his youth hockey and didn\u2019t focus on the blue line until he got to Shattuck-St. Mary\u2019s School. Even in his draft year, he was considered a talented prospect with a high ceiling, but also raw and in need of development as a defender.<\/p>\n
It is an attitude that he continues to carry as more people pay attention. He knows he can play at a high level and yet readily admits that he still has times when he feels good about his game and times when he doesn\u2019t. The Ducks don\u2019t see him as a finished product. Neither does he.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have to learn and grow,\u201d LaCombe said. \u201cYou see other players around the league and what they can do. Even on your own team, too. There\u2019s always details you can pick up and there are so many things in my game that I want to improve and work on. So, I don\u2019t think there is ever a point where you\u2019re at a finished spot, I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n
Quenneville coached Duncan Keith during his rise into a two-time Norris Trophy-winning defenseman and a leader on the Chicago Blackhawks who won three Stanley Cup titles. While the coach joked that both Keith and LaCombe wear No. 2, he draws other parallels between the two.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just know that they\u2019re comparable,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re both very agile. They both like to skate with the puck. Duncs was a good defender and he had a little bit of a bite in his game. Offensively, I think maybe more upside with \u2026 I don\u2019t say who\u2019s better at this and that, but certainly he\u2019ll have the upside that Duncan had at that stage of his career. And they\u2019re both comparable exactly where they were in their games, almost the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Development for LaCombe wasn\u2019t limited to the ice surface. In his first couple of seasons with the Ducks, he credits former coach Greg Cronin with turning him onto martial arts training \u2014 he worked with Brazilian jiu jitsu instructor Jeremy Clark \u2014 to become more comfortable with the combative side of the game. LaCombe also continues to talk with a mental coach, whom he prefers not to identify but calls a friend.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think there\u2019s a mental side of the game too that you want to enhance and try and be at your best all the time,\u201d LaCombe said. \u201cSo, for me, that\u2019s something I wanted to try and figure out and (am) still figuring out even today. That was huge for me to \u2026 be able to kind of calm down off the ice and relax. And when it\u2019s time to play, play.\u201d<\/p>\n
Now the hockey world is seeing LaCombe do it all from the back end. Those watching the series that didn\u2019t know his game became witnesses \u2014 and perhaps admirers \u2014 when he absorbed hits from Zach Hyman in Game 1 and then delivered some reverse payback in the third period against one of the league\u2019s foremost and effective forecheckers.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou look at a lot of the best defensemen in the league now or over the course of my career, they\u2019re all kind of the cool, calm, collected,\u201d said Trouba, who compared LaCombe\u2019s game to that of former Winnipeg Jets teammate Josh Morrissey. \u201cDon\u2019t really get rattled. Obviously, guys (and) teams are going to target him and try to get him off his game. I think he also has the ability to throw a hit like he did on Hyman there early.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s got that poise and the character, the charisma, everything that you want and that type of player who can play the big minutes and not really get thrown off his game, but also play the physical game. I wasn\u2019t surprised by the hit early. I think he\u2019s shown he can play a physical game and he\u2019s a good player. He\u2019s the guy you want to build around for a long time here.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"IRVINE, Calif. \u2014 Now that he\u2019s in the general manager\u2019s chair, the Anaheim Ducks\u2019 Pat Verbeek has earned…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":286850,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,824,165,164,2070,404],"class_list":["post-286849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-ducks","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news","tag-edmonton-oilers","tag-nhl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=286849"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286849\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/286850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=286849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=286849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=286849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}