Patrick Martin Verbeek (born May 24, 1964) is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player and current general manager of the Anaheim Ducks of the National Hockey League (NHL). From 1982 to 2002, Verbeek played 20 seasons in the NHL for the New Jersey Devils, Hartford Whalers, New York Rangers, Dallas Stars, and Detroit Red Wings as a right winger.
A dependable presence for over 1,400 games, Verbeek is the only player to have recorded three 40-goal seasons with over 200 penalty minutes each. He recorded thirteen 20-goal seasons in his career, which saw him become one of only three players with 500 goals and 2,000 penalty minutes. He won his first and only Stanley Cup as a player in 1999. His nickname, the "Little Ball of Hate", was given to him in 1995 by Glenn Healy after fellow New York Rangers teammate Ray Ferraro was tagged as the "Big Ball of Hate". In 2000, he became the 28th player to score 500 career goals. He is one of four 500-goal players who are eligible but not a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame.
After his playing career ended, he became a broadcaster for the Red Wings before becoming a scout for the team in 2006. He was hired by the Tampa Bay Lightning as director of professional scouting in 2010 and rose to assistant general manager in 2012; he was hired by the Red Wings to serve the same position in 2019. In 2022, he was hired as general manager of the Anaheim Ducks.
Verbeek grew up in Petrolia, Ontario to a family of farmers, with his father Gerard owning a spread in Wyoming, Ontario that had thousands of acres and pigs. Verbeek played minor hockey before suiting up for the OHA Petrolia Jets Jr.B. club in 1979–80 as a 15-year-old. He was drafted by the Sudbury Wolves of the Ontario Hockey League in 1981. He logged 37 goals and 88 total points on his way to being awarded the Emms Family Award for his rookie play, the first player in franchise history to win the award; his 88 points as a rookie is still a franchise record. He was drafted in the 1982 NHL draft and was invited to training camp but ultimately was sent back to Sudbury to play the 1982–83 season, where he had 107 points in 61 games before being called up.
Verbeek was selected 43rd overall by the New Jersey Devils in the 1982 NHL entry draft. Verbeek played his first game in the NHL on March 21, 1983, where he recorded two shots on goals and had four penalty minutes. He played in six games to close the year out, which included his first goal and assist on March 24 against the Washington Capitals. He played 79 games for the Devils in the 1983–84 season, where he recorded 20 goals and 27 assists while having 158 penalty minutes.
On May 15, 1985, one of Verbeek's thumbs was cut off by an auger in a farming accident when he tried to snag a piece of paper when loading a corn planting machine. Thanks to his father and brother his thumb was saved, and after extensive rehabilitation, Verbeek returned to hockey.
In his fifth full season, Verbeek peaked in goals with 46 in the 1987–88 season that saw him contribute 31 assists for a then-career high of 77 points as the Devils reached the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time since moving to New Jersey. His 46 goals were a franchise record for a season until Brian Gionta surpassed him in the final game of the 2005–06 season. In game one of the 1988 Patrick Division Finals on April 18 against the Washington Capitals, Verbeek cut the leg of Capitals defenseman Rod Langway with his left skate that saw Langway get a three by half-inch deep muscle laceration on his left calf. The NHL ruled the incident (which was not called for a penalty) accidental, but the episode added to the Patrick Division rivalry between Washington and New Jersey. In 20 playoff games that saw the Devils lose in the Conference Finals, he recorded four goals and eight assists. In what became his final season with the Devils in the 1988–89 season, he played in 77 games and scored 26 goals with 21 assists and 189 penalty minutes. On June 17, 1989, the Devils traded him to the Hartford Whalers for Sylvain Turgeon; his 170 goals scored with the Devils was a franchise record.
In his first season with the Whalers, he played in all 80 games for the first time in his career and recorded 44 goals with 45 assists for a career-high 89 points. It happened to be the first season where he recorded a non-negative plus-minus, recording a +1 while having 228 penalty minutes. In the playoffs that year, he recorded two goals and two assists as the Whalers narrowly lost in the first round. In the 1990-91 season, he made the All-Star team for the first time, which saw him score 43 goals and record 39 assists for 82 points while having a career-high 246 penalty minutes. He was the first player in franchise history to lead a team in goals and penalty minutes in consecutive seasons. Verbeek missed the first three games of the 1991-92 season while holding out when the team did not increase their contract offer above $700,000 when he was seeking over $1 million per year. In the meantime, Verbeek tried out for the Canada Cup and was among the first to be cut. He decided to go through arbitration with the team over his salary for the year; in 76 games, he had 22 goals and 35 assists for 57 points. In October 1992, he signed a three-year $3.3 million contract with the Whalers and was instituted as team captain. He played in all 84 games of the first two seasons as captain, which saw him score over 35 goals each time. He achieved 300 career goals in the middle of the 1992-93 season, and his talents for persevering in taking hits (with a frame of 5'9 and 190 pounds) on his way to getting shots on goal was noted at the time, with Verbeek noting, “I’m not a natural goal scorer, no. I think I’ve had to work for goals. In order to score goals sometimes, you’ve got to go where you’ve really got to pay the price in order to score them. There’s a lot of whacking and bruising that’s gone on. I’m lucky my body’s been able to take it.”
Verbeek was part of the Canadian roster for the 1994 Men's Ice Hockey World Championships that won the championship over Finland, having previously played on the 1989 team that finished as runner-up. On March 24, 1994, Verbeek was part of a Buffalo nightclub incident that saw him and six others (Chris Pronger, Todd Harkins, Marc Potvin, Mark Janssens, Geoff Sanderson and assistant coach Kevin McCarthy) arrested after a conflict with bouncers led to a fight. Upon league investigation, the altercation was found to be both avoidable but also partly the result of the bouncers, which led to no suspensions, although Whalers team owner Richard Gordon fined the players $500 (the maximum under the collective bargaining agreement). The players pled guilty to trespassing and 20 hours of community service as part of a deal where the prosecutors dropped other charges. The incident reportedly was the start of the conflict between him and head coach Pierre McGuire over whether there had been a curfew that night. When McGuire was fired in May, Verbeek notably called it the best thing that could have happened to the Whalers, stating that teammates had no respect for McGuire, who was mocked by other teams.
In the strike-shortened 1994–95 season, Verbeek, in the last year of his contract that was expected to not re-sign with the Whalers due to his salary demands, was traded on March 23, 1995 to the New York Rangers (then on a losing skid who wanted help in aggression) for Glen Featherstone, Michael Stewart, a 1995 first-round draft pick (used to draft Jean-Sebastien Giguere) and a 1996 4th round draft pick (used to draft Steve Wasylko). In 48 total games, he had 17 goals and 16 assists. In his only full season with the Rangers in the 1995-96 season, he had 41 goals (2nd best on the team) with 41 assists while having a career-best plus-minus of +29 while named to the All-Star Game for the second and last time. He had 19 total points in 21 combined playoff games with the Rangers while recording 32 penalty minutes. In the summer of 1996, with Verbeek as a Group III unrestricted free agent that allowed him to move to another team without compensation and unable to afford paying him nearly $10 million for the next three years, the Rangers allowed him to sign with the Dallas Stars on July 3, 1996.