The Edmonton Oilers are back, and it feels so good. It seems like every season we say, ‘this season feels different’ for the orange and blue, but honestly, this season really does feel different—with some unfinished business to take care of.

Of course, the preseason must take place before the real action begins, and a key storyline to watch out for in the exhibition games is whether Ty Emberson looks like he can hold his own on the second pairing, while also watching the battle for fourth-line spots, which is sure to create some healthy competition.

That said, some players may surprise with a remarkable preseason, but be careful—preseason success doesn’t always translate to the regular season. With that in mind, we outline five former Oilers who dazzled in the exhibition games but couldn’t carry it over into the regular season.

The Oilers drafted Mike Comrie 91st overall in the 1999 NHL Draft and the hometown kid produced 133 points in 192 games from 2000-2003 with Edmonton. Yet, in December 2003, the centerman held out due to a contract dispute. A deal was in place to trade him to the Anaheim Ducks for Corey Perry and a first-round pick, but it was contingent upon Comrie reimbursing the Oilers $2.5 million as part of his bonus from his entry-level contract.

Ultimately, the deal fell through and he was eventually traded to the Philadelphia Flyers instead and he shuffled between teams, later joining the Phoenix Coyotes, Ottawa Senators, and New York Islanders.

In Sept 2009, the Oilers signed Comrie to a one-year deal, marking his return to Oil Country. In a preseason game against the Florida Panthers, he won back the fans’ affection at Rexall Place, tallying four assists in a 4-0 win and got into a scrap with Eric Himelfarb, which earned him a standing ovation. On top of that, the former Oiler led the entire NHL in preseason points with 10 points in five games.

However, Comrie’s strong preseason performance did not translate to the regular season. He was limited to just 43 games due to mononucleosis, finishing the 2009-10 campaign with 21 points. He played the next season with the Pittsburgh Penguins before retiring due to injuries.

Ty Rattie struggled to find his footing with the St. Louis Blues at the start of his career, and the Oilers took a chance on him, signing him to a one-year two-way deal on July 1, 2017. He thrived in the AHL with the Bakersfield Condors in 2017-18, racking up 21 goals and 22 assists in 53 games. Later that season, he was called up to the NHL, where he had the chance to play alongside Connor McDavid, scoring nine points in 14 games.

The Oilers re-signed Rattie to another one-year deal in April 2018, and was handed a golden opportunity to play on a line with McDavid and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and he rose to the occasion in the exhibitions games heading into the 2018-19 season. He became a preseason scoring machine, potting three goals against the Vancouver Canucks, and his seven goals and four assists in just four games made him the unofficial preseason Art Ross champ (if such a title existed).

Many crossed their fingers that he could become a legit scoring threat on McDavid’s wing for only $800k annually. However, he recorded only four points in his first 20 games, suffered an early injury that sidelined him for a few weeks, was taken off the captain’s line, and struggled for playing time in the bottom six. At one point, he was placed on waivers, and overall, he produced 11 points in 50 games that season, marking his final year in the NHL before heading overseas.

Tomas Jurco was a second-round draft pick by former Oilers GM Ken Holland during his time with the Detroit Red Wings in 2011 and shuffled between the NHL and the minors, before playing for the Chicago Blackhawks and Florida Panthers organizations.

During the 2018-19 season with the Panthers’ AHL team, the Charlotte Checkers, Jurco went on an impressive run in the playoffs and helped them win a Calder Cup after putting up 18 points in 18 playoff games. That success translated into his former GM giving him another shot, and the Oilers signed him to a one-year deal for $750,000 on July 1, 2019.

The Oilers were hoping they had found a diamond in the rough in 2019-20 with the once highly touted prospect, and he made a good first impression. In the second-to-last exhibition game, he was put on a line with McDavid, recording two goals and one assist, and tallied three goals and two assists overall in the preseason. Yet, after just 12 regular-season games and a lacklustre two points, he was sent down to the AHL and did not return.

Brendan Perlini, a former first-round pick of the Arizona Coyotes, played six seasons with the Coyotes, Chicago Blackhawks, and Detroit Red Wings organizations. He scored a career-high 17 goals in the 2017-18 season and signed a one-year, two-way contract with the Oilers in August 2021 after spending the previous season playing in Switzerland with HC Ambrì-Piotta.

Perlini was known for his powerful shot and had an outside chance of making the Oilers, and he filled the net with ease in the preseason in 2021. Although he primarily played in the bottom six, he showed off his hard shot, netting six goals over the same number of games, which included a two-goal outing against the Seattle Kraken. Overall, he led the Oilers in preseason goals, recorded a 40% shooting percentage, and as a result, rightfully found a home on the team to start the season.

Yet, he was unable to carry over his hot streak when the regular season began. He went pointless in his first 14 games before scoring his first goal of the season in mid-December but started to find his rhythm, scoring four goals in a seven-game span. However, overall, he was in and out of the lineup and wasn’t consistent enough, producing five points in 23 games before being sent down to the AHL’s Condors for the final time in late Feb. 2022.

Perlini has been playing in the AHL for the last couple of seasons, but one of the things he’ll be most remembered for in Oil Country is his positivity in interviews and his expressions of gratitude. At a low point with the team, he said, “It’s really almost good to be grateful for our group to go through periods like this because when we get back to winning, it’s like, ‘Ah, I like that feeling; I want to keep winning.'”

Former Oiler Dylan Holloway (it still feels weird typing that out) was drafted in the first round by Edmonton in 2020 and played in his first NHL game in the 2022 Western Conference Final, logging only 3:27 minutes.

Yet, he became the talk of the preseason for the 2022-23 campaign, when he scored a hat trick against the Vancouver Canucks, showed off his wheels, scored four goals and two assists in six exhibition games, and earned a spot next to Leon Draisaitl to start the regular season. As a result, the young forward came in with a lot of buzz while playing on the second line, but unfortunately, that was short-lived.

He had a rough start to his rookie campaign, which began in his first shift during his ‘Welcome to the NHL’ moment when he coughed up the puck in his own end and put it on Elias Pettersson’s tape. Pettersson then beat goaltender Jack Campbell, and Holloway was promptly removed from the top six due to his error. Moreover, in his third game against the Buffalo Sabres, he was caught with his head down, and Ilya Lyubushkin delivered a vicious open-ice hit, which caused the former Oiler to miss four games.

Ultimately, Holloway was unable to carry his preseason success into the regular season, taking 17 games to find the back of the net for the first time. He recorded a total of nine points in 51 games that season before being sent down to the AHL, where he got injured and missed a month of action.

Holloway played in 38 regular-season games last season but proved to be an effective player in the playoffs, scoring five goals and two assists in 25 games while spending most of his time on Draisaitl’s wing. Moreover, he signed an offer sheet with the St. Louis Blues last August, which Edmonton did not match, much to the disappointment of a good portion of Oilers fans.

The players listed above highlight that thriving in the preseason doesn’t always lead to regular season success. With that in mind, which Oiler did you think for sure was going to make an impact during the regular season based on their showing in the exhibition games, but ultimately failed to do so?

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