From the moment he arrived in Edmonton at the 2025 trade deadline, Jake Walman made his presence felt. In his first game with the Oilers, he sat down Mikko Rantanen with a huge open ice hit and delivered a long-range flip pass onto the tape of Zach Hyman for a breakaway goal.

That was just the appetizer for his dominant stretch run. He finished the season first among Oilers defencemen in goal share at 61.9 per cent and produced eight points in 15 games.

In the playoffs, Walman was instrumental in Edmonton’s steamrolling of the Western Conference bracket. Kris Knoblauch deployed him in a third-pair role next to John Klingberg, and their ability to push the pace and move the puck up ice quickly gave Edmonton’s depth lines a significant advantage. It was largely their contributions that led to a 25-14 edge for the Oilers during that run without McDavid and Draisaitl on the ice.

The Stanley Cup Final ended in disappointment for Edmonton, but Walman emerged from the playoffs as one of their most impactful defencemen. On Oct. 6, Stan Bowman signed him to a seven-year extension worth an AAV of $7 million, a year before his previous contract was set to expire.

It wasn’t until after that massive commitment that the problems cropped up.

Walman signed his extension a couple of weeks after suffering an undisclosed injury in Edmonton’s first preseason game. He was initially ruled day-to-day, but the injury lingered and kept him out for a month. Upon return, Walman didn’t make nearly the same impact that he had the prior year.

He had the worst expected goals against per hour among Oilers defencemen in his first 17 games before injuring himself once more. This time, it was a deep bone bruise, which forced him out of action for another month and a half.

This isn’t the first time Walman has been bitten by the injury bug. Over his six seasons in the NHL, he’s never once eclipsed 65 games played. It’s a concerning trend for an Oiler team that’s committed to him for another seven years with a no-movement clause until 2030.

When you look at Walman’s career, he’s always had fantastic upside, but consistency has been an issue. His HockeyViz isolated impact timeline yo-yos up and down each year.

This season was a down year, particularly from a defensive perspective. His impact ranked 10 per cent below league average according to HockeyViz. Walman’s controlled aggression turned chaotic, leading to a shocking decline in his goal and scoring chance suppression.

Injuries were no doubt a factor in his disappointing season, but so too was his inconsistent deployment. Walman started the season on his offside next to Darnell Nurse, then he moved pairs to play with Spencer Stastney, then back on the left side with Connor Murphy, then Ty Emberson.

The coaching staff wanted the Nurse-Walman duo to work. That was the plan going into training camp. But Walman struggled on his offside and they were outscored 21-19 with a 47.1 per cent expected goal share. Between the injuries, the flip-flopping of sides, and the rotating door of defence partners, his season was thrust into chaos from the start.

After all of that, he finally picked things up in the playoffs, where he led all Oiler defencemen in expected goal share and put up four assists in six games. It was only a small sample, but it was a glimmer of hope that the 2024-25 Walman is still in there. The Oilers will need that version of him next season.

If health is on his side, and the new coaching staff can help him carve out a role and get his confidence going early, there’s a good chance we see his performance spike back up in 2026-27. If it doesn’t, the Oilers might come to regret extending him early.