On Thursday (Sept. 19), the Edmonton Oilers announced they had signed forward Jasper Weatherby to a professional tryout (PTO). The 26-year-old, who has played 50 career games in the NHL, spent all of last season in the American Hockey League (AHL) with the Milwaukee Admirals.
PTOs give unsigned veteran players the opportunity to earn a contract with an NHL team by impressing during training camp and the preseason.
Weatherby is the third player to sign a PTO with the Oilers this month, following defenceman Travis Dermott and centre Mike Hoffman. But while Dermott and Hoffman are both veterans with many seasons of NHL experience, Weatherby is not someone that many fans are overly familiar with.
As an introduction, he stands 6-foot-4, shoots left, and was born in Portland, Oregon. Here is everything else to know about Edmonton’s latest PTO signing.
He Developed His Game in Canada
During his childhood, Weatherby’s family lived in Ashland, a city of just over 20,000 in southern Oregon that isn’t exactly a breeding ground for future NHLers.
Around the time he was in sixth or seventh grade, Weatherby realized he could play at a higher level than what was being offered in his home city, so he pursued opportunities outside of Ashland.
“When you’re on the west coast, you have to fight for ice, and that gives you perspective for when you get to a hockey hotbed where there’s a lot of opportunity,” Weatherby said. “It was a rare resource where I was from.”
In Grade 8, Weatherby made road trips up to Vancouver, B.C., to play spring league hockey. Then he enrolled at the Canadian International Hockey Academy, located just outside of Ottawa, where he played for the academy’s U15 AAA team in 2012-13 and U16 AAA team in 2013-14.
He Dominated Junior A Hockey
Weatherby played two seasons of Junior A with the Wenatchee Wild of the British Columbia Hockey League (BCHL). In his second season with the Wild, 2017-18, he recorded 37 goals and 37 assists in 58 games. He received the Brett Hull Trophy, as the BCHL’s points leader, and the Vern Dye Memorial Trophy, as the league’s regular season MVP.
Then in the 2018 postseason, Weatherby led Wenatchee to its first championship, putting up an incredible 15 goals and 23 assists in 20 BCHL playoff games. The Wild went on to defeat the Spruce Grove Saints in the Doyle Cup and advance to the Canadian Junior Hockey League (CJHL) championship tournament, then known as the Royal Bank Cup.
He was Drafted by His Favourite NHL Team
After going unselected in his first two years of being eligible for the NHL Draft, Weatherby’s sensational season with the Wild put him on the radar of NHL teams. The San Jose Sharks were so impressed that they traded the 123rd and 139th picks in the 2018 NHL Draft to the Montreal Canadiens in exchange for the 102nd pick, which they used to select Weatherby.
San Jose was the favourite NHL team of Weatherby when he was growing up; his stepfather held season tickets to the Sharks, and he would drive down to San Jose to see games.
Two years ago, @jasperweatherby was at the Stanley Cup Final pulling for the @SanJoseSharks. Today, they drafted him. pic.twitter.com/K8tWuGwf2b
— Wenatchee Wild (@WHLwild_) June 23, 2018
Weatherby even attended the 2016 Stanley Cup Final between the Sharks and Pittsburgh Penguins and appeared on TV with a sign that read “Brent Burns is my Spirit Animal”, referencing San Jose’s beloved bearded blueliner. Just over five years later, Weatherby would be teammates with Burns on the 2021-22 Sharks. Burns is now with the Carolina Hurricanes.
He Was Unlike Anyone Else in College Hockey
From 2018-19 to 2020-21, Weatherby played for the University of North Dakota Fighting Hawks men’s hockey team. In his junior year, he was the only player from Oregon in all of NCAA Division 1 hockey.
Weatherby made headlines in December 2020 when his fellow UND alternate captain Jacob Bernard-Docker (now of the Ottawa Senators), knelt during the national anthem prior to the Hawks’ season-opening game, showing their solidarity in the fight for racial justice.
While many athletes across sports at that time were kneeling during the anthem, Weatherby and Bernard-Docker are believed to have been the first to do so in NCAA hockey.
“We want to spark conversations and show people that we’re not OK with the way minorities are treated in this country and around the world,” Weatherby said. “We stand — and kneel — in support of them.”
He Hasn’t Played in the NHL in Over Two Years
Weatherby’s most recent NHL regular season game came on April 24, 2022, when he played 9:21 in a Sharks’ victory over the Vegas Golden Knights.
His pro career got off to a terrific start, as he made the Sharks’ roster out of training camp in 2021 and played in 40 of the Sharks’ first 44 games of the season. But he dressed for only 10 of their last 38 games, as he spent most of the second half of 2021-22 in the AHL with the San Jose Barracuda.
He returned to the Barracuda the following season until he was traded from the Sharks to the Detroit Red Wings on Jan. 18, 2023, in exchange for Kyle Criscuolo. A change of organizations didn’t help Weatherby, who spent the remainder of 2022-23 in the AHL with Detroit’s affiliate, the Grand Rapids Griffins.
In the 2023 offseason, Weatherby signed a one-year, two-way deal with the Nashville Predators, but began last season with Milwaukee and was never recalled by the NHL club.
He’s Come Full Circle With the Oilers
By Weatherby signing a PTO with the Oilers, the Oregon native’s journey along the NHL trail has now come full circle. That’s because the fourth-round draft pick that San Jose used to select Weatherby back in 2018 originally belonged to Edmonton.
The Oilers traded their rights to that pick to the Montreal Canadiens on Jan. 4, 2018, in exchange for goaltender Al Montoya. Months later, on draft day, Montreal dealt the pick to the Sharks.
Related: Breaking Down Mike Hoffman’s PTO With the Edmonton Oilers
Weatherby faces long odds to make the Oilers, and will be in tough against the likes of Hoffman and other forwards, but he’s certainly someone Oilers fans can root for when Edmonton opens its 2024 preseason schedule with a home game against the Winnipeg Jets on Sunday (Sept. 22) at Rogers Place.
