After taking the time to review my stats and game play from the preseason, I believe that it's entirely inaccurate. Following the end of preseason, I put in a massive update that completely changed the defensive ability of my player.
I believe that this is going to make for more takeaways, blocks, hits as well as better positioning on the ice at all the times. While that might not sound like much, it should help turn an already heavily offensively oriented player into a more well rounded one.
That's all that you can really strive to be to make sure that you're constantly being the best player on the ice at any given time. I've never been one to look too far into the preseason stats, they're essentially meaningless.
Nevermind the fact that for the most part, teams don't really take preseason all that seriously anyway. The regular season is when they will start to actually work the lines/tactic properly to get everyone producing well.