$3MM qualifying offer to Athanasiou, as well as Ottawa's own RFA signings still to come, easily put the Senators over the cap floor.

The draft picks Ottawa is giving for the Oilers 14th pick is a bit of an overpay, Ottawa moving up from 28th to 14th, but including the 58th overall pick, but its a deep draft so it's not as much as it might seem. The two for one pick swap also gives Edmonton another pick in a year they've traded away three of their picks. Here's a trade value chart in this article https://stg.tsn.9c9media.ca/statistically-speaking-nhl-draft-pick-values-1.1119528

Edmonton gets a young bottom6 centre ready for full time in Chlapik, who needs to get out from behind all the centres Ottawa has been stockpiling. Russell would be another body in a crowded defence, and would probably block the resigning of Hainsey or Borowiecki. Athanasiou would probably end up in Ottawa's middle6 somewhere.

Edmonton trades Russell's $3,968,000, saves $3,000,000 in not having to qualify Athanisiou, and only increase what they sign Chlapik to, likely $800K or so, a cap savings of $6,168,000

I found the qualifying offer calculator on CapFriendly, Chlapik's Qualifying offer would be $735,000

Take Athanasiou out and I think Ottawa would be more interested. Don’t qualify him and just let him walk then make the trade without him. Russel and Edmonton 1st for the some asking price. Just a suggestion.

Edmonton cant afford to Qualify AA, so there's no need to put him in the deal.

Ottawa could probably move up from to 15th by just offering the 28th, a 2020 2nd rounder and decent prospect in Chlapik. Adding Russell's contract into the deal would make it a massive overpayment for Ottawa.

Edmonton sending Russell and the 15th to Ottawa for the 28th and maybe a late 3rd or a 4th seems more in line with what recent salary dumps have cost.

I put Athanasiou in the deal because Ottawa can use him, a cheap test run similar to Duclair, and making the trade isn't just about Ottawa, Edmonton needs a reason to say yes. This is Ottawa's last year to take a bad contract and gain cheap assets.

Athanasiou didn't score in Edmonton, but looking at his numbers in Detroit, even removing the 30 goal 1st PP unit year, he scored at a 0.24 goal per game rate from 16/17 to 19/20, minus the removed year, and that's a 20 goal pace, 44 goals in 181 games. He averaged 30 seconds of SH time per game, and was on the second PP unit. Athanasiou is a 200 foot player, but it's his speed that makes him special. Here's a quote, “His zero-to-60 speed is incredible. Flat-footed he can go from a dead stop to 60 incredibly fast” – Misha Donskov, Knights asst. coach/GM.

The Edmonton bloggers saying Athanasiou isn't worth the $3MM qualifying offer, are looking at their cap, and the 9 regular season, and 4 playoff games, where he averaged 12:19 and 10:58 toi. In Ottawa, he's worth more than $3MM if he's going to produce at a solid middle6 secondary scorer. Ottawa has the cap space, and time, if Athanasiou scores at a lower rate, since the qualifying offer is a one year deal.

The centres will probably be White, Tierney, Norris, LBrown, & Anisimov, and the wingers Tkachuk, Batherson, Ryan, Balcers, CBrown, Duclair, Paul, & Hawryluk, which leaves two spots, and I'd prefer if Anisimov and Hawryluk were the healthy scratches.

I'm not sold on Formenton being ready yet, and Abramov is still a question mark. Chlapik is ready but is blocked, mostly by Anisimov, but also because LBrown needs to move up. I expect those three players to remain in Belleville.

The draft could introduce players to challenge for those last two spots, or at least one of them.

Athanasiou is a good bet to return to his regular Detroit numbers, and could give Formenton and Abramov another necessary year in the AHL.

But in the end, this is just fun speculation.

I still don’t see any reason for the $3 million qualifying offer when he has no trade value and Edmonton can’t afford him. Holland made a bad trade but why should Ottawa help him out. He had one 30 goal season but been a defensive liability his whole time in the NHL. Sign him as UFA to a contract like Duclair had last year at 1.5 million if you want to take a chance on him.