Assuming that Pettersson is traded to NYI, what does Vancouver have that'd want for Norris? I get that Norris is overpaid and is injury prone but we're not in a position to trade him for spare parts and not get another top6 player in return. If neither Miller (already traded) or Pettersson (hypothetically traded to NYI) are coming to OTT, what's to gain from trading Norris to Vancouver ?
We are cap locked and have depth issues.
I've said this before, but I see it working out like we get 2-3 legitimate NHL players who may or may not be underperforming or redundant, and won't be at all exciting to acquire. The prime motivation of management being to improve the roster in the short term and get out of the liability of the Norris contract in the long term.
If the Islanders are involved with Vancouver, it also opens things up to take someone from the Islanders roster, because Vancouver are going to need to take back more than Dobson to make Pettersson to VAN work.
It could be something like Pettersson for Dobson+Pageau, then Pageau or Chytil+Soucy+Hoglander to Ottawa for Norris a fringe NHLer or two.
Norris and two roster spots is about 9.5M-10M in cap, (Pageau or Chytil)+Soucy+Hoglander is a max of 9.25M.
I am not advocating for that format of a trade, and saying look at this exciting idea - but I think something like that is probably the end result. Vancouver will want to move players with term to take Norris.
Hoglander only has a 1M cap this year and Travis Green would be familiar with him. Curiously enough, he saw bigger minutes as a rookie under Travis Green than he saw under any other coach for his entire career. Green was fired early into his sophomore season. He is not producing for Vancouver, and his 3 year 3M extension kicks in next season. I could see him being an ideal player for both sides because it allows Vancouver to dump cap with term, but his 1M cap hit this year makes it easier for Ottawa to fit him in.
Soucy is rumoured to be available. He has a NTC. Curiously enough, there is a connection there with Mike Yeo, who was head coach when Soucy would have been working his way through the Wild system, and later one of the assistant coaches in Vancouver. So while players usually will not waive for the Senators, if they have some sort of personal connection it's possible that Soucy might trust that coming to Ottawa would be good because the Senators want him and he can play a bigger role than going somewhere else.
Then you add another forward from either the Islanders or Senators. Ideally a center. I brought up Pageau or Chytil (assuming VAN gets a C back from NYI to replace Chytil, and assuming he wasn't their ideal target but they had to take him). But it could be just about anybody under 5M who would be expendable.
tl;dr:
-Norris for 3 roster players no one will be excited about that are cap in/out.
-Hoglander and Green are bros in my fan fiction about this.
-Mike Yeo convinces Soucy that he will get the Hamonic treatment and play 27 minutes a night here.
-Vancouver working with NYI opens up the Senators to take a veteran off the Islanders roster, because they will need to send Vancouver more than Dobson's 5M to take Pettersson's 11.5M cap hit.
