If you traded for Hossa, and dumped a similar level contract in the process, you can then place Hossa in long term IR and use that cap space to sign someone else.
Similar I guess to the NBA trading for expiring contracts. Have the contracts in the books for a year, which you need anyway, then have free cap space.
Two questions though: would the NHL allow it? They were not too keen on the Hawks doing it, so they might not like a team trading for Hossa just to skate the rules ( pun intended)
Q2: Not sure I see the value to the Hawks to make this deal? Unless they can get quality guy in return.
I think Hossa is already on LTIR for the season, is he not?
Outside of that, there are a lot of moving parts this year.
There are a lot more younger players this year. I think I recall seeing ~14 players under 25, whereas last year it was single digits, maybe 5.
You have continued decline of "The Core" (except Kane, because duh).
Crawford has fallen into the same alternate dimension as Ozzie Smith in the Simpsons.
Quenneville continues to do whatever it is he does.
I think that there were a lot of signs that this team was fading last year (before the playoffs) regardless of the getting the #1 seed in the West. It is strange in the sense that I feel a lot of people are looking at this upcoming off-season as a start to rebuilding, but I think it has already begun with the influx of younger players (Schmaltz, Hinostroza, DeBrincat, and to an extent Duclair, Kempny, and Hartman). Giving those players (specifially the first three) an extra year to get bigger/faster/stronger will be huge. I mean, even Saad is only 25.
EDIT: I forgot about Murphy,
too. Who they got for Hjalmarsson
While The Core continues to contribute less, in the ideal world the role players mentioned above take a big enough step forward next year to almost hide the cracks that are starting to become apparent with the older group of players.
Hopefully Crawford is able to come back at some point and play at the same level (or close to it) either this year or next. At this point though I wouldn't rush anything with him. He should have a few more years of good-very good production and there is no reason to put those years in jeopardy for a run at the #8 seed.
I might go full meatball here, but I think Quenneville needs to be replaced. He's a really good coach, but I think the Hawks are staring at a scenario in the near future that Q has shown he isn't the best at always handling (younger players not named Kane or Toews).
I don't believe that Bowman will be a buyer and chase this year at the risk of throwing away the future (I hope he doesn't). But I also believe that with all the NTCs the team won't necessarily be a seller this year.
Overall, there are definitely some concerns for next year (and further down the road) and regarding the window being closed, but I think this team is still built to win.