Some of those free agent veterans can be acquired, but at a higher cost. Tarasenko is a good example.
You're cutting Dorion too much slack, he made some questionable choices when handing out contracts to questionable vets like Stepan for example.
Most of the guys available during free agency are journeymen who will pack it up and go wherever will pay them well. Ottawa needs to pay more than most cities in the NHL due to taxes, weather and as of late the team's standings.
Tarasenko plugged his nose and took an Ottawa vacation for 6 months. I think it's pretty clear that this was his last choice; the guy turned down a long-term deal with the Sens at the beginning of free agency because he thought something better would come along but it never did.
In the end, the terms that Dorion had to give him to come here were extremely player-friendly. A 1-year deal at 5M with a full NTC so he could land himself where he truly wanted to be when the deadline rolls around. I don't even know how much the team benefited from having him. The on-ice results didn't improve, his contract put the team in a cap bind, and since he had trade protection we couldn't even really cash him in at the deadline. He was a mature pro when he was here, but ultimately it probably wasn't worth the investment.
Dorion didn't give Derek Stepan a contract. He was a guy they had to trade for because they couldn't fill holes any other way, which is kind of my point. If Stepan had a say in the process he would have never ended up in Ottawa, which was clear when he did his introductory press conference on Zoom and he looked like ones of those hostages in an ISIS video reading a prepared statement.
I think when people say you can just overpay a guy and he'll come to Ottawa it's a bit simplistic. The way Dorion presented the situation is that it was more like players didn't even want to hear his pitch because they had already decided they didn't want to play in Canada, or they didn't want to be part of a rebuild, or they didn't want to play for a team that was going to serve them boxed quesadillas in a chafing dish for the post-game meal, or whatever else.
One of the biggest tasks facing Andlauer and Staios is going to be rebuilding the reputation of the Ottawa Senators organization, and it's going to take years.