My thought process was this,
Ottawa is projected to have the following players at centre. In no particular order:
Anisimov
White
Tierney
Pageau
Brown probably earns a spot.
Ennis who can play in the middle
Anisimov and White can both play on the wings as well.
Without Chlapik, the Senators also have
Norris
Pinto
Lodin
So trading away Chlapik isn’t the end of the world for me. Plus Ottawa is expected to blow this year and have a better chance at winning the lottery... Lafrenière
Manning is straight up a plug and is in the deal because Ottawa will have a bunch of youngsters on this upcoming seasons roster. Also Ottawa still have question marks on the left side of defence. Also Ottawa will need the cap hit to stay at the capfloor.
Puljujarvi has been lack lustre so far in his young career. Don’t know if it’s solely because of him, but I feel like Edmonton’s management of him probably has something to do with it as well. He is a definitely a project, but Ottawa is pretty good at developing talent and the Senators have been known to take on projects before, Turris, Filatov, Latendress, Bishop etc.
And for Boedker, I like him but I can’t see him coming back.