Restricted free agents don’t work like that

You can't sign other teams Restricted Free Agents , And not only that your over the cap

It's true the Hawks don't have first rights to negotiate with either of those guys, but the "restriction" on RFA's has limits, specifically with regard to arbitration eligible players, which both Stone and Miller are. The hunch is that Ottawa lowballs Stone and that TB won't quite be able to afford what Miller can get on the open market. So, this is an OPTIMISTIC outlook, where several conditions come to fruition. A) both/either Stone and Miller go to arbitration and the teams each reject the terms they are rendered by the arbitrator, rendering them UFA's (this is what happened with Antti Niemi after the '10 Cup and he ended up with SJS). And B) the NHL raises the Cap to $80M giving the Hawks some breathing room. So, RFA's can work like this, but it takes some good fortune and an optimistic cap increase. BL: Hawks NEED another goal scorer/puck possessor and either or both Stone and Miller give them this feature. Alternatively, Ottawa or TB could entertain trades prior to arbitration if they don't think they can sign these players. That would be similar to what Bowman did with Saad after the 2015 Cup. I guess I should have put all of this in the description...