Ignore the draft picks. The trade machine kept giving me an error with Ellis in any trade.

The trade is:
M. Joseph (3 x 3M)

for

R. Ellis (4 x 6.25M) (LTIRetired)

This is similar to Dadonov for Weber. LTIR is a massive competitive handicap. Despite the common misconception on fan forums, it is not the same as "free" cap space. Having a long-term LTIR contract is a massive headache. The Senators are backed into a corner and do not want to give up a 1st round pick, so they take back an LTIRetired player for the short term benefit of getting Pinto signed. It doesn't hurt the Senators this season since they will be right at the 83.5M cap ceiling. With that said, it will likely hurt them sometime in the next four years.

The Flyers get out of LTI and free up additional cap space which can be used at the trade deadline to facilitate trades as a third team, or can be used to acquire cap dumps for draft picks. The rumour is that they like Joseph as a player, but want a major asset to take him. Ottawa taking Ellis is that major asset.

This trade heavily favours Philadelphia, and I highly doubt the Senators would do this unless they had no other option. It would almost be preferably to give up a protected 1st or Boucher and wipe their hands from the cap issues. Acquiring a big money LTIRetired contract with 4 years remaining will cause headaches down the line and the Ellis contract would likely cost more to move in terms of picks/prospects next year than the Joseph one does now.

The big difference between this contract and the Weber contract is that the Weber contract was owed very little real money (a few hundred k per season after insurance). That made it easy for the Knights to eventually dump. Ellis is owed a lot of money. We also don't know if he is insured. Even if he is insured, he will still be owed seven figures per season, which would not be easy to find a taker for in the future if the Senators want to get out of LTI.

In what world is this better for the Flyers? 😂 Ellis doesn’t even need to go on LTIR this year have you checked our salary cap?