A year ago, it seemed that no amount of salary-cap wizardry would allow the Ducks to avoid trading defenseman Cam Fowler. He didn’t want to leave the team that had drafted him 12th overall in 2010, but he understood that the Ducks wanted to keep emerging stars Rickard Rakell, Sami Vatanen and Hampus Lindholm, and that the math simply didn’t look good for him.
Hoping to stay — or to prove his worth to potential suitors — Fowler narrowed his focus and actually did what every athlete in such situations vows to do: he controlled what he could control and let everything else sort itself out.