Ok, granted: Shooter’s five-year, 29.5 million dollar deal doesn’t exactly scream hometown discount. Then again, if the off-season FA frenzy and Weber’s arbitration award represent market trends, Sharp’s cap hit of 5.9 per might end up being league minimum by 2018.

No one save Kane or Toews is as lethal with time and space around the circles, and Sharp’s ability to diffuse tension in the room, especially the perpetual competitive simmer between Felix and Oscar, is a team asset worth its weight in silver.

There’s as much to like about this signing as there is to hate about the fact that it’s still August. Please kill all the time that’s fit to waste with these morning links…

• The best minds…destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked: The beats’ take on the Sharp signing…Sassone. Jahns. Kuc.

• Jesse Rogers’ multi-media extravaganza

• Blackhawk Up talks ramifications

• Jaeckel shares his thoughts

• The Hawks announce dates for preseason and single-game tickets.

• Lombardi wept: Will Weber’s arbitration award send the d-man market into the stratosphere?

• The Village Voice talks pucks: Are the Islanders gonna be standing on the corner of Twelfth and Vine in 2015?