Bits: Many NHL Contract Extensions, No Schedule

PGI did a Frans-ian job with the daily a.m. bits this week -- to the point that I feel some pressure to continue them, at least through Friday, after which you will hopefully forget over the weekend that they were almost a daily thing again.

Thomas Hickey is not only a newly re-signed Islanders defenseman, he is also "an unlikely authority on home fragrance."

• Still no NHL schedule. (Man, it's so weird for the Olympics Inc. to be holding something up.)
• After being forced to take a bridge deal after his ELC, Matt Duchene signed long term with the Avs.
• Dustin Brown is also rich, having signed with the Kings for many many millions and eight years in a contract that, in an aesthetically appropriate way, declines in salary as his body likely will.
• I hope you're sitting down, because the Philadelphia sports media got something wrong. (R.J. Umberger doesn't have a Flyers tattoo.)
• The exodus of talent to the KHL contin- wait, what? Denis Grebeshkov has returned to the Oilers on a one-year deal. Nice move.
• This is old, but perhaps never mentioned here. The latest Kichton lament reminded me that Jason Gregoire (like Blake Kessel with the Flyers) was not qualified by the Jets.
  
• HEOTP's summer fancy stats school continues with zone starts.
• Ted Leonsis is refinancing the Capitals on a loan bigger than the price he paid for the team in 1999.
  
• On that note, CBS: "Over the past couple of years, almost no team in the league has been better than the Kings when it comes to controlling the puck. They've steadily improved each season."
• Would you rather the Isles still shopped up front? The Detroit Red Wings have an excess of NHL forwards and want to trade one of them | Edmonton Journal
• Justin Bourne on the unclear but palpable value of "character" guys.
• Hockey as therapy: For Combat Veterans, Life During Ice Time - NYTimes.com
• I mean, maybe but then maybe not: The return of ‘NHL 94’: How EA Sports improved on a hockey classic - Yahoo! Sports
• Jamal Mayers didn't dress for a single playoff game (yet did dress for the Cup celebration), but he won the Cup anyway and that sounds like a nice gig so he'd like to continue. (Personal tangential connection: While he was dating his future wife, her sister was an intern ... who would not stop talking about Jamal. Every. Single. Day.)
• Video: The Senators went wild with some outdoor activities at their summer camp.

Oh, and music? Well I have no brilliant music selection. But in honor of Thomas Hickey's extension...Kiss: