The internet exploded an hour ago when reports surfaced that Mike Brown had been canned. And so as Twitter does, names for Brown’s replacement – everything from the absurd (Phil Jackson) to the more absurd (Stan Van Gundy) – were floated with self-congratulating conviction. An injured Mike D’Antoni was one of those names.

There’s been no more heavily-scrutinized team in the early part of the NBA season than the Lakers, and while it’s early and it’ll take time for all the new pieces to mesh and Steve Nash is hurt and blah blah blaaaaaaaahhhhh, the scrutiny was inevitable – especially for coach Mike Brown. How inevitable? Enough that even though the team gave him a public vote of confidence, there are still new reports that Brown’s on the hottest of seats.

Hurricane Sandy knock out your power? Have another lame excuse for missing the start of the NBA season? We’ve been previewing the NBA season with our Pretty Much Screwed series, so you should know by now that your team is probably screwed and maybe not worth watching anyway. In case you’re still optimistic but missed the first night of future misery, we can let you know what happened.

According to Bengals owner Mike Brown, the team will let Carson Palmer make good on his plan to retire, and intend to move ahead with second-round draft pick Andy Dalton as the possible starting quarterback. The NFL equivalent of a Mexican standoff is currently going down in Cincy.

So, Mike Brown will be the Lakers’ next head coach. What does his star player think of that fact? Hard to say.

There’s a rumor floating around that on July 1st, LeBron James is a free agent. Media outlets have been surprisingly mum on the story (ha!), but this could really shift the power structure in the NBA. We thought, since no one else is blogging about it, we’d provide the cities of New York and Chicago a primer on the proper way to pursue basketball’s King. After the jump, the 5 measures both teams can take in their quest for ‘Bron.