I considered writing my normal wordy intro paragraph about how Taiwan Animation is the weirdest thing in the world, citing examples from the stories we’ve covered and wondering how two Taiwanese ladies with 3rd grade computer animation skills could get to the heart of a story better than a nation of aged sports reporters, but I’ll let this image do all that for me:

Additional highlights, if you aren’t already watching, include:

- Phil Jackson as the zen, levitating version of The Mandarin from ‘Iron Man’
- A swinging jazz soundtrack
- The Lakers having fruit thrown at them because they’re trying to play basketball with walkers (try to figure out which one’s supposed to be Steve Nash!)
- Slow motion fruit explosions
- Player-on-fan violence

They really got their money’s worth out of that “bus backing up” noise.

HONNNNNNNNNNK!

When news broke on Friday that the Los Angeles Lakers had fired Mike Brown just 5 games into the season, the majority of NBA writers and just fans in general said the same thing: “Hello, Mike D’Antoni.” But stating the obvious is only fun if you write for NPR, so a bunch of us felt like speculating. For example, I said that Indiana Pacers associate head coach Brian Shaw would be the top candidate because he was the hot name for four coaching vacancies in the offseason, but that made little sense because C) nobody hired him then, and 6) the Pacers aren’t just going to let an important part of the coaching staff walk to another team with the season underway.

But then the PJ bomb was dropped, and we spent the weekend just waiting for the announcement that Phil Jackson was returning to coaching. Obviously, it made sense, because the Lakers have a stacked roster and Jackson loves to conveniently coach stacked rosters. It was eventually reported that Jackson allegedly wanted specific things like a 2-year deal, Scottie Pippen on his coaching staff and travel exemptions, which is ridiculous, because no coach deserves to be able to miss games when he feels like it.

Thankfully, we don’t have to bother debating that, because Jackson is out of the picture and the Lakers have hired D’Antoni. Of course, some people aren’t happy about that choice. Namely Jackson.

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The worst news for the Los Angeles Lakers today should have been that Devin Ebanks was arrested on suspicion of a DUI this morning. And then maybe that whole 1-4 start while Kobe Bryant evolves into a new breed of evil and Dwight Howard continues to pretend that everything works out in the end. Instead, it’s f*cking DEFCON 2 in L.A. this afternoon, as Lakers coach Mike Brown has been fired already, according to USA Today’s Sam Amick.

Mike Brown has been fired by the Los Angeles Lakers, according to his agent Warren Legarie.

The Lakers are off to a 1-4 start and will play Golden State tonight at the Staples Center.

Simple. Subtle. And not really unexpected, most notably because of this GIF of the Year candidate:

But it’s still shocking, as Lakers owner Jim Buss had made it clear that he had full trust in Brown and that he was sticking with him as a hard working, knowledgeable coach. Then again, this is the NBA and trust only means something when it’s written in the win column. So who then will replace Brown and fix this 1-4 funk that the sloppy, injured Lakers have already fallen into?

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I took a couple weeks off from doing these here ROFLMNBAO posts for two reasons: 1) because the last two weeks of the season were soooooo boring and B) I forgot. But I figured what better time than now to resume posting these NBA meme pictures since the news that they’re so in demand. Form a line to the left, attractive girls who want to give me money to create ridiculously corny-sounding sites!

Also, I figured it was a better time than any for this week’s installment with the playoffs in full swing and individual awards being presented by the league. As we already know, Tyson Chandler is the Defensive Player of the Year, Jason Kidd received the Sportsmanship Award and Gregg Popovich is the Coach of the Year. “What about the other awards?” you ask while peeling apart the pages of my vintage Hustler collection. The NBA is taking its sweet ass time with those, so I’m issuing my own awards.

A lot happened in this condensed season, so it’s only fair that we recognize everyone for their efforts.

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Apparently people were surprised on Wednesday when New York Knicks coach Mike D’Antoni suddenly resigned, but something was obviously going to happen. The Knicks were 18-24, barely hanging on to a tie for the 8th playoff spot in the Eastern Conference despite last season’s huge trade for Carmelo Anthony and the addition of Tyson Chandler. Also, there’s that Jeremy Lin kid who was playing pretty damn fantastic for a while. Factor in Anthony openly talking about his displeasure with D’Antoni and nobody should be surprised.

What was surprising, though, was the team’s response on Wednesday, when the Knicks completely pummeled the Portland Trail Blazers 121-79 under the direction of new coach Mike Woodson. And that was just the first cannon fire of Woodson’s new campaign. The second? Putting D’Antoni’s Harvard boy in the backseat.

On Thursday things got tougher: Woodson ran his first practice and began to make it clear to his players that this is now his team, at least for the rest of the season, and not Mike D’Antoni’s.

That almost certainly means it will be a Knicks team that will slow things down on offense and run an isolation-heavy system more suited to Carmelo Anthony’s ball-dominating inclinations.

“It’s everybody’s ball club,” Woodson said after practice Thursday, when he was asked if the Knicks were once again Anthony’s team, as they were before Jeremy Lin briefly took over. “I want everybody to feel comfortable. When I put a guy in the game, if he’s got a shot, I want him to feel comfortable about making that shot.”

(Via the NY Times)

Well I suppose this makes a lot more sense now…

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With the NBA trade deadline just 7 days away, all of the media’s focus is on the big market teams and their needs, which begs the question – which chump teams are gonna get fleeced? The quick answer: probably none. The Orlando Magic currently have the 5th best record in the entire league, which absolutely baffles me after watching them stand still and take it hard against the 4-win Charlotte Bobcats the other night, but then that’s how the wonderful world of sports works. So they’re most likely not trading Dwight Howard, and every other team is stuck waiting to see what happens with that to make their own moves. Classic log jam, folks.

Common sense says that Orlando won’t get a Denver Nuggets-type haul at the deadline, so that means the Magic instead want to move some of their crap for another team’s lesser crap. Meanwhile, Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers sure could use some help, as could pretty much any team that isn’t the Chicago Bulls, Oklahoma City Thunder, San Antonio Spurs or Miami Heat. Face it, your team is pretty much screwed.

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