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Get enough cork to wallpaper the outside of Wachovia Center, a blizzard of thumb tacks and every newspaper clipping and Internet printout of Larry Brown and some of the 76ers in verbal volley a few weeks back and ...

... and ...

... and ...

Sorry. Had to yawn.

Brown has a homecoming Wednesday night, when his Pistons play in Philadelphia for his first trip back there since leaving the 76ers for Detroit. So.

Brown always has a homecoming. His résumé will be released as a three-volume set. His autobiography will be published by Rand McNally.

It's a little more interesting this time because LB and some of the 76ers traded jabs through the media earlier in the season, debating his legacy in Philly and setting records for how many times he can refer to difficult situations without mentioning the name Allen Iverson. Things like that. He said, he said.

And aren't we just so surprised. Brown had a strained relationship with a star? Hold on a sec. Danny Manning and David Robinson and Reggie Miller need to stop laughing.

That's Brown. He pushes and demands and teaches and refuses to accept that the great game the night before is the top of the mountain. Kansas won the NCAA championship with Danny and the Miracles, and then Brown coached Manning again with the Clippers and nearly sent him hitchhiking to get out of Los Angeles. He helped make Manning an All-Star but with a splintered relationship. Hell, things got so bad in San Antonio that Brown nearly drove Robinson to slouch. That Brown can also be the first one to jump in a foxhole should never be forgotten -- and his passion for everything good about basketball is indisputable -- but it's just Iverson's turn now. That's all.

Besides, when the time comes to move on, someone stays on Brown far worse than he ever did to any player.

Brown.

	“	Since I left, I think some guys have been hurtful in the way they've said things, and that's bothered me because I know where that franchise was six years ago and I know every player I coached has the maximum contract and all the people I worked with have really moved up. That's been troubling to me. ”
		— Larry Brown

He does self-analysis like the Atlantic Ocean does wet. That's how he always gets to this point, of going home again only to open the front door and find a lot of tension sitting in the living room. Four jobs later, Brown still voluntarily laments letting Robinson down by not surrounding the Admiral with a better supporting cast in the early days in San Antonio. So someone in Brown's current lifetime asks, now that he is settling into life as a Piston, about the way things ended in Philadelphia and the answer is cutting to some 76ers. So they fire back and it's on.

In truth, Brown was more hurt by the exchange than angered. He helped get the Sixers to the Finals. Iverson developed into an MVP under Brown. Players got max deals under Brown. Against the backdrop of the happy-feet jokes, he stayed six years. No one got shortchanged. His wife, a Californian, loved the area. Brown, an Everywhereian, loved the area.

Wednesday night, he becomes the enemy because some fans might feel slighted that he left them, and for one of the main competitors in the Eastern Conference at that. But they're also angry because he's there to try and beat the Sixers. Philly fans are passionate about their sports, so of course that means they'll root for Larry Brown to wobble out of the building at the end of the night with a searing headache and bleeding with a 30-point loss. Santa Claus got booed there. What chance does a Piston have?

Brown wouldn't have it any other way. He grew up in New York City, played at North Carolina and coached at UCLA and Kansas. So maybe he knows a little about pressure environments. He'll even want it that way Wednesday night -- have the fans back the 76ers for Randy Ayers just as they did for him.

"Since I left, I think some guys have been hurtful in the way they've said things, and that's bothered me because I know where that franchise was six years ago and I know every player I coached has the maximum contract and all the people I worked with have really moved up," Brown said. "That's been troubling to me. But I loved living there. I love the fact that the fans care. That was fine. I don't care if they're on the coach. They have every right to be if you don't play well. They were real supportive."

He can handle it. He's been here before -- in the same place, just in different places. It's just Philadelphia's turn this time, that's all.

	Malone

There is no such thing as definite in the never-stable Laker world, but Karl Malone has no intention of leaving Los Angeles when he can become a free agent at the end of the season. There never was the intention that the first post-Utah home of his career would be a brief stopover because Malone does not want to continuously uproot his family, and the plan all along had been to play beyond 2003-04.

The basketball implications are that the Lakers might still have a power forward to contribute 25 to 30 minutes of rebounding and physical play at a bargain rate, depending what happens if he opts out in the summer, and that Malone could be going for the coveted career scoring record in L.A. The possibility remains, however, that he will finish his career with the Jazz, even for one game in a symbolic conclusion. It could also be for longer, depending on where he is in the chase for Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and 38,387 points.

Year 3 for the NBA-run National Basketball Development League comes with the ultimate in growing pains, with plans for a significant expansion at the very time it downsizes from eight to six teams and plays on without a defending champion. Mobile went from winning the title to being folded by the NBA because of what it felt was a lack of community support. Greenville -- another centerpiece as the home of the NBDL offices -- was put on what is being called a one-year hiatus amid hopes that the South Carolina city will be re-admitted next season.

The real development is that it might have company. The league that has confined franchise locations to small-market locales around the southeast, from Virginia through the Carolinas to Georgia and Alabama, is considering adding an entire region next season. Talks continue about expanding into the northeast and several towns have already been targeted as possibilities, including Atlantic City, N.J., Harrisburg, Pa., and upstate New York in Albany or Rochester.

Scott Howard-Cooper, who covers the NBA for the Sacramento Bee, is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.