Just before the PBA Commissioner's Cup opened and they announced the return of the team name to San Miguel Beer, I was pretty much excited, San Miguel Beermen for me represented tradition, winning excellence and championships and the return of the name was pretty much in time for celebration of the 25th Anniversary of the Grand Slam championship back in 1989. I look forward to every play date, in a short Commissioner's Cup, a win is a win and placing highly in the team standings is pretty important.
SMB came in the 2nd conference with a two-coach set-up, long-time assistant coach Biboy Ravanes was placed into the coaching position with former Indonesia Warriors Head Coach and then SMB assistant Todd Purves placed on an active coaching role - the idea didn't sit well for me at first, reminded me of Coach Rajko Toroman and Olsen Racela who had problems towards player rotation and game plans, but for the next 9 games, it took upon me that hey, both coaches knew their roles.
The departure of Alex Cabagnot to Global Port Batang Pier in exchange for Solomon Mercado opened up things for Paolo Hubalde and Chris Ross, who became integral point guards of the franchise. Mercado didn't have to worry about scoring in bunches, with Marcio Lassiter, the reigning MVP Arwind Santos and the Kraken Junmar Fajardo doing the scoring load, Sol just had to be himself - play ball, play clean defense and intimidate opposing players - score when needed, without having to lose his energy playing the entire game. Kramer, Tubid, Maierhofer, Lutz, Lanete may be considered second-stringers, but they can come in and be starting lineup anytime (a perfect example was Maierhofer's entry which acted as a spark plug to the run made against Air 21).
San Miguel Basketball, right now was about TEAM basketball, where no one cares who actually gets the credit, the reigning MVP Arwind will still be producing his numbers, but may not be named as BPG and can be okay with it. Last night, I actually gave up on the big lead they went deep into against Air 21, only to wake up today with my father saying SMB actually won. They thrive on their lock-down defense and quick movement around the court that they manage to find open people to knock-down shots. It was also a lucky change of import in Kevin Jones, whose perimeter shooting is well and is mantra is to WIN and not for any individual awards.
San Miguel Beer is placed #2 after the eliminations, with this change of attitude, I pray that I get to see them in the Finals once more, for now I'll see to where this team would go, hopefully this different San Miguel team will just be as is -- no roster changes, no more coaching changes to build chemistry and run for more titles in the years to come.
- Michelle Constantino.
4:55 PM
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