PBA Commish Cup Finals: A lesson in coaching

If there's any truth to Barangay Ginebra San Miguel head coach Alfrancis Chua giving a referee the finger in last night's Game 2 loss to the Alaska Aces (which it probably has because Chua has reportedly been summoned by Commissioner Chito Salud), don't blame him. Blame the referees.

But that's not because the referees were making calls in favor of the Aces, on the contrary they've been calling it for Ginebra dating as far back as the team's magical late-eliminations run. We're not going to say that Ginebra's being favored and buying wins, but we are going to leave it at them getting the lighter end of the stick.


Take for example the Talk n Text series in which Ginebra import clearly pulled Aaron Aban down with both hands by the neck during a rebounding skirmish. That could've easily sealed the win for TNT with Macklin to be sent out of the game with a clear as day above the shoulder flagrant foul penalty two. He wasn't penalized for it, and Ginebra ultimately won.

In this Finals so far, it's been Ginebra that's been throwing out a lot of cheap shots. Game One you have Billy Mamaril. Last night, you have Macklin and Mac Baracael. They were going after the Aces' rookie Calvin Abueva. So far, from an unbiased point of view (we are Rain or Shine fans here) , Abueva has been annoying at best.

He hasn't thrown a kick, sneaky elbow or even a hard, tanggal panga foul.

Just being an on court douche, mocking opponents and celebrating a little too much with some theatricality by way of flops.

 Maiinis ka talaga kung Ginebra ka, pero sa kahit anong paligsahan, ang pikon laging talo.

So if we just said that Chua and Ginebra have every right to give the referees the dirty finger, it is because they have been used to getting away with calls so much so that they felt that despite being the dirtier team, they still weren't getting more calls handed to them.

Call them spoiled if you will.

But there in lies the difference between a grade A coach like Chua and his counterpart Luigi Trillo who is a B grade at best.

Trillo could spend the whole games one and two hollering at referees for those shots being given to Abueva and the rest of the Aces but he doesn't. His champion pedigree line up of assistant coaches from Alex Compton, Louie Alas and Topex Robinson know the task at hand.

They break Ginebra's momentum with timeouts and fouls. They ignore the semantics of any Abueva related fouls and push their team to just keep playing. They don't let up, they're not distracted.

All the back screens, motion offense and some triangle is pushing Ginebra to the brink. Call it a tried and tested ploy by Chua to bark at referees and call them out, but in the two Finals game both won by the Aces it's pretty clear that Chua has been out coached in every single way.

We wonder why Chua hasn't used Josh Urbiztondo the way Trillo uses his own trigger happy point guard RJ Jazul: off the bench, in spurts. Why Billy Mamaril doesn't play the four more alongside Macklin for defense instead of Kerby Raymundo (who is more effective on offense, against the Aces's 2nd string big Gabby Espinas)? And why, oh why, hasn't Chua figured out that The Aces's guards aren't that tall and that he could go with an LA Tenorio, Mac Baracael, Chris Ellis backcourt + wing combo and have those two big wings play the post?

A Tenorio, Helterbrand and Urbiztondo or even a Rob Labagala trio on the floor is quick and will give you points, but they're not stopping anyone.

Offense wins games, defense wins championships.