Lethal Weapon II

"Dito mo bigay sakin yung bola,
tapos alis ka sa daan ko ha?"
(Photo courtesy of Sports5)

His humorous fascination of making it home in time after games to watch the ABS CBN hit telenovale "Forevemore" aside, the Rain or Shine Elastopainter's Paul Lee has definitely reinvented himself in the on-going PBA Commissioner's Cup.

Currently averaging 18.9 points, 7.6 rebounds, 1.8 assists on 47% shooting from 3 and 38 from 2 in five games played, Lee has regularly shown a knack for taking over games and willing his team to victory.

Keyword: regularly, not consistently, but regularly.

This conference however, we may be looking at the evolution of the man hailed as the "Lethal Weapon." Though he's still playing under 30 minutes (26.8 mpg), which is not something you'd expect from of a player of his caliber, he is definitely making an early case for himself as PBA Best Player of the Conference with one superb performance after another.
It seems as though that right after his Gilas stint, Lee has openly embraced his role as shooting guard rather than a "big" point guard. Yes, Lee is still more than able to call the shots from the backcourt as he pleases and is arguably as good in making game-changing decisions in the clutch as an L.A. Tenorio or Jimmy Alapag, but just working off the ball, going through screens and basically knocking down jumpers and driving into the lane is starting to look like it plays more to Lee's overall strengths while minimizing his defensive faults (where he is always too slow to stay in front of cat-quick, pint-sized point guards who love the pick'n'roll).

Lee's shift to the two-guard spot has also allowed their loaded point guard rotation to develop, with the hard-working Jonathan Uyloan enjoying a "Linsanity"-kind of PBA season thus far. It has also eased the times when resident three-point specialist Jeffrei Chan would go on his long cold spells (which thus far, has been quite a lot for a guy of his Gilas stature).

Now, we've already seen how good Lee is despite his young career and limited minutes. The thing that has always bothered us when it comes to this gem of a talent for the Elastopainters is consistency. For all things Jeffrei Chan, Lee has been just as inconsistent though it's not as obvious because as a big 1,  he can still make assist-passes and so on.

For everyone's sake, including Lee's, we hope that he continues on this "Lethal Weapon II" path and further establishes himself as the league's top 2 guard now that his openly-declared idol, Barangay Ginebra's Mark Caguioa, seems to be more than ready to hand over his throne to the younger generation.

Now about that upcoming album though...