The "Other" Ginebra Big Man

Ginebra has another big man in tow
(Photo courtesy of Sports5)

The first time I saw JayR Reyes, now of Barangay Ginebra San Miguel, was at the 3rd year high school prom of one of my exes. The first thing everyone noticed was how insanely tall the guy was as compared to the rest of the evening’s escorts/ dates (myself included and back then I stood a lanky 5”10). From then on I decided to keep an eye out for the guy in case he makes it big in the sport that I love (because, in a world of sports blogger hopefuls, who doesn't).

Because, really now, how many 6”5 and up high school kids living in Manila back in the day were not part of some basketball program?

The next time I heard about Reyes, or got to see him play was when he suited up for the U.P. Fighting Maroons. He was raw as hell, but was in pretty good, athletic shape for a guy his size. He could run with the forwards so that’s a plus moving forward to a possible career in the professional ranks.

Who is the Best Pinoy Big Man today?

Where would you rank RDO and The Boss?

One of our friends over at Facebook.com/KiliKiliShot (shoutout to boss Dexter Cumigad and his family, thank you for reading our stuff) asked who we feel are the best big men in the Philippine Basketball Association today. The easiest way out of course is to simply go with the numbers, but contrary to popular belief-- numbers lie.

A guy could average only 6 points and 7 rebounds for his team but still have the most dominating presence on the hard court (think Belga, who makes use of his height, heft and six fouls to the hilt every time). So here's a list of who we feel are the league's best big men- taking one per team of course and ranking them altogether. And just to spice things up, we're not simply going to go with the guy who starts the game at center or is marked as one. We're going to rank the Top 10 bigs who play the position for their teams when the games are tight and shots or stops need to be made.

10. Jay-R Reyes (Meralco Bolts)
How long before we finally give up on the former U.P. Maroon and Gilas Pilipinas campaigner? No matter the extended minutes, international training and exposure, it seems that Reyes just isn't meant to dominate the sport after glimpses of near-Kerby Raymundo potential. He has the post-up moves and range, but as with some players, it comes down to putting it all together and being consistent. The silver lining for Reyes of course is, being a young player in the pros, he has time to find a niche. With all the scorers that the Bolts have on the roster (starting with star guard Mark Cardona), perhaps Reyes can concentrate more on playing defense and grabbing more rebounds (then maybe the offense can come later).

9. Doug Kramer (Barako Bull Energy Cola)
We are big Kramer fans. We fill that he is the most under-rated and under-utilized quality role-playing big man in the PBA today. No, he is not gifted with back-to-the-basket abilities like teammate Enrico Villanueva, but he has found a role in the pros and has stuck to it the last three to four years. Kramer does his best work setting hard screens, boxing out, rebounding and knocking down kick-out/ dump mid-range jumpshots. He's not a guy who'll average 15 and 10 a night, but he'll contribute right away given the minutes.

Has Captain Hook Relinquished His Alpha Status

Saludo si Captain Hook sa inyo

Following last night's 105-104 defeat at the hands of Willie Miller and the rest of the GlobalPort Batang Pier, there was one standout statistic featured on the Meralco Bolts' box score. It featured no less than "franchise player" Mac Cardona and under the label "Points" where it would usually read 18 to 24, it read 2.

TWO points.

We're not talking about on and off guys like Miller or Barako Bull Energy Cola's Danny Seigle or even  San Mig Coffee Mixers' PJ Simon here. We're talking about Cardona-- a guy who would take (and has taken) over 30 shots if he could to break the double digit scoring barrier. Of course, had the Bolts won we wouldn't even be talking about it since we could easily dismiss it as an "off night" for Cardona. Fortunately for the Bolts, there were guards Sol Mercado and recently acquired Ronjay Buenafe dropping 30-points EACH to make it a game.

But now that Mercado looks more and more like the lead guy, the "Alpha Dog" so to speak, is it finally safe to say that Cardona has willingly ceded his lofty standing in the Bolts' pecking order?

SMART Gilas: Is the center position still a problem?

The HOPE of Pilipinas Basketbol

With all due respect to Marcus Douthit and his heroic efforts the last few years in basically carrying Pilipinas Basketbol on his lanky shoulders, let's touch on an interesting idea raised by our friend @akosimayco over at Twitter.

Should we get a player of a different position-- say a small forward, to be naturalized since (God willing) we are bound to have bigs like 7"0 Greg Slaughter, 6"10 June Mar Fajardo and even 6"8 Ian Sangalang in maybe two to three years time? Qatar and Jordan did it/ are doing it, South Korea also fielded in a wing at one point years back so why not the Philippines?

You could argue for the guys that we currently have and play the wing position in Gabe Norwood and Jarred Dillinger, but let it sit for awhile. We don't really need a do-it-all small forward, but probably a big time scorer such as the Anthony Johnsons, Champ Oguchis and so on who can score from just about anywhere on the floor (Gabe Freeman doesn't count since his jumper is streaky wretched at best). This way, we can play Dillinger at the 1, Norwood at 3, Ranidel de Ocampo or whichever power forward you want to throw in there for rebounding purposes and one of the three young studs previously mentioned in the paragraph above.

Why complicate things?

Was Coach Luigi the right choice? 

Before we proceed with meatier entries going into the final stretch of the Philippine Basketball Association's highly successful 37th season, let's take a look back at one of its more storied franchises which suddenly found itself lost making nary a whimper in any of the three conferences.

We're talking about no less than the Wilfred Uytengsu-owned Alaska Aces-- robbed of its identity the last 20 or so years no thanks to Hall of Fame coach Tim Cone's decision to search for greener pastures (read: join Team San Miguel via the B-Meg Llamados which he led to the PBA Commissioner's Cup title in only his 2nd conference on the job).

Meralco scores big pick-up

Reyes and Espinas: Palit jersey

After days of speculation, the Alaska Aces (under interim coach Luigi Trillo) have decided to send offensive-minded big man JayR Reyes to the Meralco Bolts for energy power forward Gabby Espinas in a trade that addresses both teams immediate needs.

The Bolts are looking for a big man to possibly supplant the aging and sure-fire future Hall of Famer Asi Taulava at the center position while the Aces want to move to a more uptempo approach with a rebounding athlete. At first glance, it's quite easy to deduce that the Bolts are the clear winners of this trade given the fact that Reyes is not only three years younger than Espinas, but is also only scratching the surface of his true basketball potential.

Trillo-era Begins for Alaska

It was Trillo. All along.

Forget that the man had two lousy, winless seasons with the Adamson Falcons in the UAAP despite having the uber-talented Ken Bono, sharp shooting Patrick Cabahug, wing man Mark Abadia, Ruel Hugnatan, Marvin Polyapoy, Ramil Tagupa and the closest thing the UAAP juniors had to an Allen Iverson (back in the day) Leo Canuday (who was blatantly robbed of an MVP trophy by Ateneo and Ken Baracoso) at one point or another-- Luigi Trillo has been called upon by Wilfred Uytengsu to right the Alaska Aces ship that Joel Banal has "wronged."

Granted, Trillo is enjoying a renaissance of sorts as far as his coaching career is concerned-- leading the Cebuana Lhullier team in the PBADL to respectable finishes the last two seasons and even in this one. But the guy was called upon by Uytengsu in an effort to "return to the Triangle Offense."

Goodbye Joel

Was it really Banal's fault?

Well that was fast.

Coaching and personel selection errors aside, Joel Banal remains to be one of the better coaching minds in the business though rumors have it that he's on his way out of the Alaska Aces camp.

After given a fresh 3-year pact to lead the post-Tim Cone Aces, Banal was given only two conference to prove his worth and lead the young and developing squad into a Playoff contender. The first time out, they were pretty much a mess and were trying to run a sham of the Triangle Offense.

The Aftermath: What went wrong for Alaska

Nawala si Reyes sa maling
balasa ni Coach Joel

Now that the Aces have been sent home in the PBA Commissioner's Cup, it's high time to review just what went wrong/right for a team that was able to rebound from an abysmal first conference showing.

First off, there's the re-emergence of L.A. Tenorio as one of the league's premier point guard- if not as THE premier point guard now that we've seen Petron's Alex Cabagnot go back to his old, timid, flashy ways. In the Philippine Cup, Tenorio tried his darndest to lead a team that wasn't ready to win. They looked for Tim Cone on the bench and ran the same plays but it just wasn't the same.