Pushing through plateaus

Casio needs to take the big leap
while Abueva struggles
(photo courtesy of Sports5)

Don't blame Calvin Abueva for the Alaska Aces' mildly surprising 4 wins, 9 losses slate in the on-going PBA Philippine Cup.

There's plenty of that to go around. Despite the impressive numbers shared by starters Sonny Thoss (16 points, 9 rebounds), JVee Casio (14, 3 and 3 assists), Cyrus Baguio (13, 3, 3), Gabby Espinas (11, 9) and Abueva (10, 8), the Aces are struggling more because they've become rather bland. Yes, the names on the roster are almost the same to when they punked their way into a PBA Commissioner's Cup title last season, but the fire and energy just isn't.

And while Abueva continues to find that balance between a flopper and token energy guy, the Aces need to come up with surprises to battle the strengthened/ overhauled PBA teams. Though we have nothing but love for the blue-chip recruits in ASEAN Basketball League Most Valuable Player Leo Avenido, Ryan Buenafe and Ping Exciminiano, it appears as though the three have yet to really learn the Aces' offensive sets as proven by the little amount of minutes they get on the floor (aging small forward Tony de la Cruz logs close to 19 minutes a game). 

2013 PBA Draft Results

The Big Men Cometh
(Photo courtesy of Sports5)

We will work on the post analysis in a bit, for now we'll borrow some copy from the InterAKTV website because we're simply too lazy to retype the damn thing.

In our honest opinion, all hell broke loose after the "given" Top 3 Picks.

First Round

1. Barangay Ginebra San Miguel – Greg Slaughter
2. San Mig Coffee Mixers – Ian Sangalang
3. Rain or Shine Elasto Painters – Raymond Almazan
4. Barangay Ginebra San Miguel (from Barako Bull) – James Forrester
5. GlobalPort Batang Pier (from Barako Bull via Petron) – Terrence Romeo
6. GlobalPort Batang Pier (from Barako Bull) – RR Garcia
7. GlobalPort Batang Pier – Isaac Holstein
8. Alaska Aces – Ryan Buenafe
9. Rain or Shine Elasto Painters – Alex Nuyles
10. San Mig Coffee Mixers – Justin Chua

KKS Scouting Report: 2013 PBA Draft Favorites (Part 2)

Continuing our Scouting Report on the 2013 PBA Draft “Favorites” with the exception of Carlo Lastimosa, SG, 5”10 and James Forrester, SG, 6”0 because, quite frankly, we didn’t know where Destiny Cable put AksyonTV not until maybe three weeks ago. 

And that’s only because we reset our television and put it on auto programming.

In case this is your first time to drop by our page, please feel free to check out Part 1 of our Scouting Report. We're going with the 2013 PBA Draft Favorites-- their Strengths and Weaknesses plus the PBA player that they remind us of (Ceiling would be who or what they could become and Basement would be, well, the basement).

Ryan Roose Garcia 5”9.5

Strengths: gifted with range, made giant leap from shooting guard to point guard, able to play off the ball and defer to superstar teammate/s, solid ball handling skills, heady point guard, savvy, can create own shot 

Weakness: man to man defense, late on switches, average frame might be a problem against stronger guards and fighting through screens, any questions pertaining to his relationship with a former teammate and a famous TV personality

Ceiling: More offensively potent Mark Barroca, minus the stingy defense  

Basement: Shorter RJ Jazul