KIA’s Draft joke

This coming Sunday’s consensus number one pick is Fil-German Christian Standhardinger.  His game is deceptively awkward but, borrowing restructured terms from millennials, his play is very 'petmalu' and 'werpa'.  Standhardinger will become the third most important big man in the PBA, next to June Mar Fajardo and Greg Slaughter.

Any team in their perfectly right minds would gladly grab the opportunity and go with the talent offered at top pick.  Standhardingeris an experienced German leaguer, having played for first tier teams in the Basketball Bundesliga.  Well-built and at 6-7, he can hold his own against foreigners in the import-laced conferences.  He’s currently under contract with the Hong Kong Eastern Long Lions in the ABL and if his ABL team goes all the way to the Finals, he’ll have his PBA debut by February of next year.

Here’s the SMH part. Since KIA joined the league in 2014, team officials already were showing signs that their brains were scrambled when they selected Manny Pacquiao as their first round pick. There was a Rene Pacquiao picked later in the second round, probably a Pacman relation.  The novelty became a comedy when Pacman was named as playing-coach, who merely stood silently in the middle of the huddle during timeouts.

It’s no secret that Pacman loves basketball but basketball obviously did not reciprocate the affection.  Kia should have not wasted the chance and they could have picked a very serviceable Brian Heruela who was also in that draft class.

2015 would have been a good year for them but they banged their heads when a few days after the draft, they traded their number 2 pick Troy Rosario for KGCanaleta and Aldrech Ramos.  In all fairness to the mentioned players, they were solid contributors when the team reached the 2016 Governors Cup playoffs.  Both 6-6 forwards, Canaleta is now with Blackwater, Ramos with Star Hotshots.  Ergo, KIA in the long run gave away Rosario for nothing.

There were other good players who suited up with the franchise but were discarded either after one conference or one year.  KIA’s bad decision making is the other teams’ gain as Joseph Eriobu, Mike DiGregorio and Alex Mallari are now important parts of the rotation for their present teams.

We are all aware of that abnormal trade proposal dropped at the PBA office where KIA will give up their first pick to San Miguel for three practice players.  Hoooowaw!  Upon getting the one-sided proposal, the PBA league commissioner should have immediately thrown that into the shredding machine and then to the incinerator instead of letting it sit and say that many factors are being considered before deciding on it.  And did he say something like everything is all for the good of the PBA?  Yeah right.  Interim KIA coach Chris Gavina said that having the top pick would be great but there might be some league gods who have other ideas.  This statement could probably cost Gavina his job.

There were some revisions on the proposal after other PBA teams and fans reacted.  Aside from the practice players, several role players are in the mix but still conspiracy theories abound.  Exactly why, for the last three years, the KIA franchise had been happily discarding serviceable players to the benefit of the other teams, only they can confusingly answer. 

As per Alaska team owner Wilfred Uytengsu, the trade defeats the purpose of the draft where weaker teams get the chance to improve their roster, and to quote him, “… if you look at who is being traded in return, it clearly doesn’t make basketball sense for the weaker teams…”  It sure don’t that from Sorento to Carnival to Enforcer to Floodbuster to Picanto, it always made the wrong turn and slammed into a wall.

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With a record 53,642 paying fans trooping to the Philippine Arena last Wednesday, expect the number to be broken again tonight when Barangay Ginebra battles Meralco in a sudden death for the 2017 Governors Cup title.  Big, big revenue for the league because Ginebra is a major finals draw, regardless of who they will be fighting against.

We’ll see the oldies but goodies Reynel Hugnatan of Meralco and the Ginebra’s former Fast and Furious Mark Caguioa and Jayjay Helterbrand.  “Former” because they had now become ‘Slow and Mellow’ at 37- and 41-years old respectively.  Still, they give quality minutes. Hugnatan is 38 but is Meralco’s top-scoring local in this series.  Yup, old guys rule!