Why is there a Big Man crisis in the PBA?
Credit to Author: Michael Angelo B. Asis| Date: Sun, 26 Jan 2020 16:16:07 +0000
Mighty Sports is representing the Philippines in the Dubai Invitational Basketball Championship. They have Andray Blatche as a local, three imports in Renaldo Balkman, Mackenzie Moore and Jelan Kendrick. They also included college stars Thirdy Ravena, Isaac Go, Jamie Malonzo, Dave Ildefonso and the Gomez de Liano brothers, Javi and Juan.
These are the best of the UAAP, and only Isaac Go is a big man. Malonzo is 6’6 but he plays small forward. Ten years ago, he would’ve been pushed to play the slot. Nowadays, the big man role is played by the foreign students. Most of them, primarily from Africa, would spend their college years in some of our top universities. But after that, they do not have a pro league to play on.
Sam Ekwe of San Beda was the start, and other schools followed suit. The Red Lions will now halt the practice as the NCAA Season 95 will do away with foreign students.
The hope is that the NCAA could attract local big men, and also for the schools to step up recruiting in the local scene, rather than “lazily” relying on foreigners.
The current crop of big men in the NCAA consist of raw talents, perhaps taking a backseat has taken its toll on their development—which, in a way, justifies the rule. However, there are also other reasons.
The FIBA obsession
Filipinos have become height obsessed, and now they also want to develop skills that would be appropriate for the international game. Following the NBA paradigm, it’s now about speed, three-point shooting and less about dominance in the slot.
Calvin Oftana has the height of a PBA big man (6’6), but he has chosen to play small forward and won MVP honors for it. Jeo Ambohot of Letran is in a similar lot, although Ambohot is more of a sleek big man. One thing that you’d notice, both 6’7 players are on the lean side. That probably necessitated their style of play.
With the tall, muscular Africans, it seems like an unfair match. Raymond Almazan was probably the last of the college slotmen who had the audacity to match against Ola Adeogun of San Beda. He’s also lean, but Letran had no import so he had to step up.
It seems we have yet to develop big men because we rely on that foreign/naturalized player to fill that void. But we do have promising big men, in terms of height.
Hope in the Juniors
The last Juniors match-up in the UAAP featured great big men match-ups. Kai Sotto and Geo Chiu on the Ateneo side and Carl Tamayo and Kevin Quiambao for NU. Chiu has crossed over to the Seniors, but is still playing behind the wunderkind Ange Kouame—this will be a familiar story for the UAAP.
Former NCAA juniors MVP Will Gozum, another hyped potential big man, was left in the freezer when UP got Bright Akhuetie. With the Fighting Maroons securing Malik Diouf, he took off to the CSB in the NCAA. You can see how the import ban worked out for CSB, at least in the short term.
The Juniors rosters are filled with 6’7 and above players, and they would be repurposed to be tough, big men instead of always being trained to be hybrid outside shooters, stretch 4 or what not, then they can develop into quality big men.
Still, the NCAA seniors tall players who’ll have the chance to play as real big men. FIBA dreamers and height purists who insist that “6’7 below should be wing players” will frown upon this, but you have to swallow the bitter pill of truth: Not every player is obsessed with playing for Gilas. They just want a career, PBA or somewhere else.
If you are 6’6, be strong enough and hone your skills, you can be a big man in the PBA, and that’s not a bad thing to hope for. See Beau Belga, who even made it in the international game.
The UAAP and NCAA seniors are no longer good training grounds for big men. Let’s see if the NCAA rule could change that.