An old team bade farewell after 18 seasons, while a new company synonymous with winning made a grand return to the professional basketball scene.
Players were shipped from one team to another, while a new man was installed to lead the Philippine Basketball Association to greater heights.
Purefoods/B-Meg Derby Ace and Alaska lorded it over the field of combatants in the 35th season of Asia’s first professional league.
These were some of the biggest developments that helped make 2010 an exceptionally eventful year for the PBA.
Sta. Lucia left the PBA in the middle of the year after all of 18 years of participation. It came two years after the Realtors traded their marquee players who were instrumental in giving the team its only All-Filipino title — Dennis Espino, Denok Miranda, Joseph Yeo, Kelly Williams and Ryan Reyes.
Buddy Encarnado
Sta. Lucia’s franchise was sold to Meralco, a company that has a rich history in Philippine basketball, having been a championship squad in the league that antedated the PBA — the Manila Industrial Commercial Athletic Association (MICAA).
With businessman/sports patron Manny V. Pangilinan heading Meralco, the Bolts became a sister team of Talk N Text.
The Bolts inherited some players from Sta. Lucia, yet the biggest surprise didn’t come from the cagers, but the people who will continue the winning legacy of the squad adored by many during the '60s and '70s.
The primary task was given to three-time PBA champion coach Ryan Gregorio, who after steering the Purefoods Tender Juicy Giants to yet another title in the Philippine Cup, decided to join the Bolts as their chief mentor and head of its basketball operations.
Gregorio brought with him his former college coach and chief deputy at Purefoods, Ronnie Magsanoc, and also installed ex-Sta. Lucia bench tactician Boyet Fernandez on the Bolts' coaching staff.
Trades galore
Quickly, Meralco became active not just on the hard court, but also on the trading table.
A move was made to land big-time scorer Mac Cardona in a three-team, mutli-player trade that involved Air21, Talk N Text, and players Josh Urbiztondo, and the Bolts’ 2010 first-round pick.
The Bolts also traded Ali Peek in a separate deal that again involved Talk N Text and Air21. Peek went back to the Tropang Texters, Beau Belga was acquired by the Bolts, and JR Quiñahan was picked up by the Express.
But the Bolts weren’t through yet.
In need of a big man to back up veteran Marlou Aquino, Meralco made another blockbuster trade to get a dominant center — 6-foot-9 Asi Taulava, who was acquired in a multi-player, three-team trade involving Powerade, Barako Bull, and players Jason Misolas, Kazim Mirza, Rob Reyes, Ken Bono, Meralco’s 2011 and 2012 second-round picks, and Barako Bull’s 2013 second-round pick.
Asi Taulava (middle) was traded to Meralco before the start of the PBA's 36th season. GMANews.TV
B-Meg Derby Ace, Gregorio’s former team, also became busy on the trading table prior to the start of the 36th season.
The Llamados traded spitfire guard Paul Artadi for San Miguel Beer’s Jonas Vilanueva, using Air21 as a conduit. The Express got a future pick in return.
Rain or Shine also made its move in the off-season, getting frontliners Larry Rodriguez and Doug Kramer.
Rodriguez was taken in by the Elasto Painters in exchange for Eddie Laure and Rain or Shine’s first-round draft pick in 2011.
Kramer, on the other hand, was grabbed by the Elasto Painters from the Express in exchange for guard Marcy Arellano.
The younger Salud's historic appointment
The PBA experienced a lot of firsts in 2010.
There was the appointment of Atty. Chito Salud, son of former league commissioner Rodrigo Salud, as the new commissioner of the pro league.
Chito Salud
The younger Salud’s appointment as commissioner proved to be a historic one, as it was the first time a father and a son held the highest position in the league.
A visionary like his father, Chito quickly buckled down to work and brought back some of the juice that made the PBA the country’s premier basketball entertainment for many years.
He quickened the game, letting the players decide the outcome and taking away long lulls in the game like ticky-tack fouls, flopping, and other delays of the game.
The younger Salud also brought back the three-conference format, and backed the idea of coming up with a Developmental League (D-League), which will be implemented next year.
Another first is set to happen in the near future, as the PBA will finally have its own coliseum. Details of this multi-billion project will be discussed in next month’s meeting with the team owners.
For the first time, too, a board member was appointed to a key position in government.
After just a few months of serving as board chairman of the PBA, Lito Alvarez of Air21 was appointed Customs Commissioner.
Alvarez, known in the league as “The Master Trader," had to leave his PBA post as well as his executive position with the Lina Group of Companies, where he was the president and chief operating officer, to assume a more sensitive position in the government of President Noynoy Aquino.
Air21, Alvarez’s former team, also had its share of history. For the first time since the annual Rookie Draft was implemented in 1985, the Express became the only team to own the top three picks in the first round of the draft.
The Express exercised their rights by picking Nonoy Baclao as the top overall rookie pick, Rabeh Al-Hussaini as No. 2, and Rey Guevarra as No. 3.
And for the first time, the PBA loaned players to play for the national team competing in major international basketball tournaments.
Taulava, Williams and Solomon Mercado were requested by the Smart Gilas national developmental team to reinforce its squad in the Guangzhou Asian Games. Unfortunately, the squad had a dismal sixth-place finish, the lowest the country has achieved since professional players were sent to the quadrennial meet beginning in 1990.
All-Pinoy tilt to Purefoods, import-laced conference to Alaska
Purefoods, now known as the B-Meg Derby Ace Llamados, reaffirmed its dominance in the All-Filipino Conference.
A familiar fixture in the All-Filipino finals, the Tender Juicy Giants swept the Alaska Aces in their best-of-seven series, 4-0, to bag its fifth all-Pinoy crown.
Purefoods became the second winningest team in PBA history as far as All-Filipino titles are concerned — next to the Crispa Redmananizers, which had six.
Still licking the wounds of their finals setback at the hands of the Giants, the Aces struck back and vented its ire on Purefoods' sister team, San Miguel Beer, in six games of the Fiesta Conference finals. - KY/HS, GMANews.TV
