WITH all signs pointing to another idle season for the Philippine Basketball League (PBL), the
Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) is all the more resolved at pushing through with the
formation of its Developmental League this year.

PBA commissioner Atty. Chito Salud stressed the need to immediately fill in the gap at the middle linking collegiate players to the professional ranks now that indicators show the PBL is likely to stay inactive again.

“It’s unfortunate na ang daming usapan that the PBL would not be active as before. And the PBA would not be caught napping. The PBA needs to act and to act now,” Salud declared in his first guesting appearance in the initial session of the PSA Forum for the year 2011 at Shakey’s U.N. Ave.

“While we fully support other collegiate leagues, we feel there is a gap within these leagues
(PBA and collegiate). So there should be an intermediate league where players can develop physically and mentally.”

And proof that it’s all systems go for Asia’s pioneering pro league’s newest undertaking,
Salud said he’ll be presenting the blueprint of the tournament, patterned after the NBA D-League, before the PBA Board when it meets on Jan. 25 at the Club Filipino in San Juan.

“I remain confident that it will be given clearance. I already made some adjustments which we
will present to the (PBA) Board for approval,” said the mild-mannered son of former commissioner Atty. Rodrigo Salud.

For more than 25 years, the PBL used to be the breeding ground of collegiate players aspiring to join the PBA. Unfortunately, financial concerns forced the league first established in 1983 by then Ambassador Eduardo Cojuangco Jr. to hibernate beginning last year.

Not even a last-minute effort to revitalize the league by merging it with Liga Pilipinas
(Tournament of the Philippines) did not last, the union only subsisting for a single season.

“We’re obligated and mandated to open new areas of competitions as far as areas of basketball
is concerned, to show fans that the PBA is open to helping in the development of basketball in the country,” said Salud in the same forum presented by Outlast Battery, PAGCOR and Shakey’s.

Rickie Santos, the operations and technical chief of the PBA, appeared with Salud in the session, and divulged that teams from the PBL itself has kept in touch with them on the possibility of joining the D-League.

Other teams from the National Basketball Conference (NBC) and those coming from minor leagues have also sent feelers on their intentional to get involved.

But at the most, Santos said a field of six to eight teams is the ideal set-up for the D-League,
with the group of Manny V. Pangilinan through Maynilad, and the SMC people, among those planning to put up a team.

Players to be accepted in the D-League should be within 17-26 years old, and could either come
directly from the collegiate ranks and the free agent market.

Foreign-bred players are also welcome to suit up, although Salud proposed that they see action for two years before they are eligible to enter the PBA Draft.

The D-League is just among the immediate concerns to be discussed in the very first meeting of the PBA Board of Governors for the year, which precedes the much-awaited team owners summit that will tackle the possible role the league will have to play in the formation of the national team, the building of the PBA’s own coliseum and the next TV coveror of the league.