You know how Purefoods fans like me keep harping that the team’s coach, Ryan “The Genius” Gregorio, can’t coach? Well, here’s all the proof you need. Asked how the team pulled through in the do-or-die game in the best-of-five quarterfinals series against Rain or Shine, he responded with his usual cliché: “I just told my players to throw away the statistics and the results of the last two games and simply bring to tonight’s table a big heart. That’s what they did.”

Purefoods star James Yap, however, had a different take on things. The hotshot guard had a difficult time in games 3 and 4, but broke out of his slump to score 28 points in the deciding game. According to him, it was because of a technical adjustment he had to suggest to his coach: “Sinabi ko kay coach na bigyan ako ng bola sa loob ng three points para dalawa, tatlong dribble lang nasa basket na ko. Dati kasi malayo ang tanggap ko ng bola kaya nakaka-collapse agad sa akin ang depensa.”

It worked too, because Yap did his best Vergel Meneses impersonation last night, slicing through the lane repeatedly for twisting layups and finding cutting teammates when he was mobbed. It’s a good thing he spoke up, because all his coach ever seems to talk about is heart. At this point, I really don’t want to hear anything about heart, unless we’re talking about Heart Evangelista.



Does any other PBA team win games in spite of its coach?