If plans don’t miscarry, Noli Eala will soon be out of the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas. The ouster of the executive director, according to multiple sources, stems from several issues of mismanagement under his reign, particularly of the Smart Gilas program. One issue involves the failure to liquidate funds supposedly for the team, which resulted in the delay of salaries of the Smart Gilas players.

Continue reading "Noli Eala out of the SBP, into San Miguel?"

Listed below are ten statements about the PBA Commissioner's Cup, which kicks off tonight with the Ginebra-Meralco game in Laoag City. In the comments, leave a post on whether you think each statement is true or false, and a short explanation why this is so.

Continue reading "True or False: 2011 PBA Commissioner’s Cup"

So what do Chot Reyes, Tim Cone, and Ryan Gregorio – the coaches of the last three PBA championship-winning teams – have in common that set them apart from other coaches?

They all read Fire Quinito.

Of course, the fact that they are all brilliant coaches who led talent-laden squads probably had more to do with their victories. But hey, if Quinito Henson can talk about birthdays and biorhythm during the PBA broadcast and pass it off as “analysis”, then I can claim to be the reason for these coaches’ success, right? Let’s take a look back at how they got here.

Continue reading "The secret to PBA championship success"

Last night, the Talk N Text Tropang Texters ran defending champions B-MEG Derby Ace out of the court to nail the first finals slot in the ongoing Philippine Cup. After the game, TNT coach Chot Reyes was magnanimous, saying that the final score did not reflect the difficulty his team encountered against the defending champions. Still, to an outsider, the beatdown the Texters delivered looked easy, and the team should be the favorites whoever they face in the championship round.

Continue reading "Talk N Text books Philippine Cup finals seat"

In his column yesterday, Quinito Henson wrote about the flap caused by a tweet by Sol Mercado criticizing him. If you’re not on Twitter (and if you’re a PBA fan in this day and age, you really need to be on it), here’s what happened: Mercado was watching the broadcast of the Talk N Text-Derby Ace matchup which Quinito was announcing. After a stepback move by James Yap, Quinito compared the reigning MVP to Michael Jordan, which pissed off Mercado; he swore he wouldn’t watch another minute of the game until the PBA hired an announcer who actually knew what he was talking about.

Continue reading "Quinito Henson vs. irreverent Twitter users"

Haven’t done this in a while, but before we get to the bullets, I enjoyed this comment from reader Jowana Bueser last week:

Have you seen Kris Aquino's Dalaw? Just bothered with Diether Ocampo's role as her husband. Seems like potshots against James Yap. He's the almost spineless, not so good with English husband who earns less than his better-educated wife.

Okaay. On to the bullets:

Continue reading "Wednesday bullets, starring Jeron Teng, Jerry Codiñera, Younghusbands and Dalaw"

Yesterday, Ronnie Nathanielsz reported that the referees who worked Sunday’s game between Derby Ace and Talk N Text were suspended by the PBA for calls that affected the outcome of the match.

Later that night, however, the Inquirer published a story correcting the earlier item. Salud said that only one of three suspended refs were actually part of the crew that worked the Derby Ace-TNT game, and the reasons for their suspension was totally different from what the original story said. So the initial report was, well, wrong. It is unclear who wrote the follow-up, Nathanielsz himself corrected the details on Twitter too.

Continue reading "Is Talk N Text being screwed by the refs?"