I mentioned earlier that I had been planning to write about the Smart Gilas victory in the recently-concluded pocket tournament over Jordan. However, like everything else, including her brother’s inauguration, it had to take a backseat to an issue concerning Kris Aquino. I apologize for that.

Anyway, here are the things we learned from the invitational, apart from the fact that Mac Cardona punches like a chick:

• Mac Baracael was the hero of the final game against Jordan, and at this point, I think we could safely say that he’s they key to Smart Gilas’ upsets. This was also the case during the team’s successful campaign last January in Dubai, when Baracael caught fire and led the team to several upsets. When he’s shooting well, he opens up the Gilas offense, which is predicated on spacing and ball movement, making the team very hard to defend.
  
  That said, I can imagine why Toroman is still looking forward to having Kelly Williams on the team; in the first Jordan game, the visitors repeatedly took advantage of Baracael in the post and off the boards, and Toroman was forced to take him out and go with an awkward twin tower combination of Marcus Douthit and Greg Slaughter. It’s feast or famine with Baracael, and we’ve been fortunate that so far, it’s been more feast.


• Marcio Lassiter is pretty good, reminds me of Jeffrey Cariaso.


• Dongguan coach Brian Goorijan gave high marks for the Gilas offense, but I think two things that really make the Gilas so effective on the offensive end doesn’t necessarily have to do with putting the ball in the basket: they never turn the ball over, and they always have floor balance. International teams like Jordan and Iran make a lot of hay off the break, but the Gilas offense is geared to prevent just that. This is also the reason the Powerade team looked so bad against these international teams in the Jones Cup; poorly-prepared teams tend to turn over the ball a lot, which leads to a lot of easy baskets on the other end.
  
  That’s almost never the case for Smart Gilas, or at least, its man-to-man offense. Their zone offense, however, could use a little more fine-tuning.


• Elsewhere on the Internet, people have been bagging on Gilas about their defense. I tend to disagree; I think they have a great defensive system in place, one that even Talk N Text has adopted too. They do a great job of cutting the court in half, preventing all-important swing passes from the strong side to the weak side, and clogging the middle effectively.
  
  They could still do a better job of cleaning up the defensive glass, and it would help if they forced a few more turnovers. But I’m not sure they can do that with the personnel they have on the team currently. They just don’t have the size or the length to do both at a high level.


• Sure, they only played against a Dongguan team that was still trying to find its way, but the Talk N Text Tropang Texters looked like the best team in the tourney; their offense was very crisp, and they were much more active and effective on defense.
  
  It makes me wonder: Are we underrating our PBA teams? Even Ginebra, which has been mediocre in the ongoing PBA Fiesta Conference, was able to stay toe-to-toe with Jordan, despite the fact that they looked like they were treating the game like a half-assed scrimmage. I’m not talking about star-studded PBA-organized national teams, but PBA teams per se. Are they better than we give them credit for?
  
  It also makes me curious about just how effective some guys who probably wouldn’t have a chance to get picked for Asian-level competitions would do. Will LA Tenorio be able to get in the lane and loft floaters against Asian teams? Will Marc Pingris’ madman act work against bigger and heftier opponents? Can Sol Mercado barrel his way to the ring? Will opposing point guards in Asia panic when Paul Artadi harasses them in the backcourt?
  
  The kneejerk answer is no… but unless we see it on the court, we’ll never know, wouldn’t we?


• Then again, JC Intal probably wouldn’t be able to get to the lane so easily if Jordan’s injured big men made the Manila trip. Rasheim Wright is reportedly also still recovering from a knee injury. The Gilas victory over Jordan is impressive, but I hope no one’s getting over-confident over the result.


• Also, the refereeing was clearly slanted in favor of the local teams; the foreign teams probably didn’t mind so much, because these things are par for the course for these types of tournaments. But for a country that always rails against bad officiating, man, we sure can eat up loads upon loads of lutong macao if it benefits our team.

Finally, some non-Japeth Aguilar PBA news: Sta. Lucia made trades over the last couple of days to dump salary, shipping off point guard Denok Miranda to San Miguel yesterday, before sending their team captain Dennis Espino to the Coca-Cola Tigers. The Realtors received draft picks from both transactions, with back-up big man Jason Misolas also coming on-board from the Tigers. I’ve also heard rumors that Bitoy Omolon will be traded next.

It’s no secret that the corporation behind the team has been affected by the economic downturn. The real estate sector, in particular, has been hard-hit by the financial crisis especially because of the credit crunch. Last year, the corporation underwent corporate restructuring and reported a loss of P74.6-million from January to September, mostly due to operational costs and taxes.

While I hate teams trading off players for nothing, I have to say that Sta. Lucia so far is going about their salary reduction very smartly. They replaced Miranda with underrated (and cheaper) guys like Chris Pacana and Josh Urbiztondo. The loss of Espino shouldn’t hurt that much either, since he splits minutes with Marlou Aquino; when you’re belt-tightening, there’s really no good reason to pay both of your centers max money. Omolon’s exit, meanwhile, should be mitigated by the arrival of Gabby Espinas. They also smartly traded their assets for future picks, so that should help.

The best thing about their moves so far is that they didn’t touch their core of Kelly Williams, Ryan Reyes, and Joseph Yeo, or at least not yet. I’m a big fan of Coach Boyet Fernandez, and if Williams and Reyes come back healthy (big ifs), I couldn’t see how they can’t still remain competitive.

Hopefully, though, the Sta. Lucia downturn is only temporary. They’ve never been the richest of teams, but they always did right by players – remember how the team shouldered Kelly Williams’ medical expenses and signed him to a new max deal despite his sickness? The company reported that they ended the first half of 2009 in the black, with net income of P5.29-million compared to P85.02-million in losses in the same period last year.

UPDATE: Going by Rey Joble's latest report on the Sta. Lucia situation, it looks like Bitoy Omolon will not be traded... yet. This is great news for Realtors fans, as Rafe Bartholomew pointed out in a couple of tweets: "Omolon is really key to Boyet's man-to-man pressure. Espinas is similarly long and athletic, but he doesn't seem aggressive. When SLR looks good, it's often because Bitoy is making things happen."

Powerade Team Pilipinas stalwarts Jared Dillinger, Gabe Norwood, Asi Taulava, Jayjay Helterbrand, Japeth Aguilar, and Ryan Reyes hit the streets of Beijing shortly after the Fiba-Asia Championships and sampled some of the exotic local food. Dillinger and Norwood are both providing updates on Twitter, along with other PBA players Kelly Williams and his brother-in-law Lamont Waters.

The Jordanian national team wiped the floor of Taipei’s Hsinchuang gymnasium with the Powerade Team Pilipinas yesterday, 90-59, as hostilities opened in the 31st Jones Cup. And yes, the 31-point drubbing was every bit as awful as it sounds – the only reason I watched the game all the way through is because I’m a masochist who commits to watching even the ugliest blowouts. Yeng Guiao certainly has his work cut out for him.

The sky is not (yet) falling, however, and we ought to take this loss with a grain of salt. Or maybe take two grains, for good measure. Consider:

• The players are terribly out of game shape. Most of the players are coming off long layoff. In fact, a few weeks ago, the team scrimmaged against an American team and only six guys were available to play, with the rest either playing in the PBA finals or on vacation. Some guys only joined the team again this week. These weren’t our players at their best.


• This team hasn’t had much chance to play together. This is the first PBA-backed national team since the 1994 Hiroshima Asian Games that did not have the opportunity to play together full-time, and that team was made up, at its core, of players from San Miguel and Purefoods (with Johnny Abarrientos as a late addition). Between the lack of time together and their shape, this is pretty much day one of training camp for the team. They’re supposed to be terrible.


• We’ve never played well against Jordan. Not only was this the team’s first game against high-level international competition, but Jordan has had our number. In the lead-up for its stint for the Fiba-Asia championship, the Chot Reyes-coached national team played Middle Eastern powerhouse teams Lebanon, Jordan, and eventual Fiba-Asia champion Iran. Guess which team our boys never beat? Yep, it was Jordan, who also eliminated us in the first round of the Fiba-Asia championships. Jordan’s size at all positions is a matchup nightmare for us.


• Injuries have decimated the team. Guiao picked three point guards for the team: Ryan Reyes, Jayjay Helterbrand, and Willie Miller. In the team’s early tuneup games, Reyes was obviously the best fit with his ballhawking defense and open-court brilliance, Helterbrand shot well and played quality minutes, while Miller was decidedly the worst. Unfortunately, both Reyes and Helterbrand went out with hamstring injuries.
  
  The team also suffered major blow when Kelly Williams, the team’s most athletic defender, suffered a rare blood disorder, cutting short his season and thrusting Jared Dillinger into his spot. The difference between Williams and Dillinger is like the difference between Sloan and Eric’s wet blanket girlfriend from Entourage.

Speaking of which, aren’t you all glad Sloan is back in our lives? The smoking hot Emmanuelle Chriqui, after the jump.