• Noynoy Aquino was proclaimed the 15th president of the Philippines yesterday, which would make James Yap part of the extended First Family. Funny, even though he could end up winning his second MVP award and lead his team to a sweep of the two PBA tournaments, he still wouldn’t have had as good a year as his brother-in-law has had.


• Jeffrey Cariaso, meanwhile, did a Gloria Macapagal Arroyo and decided to defer his retirement. He actually played well last night in Alaska’s one-point loss to Talk N Text, and even had a chance to win the game in the closing seconds, but his 15-footer rattled out of the rim. That would have been too perfect. The only bad thing about The Jet’s comeback is now I have to revise some things for the review of Pacific Rims that I had written (Jeff is a major character in the book, and as I understand, still maintains close touch with author Rafe Bartholomew).


• A couple of days ago, I wrote about how the only qualification for Chito Salud to be the next PBA commissioner seems to be his surname, which he shares with his father, former commissioner Rudy Salud. Then the very next day, his dad’s buddy, Ronnie Nathanielsz, spent a thousand words building up the young lawyer, just stopping short of proclaiming that Salud could turn water into wine. My favorite part: “Rudy Salud’s charming wife Pampin, mother of Chito, has always been a prayerful person who constantly infuses the essence of love of God and guidance from Him that indeed shall show us the way every moment of our lives.” Uh-huh.


• I’m not gonna lie: I’m absolutely thrilled that about the upcoming invitational tournament featuring Smart Gilas playing against teams from Jordan and China. I know he’s not exactly my favorite person, but credit must go to SBP executive director Noli Eala, especially if he pulls this off successfully. The tournament would be more exciting if the PBA accepts the SBP’s invitation for a couple of teams to participate in the pocket tournament. The tournament will be the first opportunity for the team to test out new reinforcement Marcus Douthit.
  
  UPDATE: Fidel Mangonon tells me on Twitter that the schedule could not work for PBA teams.
  
  UPDATE 2: Noli Eala tweets that Ginebra and Talk N Text will participate as guest teams, on the condition that the games be purely exhibition in nature.


• My favorite post from the past week: Pinoy Fight Scribe’s Mark Lorenzana transcribing Dyan Castillejo’s gems of wisdom from the broadcast of the Miguel Cotto-Yuri Foreman fight. Hilarity ensues: “Araaay! Aray! Ako ang napapa-aray! (laughs). Ang sakit!”

Rafe Bartholomew’s seminal book about Philippine basketball came out in bookstores yesterday, and you should really get a copy if you’re any kind of fan of Philippine basketball. I got mine last night at Fully Booked in Rockwell, grabbing the last copy in the store; the lady at customer service said they had four copies in stock, all of which ended up sold. The books are supposed to be available at Fully Booked, Powerbooks, and National Bookstore outlets, but because they usually keep a low number of copies on stock, the availability is hit-or-miss. Or, you can grab a copy from Amazon.

Full disclosure: My name appears on the acknowledgements, right between Quinito Henson and Ronnie Nathanielsz, which I think was by design. But that’s not the reason why I’m recommending the book; I started skimming last night and couldn’t stop reading. I finally put it down with just about fifty pages to go (and it’s a 400-page book, pretty much longer than most recent basketball books not written by Bill Simmons). Not coincidentally, I ended up awfully late for work today.

I should have more on the book in the next couple of days, but meanwhile, check out the book trailer above, or Rafe’s piece about Philippine basketball history on Slam Online, his profile on Gelf and this interview on The Awl. UPDATE: Another lengthy interview on Sports Crackle Pop.

Haven’t done a bullet/links post in a while, so here we go:

• Rafe Bartholomew had a lengthy, two-part interview at In the Bullpen (part 1, part 2), which delves not just into basketball, but Philippine culture and history as well.


• Ronnie Nathanielsz gave his new favorite sports patron, Manny Pangilinan, a tongue bath (as Rick Reilly would say) in last Friday’s column to show his support for MVP’s plagiarism issue. I laughed out loud when, in an effort to praise the PLDT chair, Nathanielsz compares Pangilinan to… Ferdinand Marcos!


• I may not agree with a lot of what he says, but I always look forward to reading Coach Chot Reyes’ candid Twitter feed. Last week, when Manila Bulletin’s Waylon Galvez was raising muck about his performance and hinting at the possibility of Talk N Text replacing him with Norman Black (who was recently hired as a team consultant), Reyes himself set the record straight: “Obviously, the writer doesn’t know what he’s talking about. My players and I get into it all the time. Better silence than sulking.” He also hints at Galvez having an issue with him: “Besides, that writer has always had the ‘hots’ for me ever since. I teach my players to embrace conflict.” Apparently, he embraces conflicts with sportswriters too. Awesome.


• Maybe it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Pinoy Fight Scribe, one of the most promising boxing/MMA Pinoy blogs, is run by a guy from Talisay City in Cebu. I have been wondering why there aren’t more Pinoy boxing blogs with original content starting up. Hopefully the writer continues to update his blog regularly.
  
  UPDATE: Another promising Pinoy boxing blog: Underdogboxing.


• I really enjoyed the POC Sportacular’s two-part feature on UAAP rumors by Adrian Dy, culled from various sources. Who doesn’t love rumors? This is the type of thing I wish the guys over there would focus on, instead of more NBA recaps that could be found on every other sports site on the Internet. I would click on one of Dy’s NBA recaps and think, “Yeah, I liked this column better when Kelly Dwyer wrote it.” I hope they continue their coverage of the pre-season college tournaments, and not just when Ateneo is playing.


• We all know Quinito Henson has a few templates he regurgitates in his columns. When it comes to reinforcements, his specialties include Import Column A: the “Player with a rough background overcoming the odds” inspiring feature; and Import Column B: the “Import that misbehaves deserves to be fired” column. A couple of years ago, he ended up writing one of each for Sta. Lucia import Lee Benson, hilariously within two weeks of each other. Here he is at it again, writing Import Column A for Derby Ace import Lorrenzo Wade (whose name he misspells throughout the column). Hopefully he doesn’t have to write Import Column B anytime soon.


• Last week, I worked on a couple of reports for the day job on online campaigning and mobile campaigning. GMANews.TV also ran the online campaign story, and Fire Quinito makes a cameo in that website.


• While we’re on it, imagine this: before the big fight, one contender dares his opponent to take a test. Floyd Mayweather asking Manny Pacquiao to agree to a drug test? Nope, Manny Villar daring Noynoy Aquino to do a psych exam.

• PBA Commissioner Sonny Barrios will fine Talk N Text more than PhP1-million for their walkout. Fidel Mangonon has all the numbers.


• Jude Turcuato, who had a short stint working in the PBA Commissioner’s Office a few years ago, writes in his blog from the perspective of both a fan, and someone who has seen how the Talk N Text organization operates: “Throughout the whole Asi Taulava ordeal about his citizenship, TNT Management always felt that (then-Commissioner) Noli (Eala) was unfair with disallowing their big man to play because of him not having the proper documentation. They even had the PNP ready to arrest the commissioner at one point with cops at the Araneta if he didn't allow Asi to play.”


• Ronnie Nathanielsz, not surprisingly, defended the Talk N Text decision. At this point, Nathanielsz is the closest thing that the Philippine sports scene has to a moral compass; if he’s taking one position, you could almost be certain that the opposite position is the correct one.


• Tito Talao opened his column about Manny Pangilinan with this line: “Like the noble captain of a doomed ship, Talk ’N Text team owner Manny V. Pangilinan waited until everyone aboard had been saved before quietly stepping off deck Sunday night.” Yuck. Will he be faxing this column to Pangilinan’s office along with the solicitation letter for the PBA Press Corps Christmas Party? (I’m kidding.)


• Sometimes Recah Trinidad annoys me.
  
  There is the way he writes one sentence paragraphs, to make all his points seem profound—not to mention to stretch his point across the Inquirer’s column inches.
  
  * * *
  
  But sometimes, it works.
  
  Take his column about game 5 of the Ginebra-Talk N Text quarterfinal series, for example.
  
  He paints a picture of Manny Pangilinan and Chot Reyes’ terrible realization of the game four mistake—the walkout that was unwarranted.
  
  * * *
  
  It left the reader wondering, if there was something up with Pangilinan leaving the Araneta Coliseum so late. There must have been nagging questions.
  
  Could one of those questions be about Reyes’ job?