Filtered By: Sports
Sports

Meralco eyes cage return via PBA next season


Make way for the Meralco Reddies’ possible return to local basketball’s big scene next season. The company with a rich basketball tradition, is now knocking on the Philippine Basketball Association doors. Talk N Text board governor Ricky Vargas confirmed the news to GMANews.TV, stressing that the company is expressing its interest to join either as an expansion squad or by acquiring an existing franchise. Talk N Text is a company being controlled by Manny V. Pangilinan’s group, which is also the majority owner of the Manila Electric Company (Meralco). “There’s a plus and minus when it comes to joining the PBA as an expansion squad or by buying an existing franchise," Vargas said in a telephone interview. “Of course, if Meralco joins as an expansion squad, we can bring in players from the amateur ranks." But Meralco doesn’t have a basketball team competing in commercial leagues since the old squad folded during the early 1970s, and chances of making it to the PBA next season is to acquire an existing franchise. Sta. Lucia Realty and Barako Coffee, two teams which unloaded their marquee players, are reportedly being eyed by Meralco. Of the two, the Realtors will most likely be bought out. PBA commissioner Sonny Barrios welcomed this new development. “This is good news if indeed Meralco joins the PBA next season. I’m happy that the company sees the PBA as a good vehicle in terms of promoting their company," said Barrios. Barrios would be delighted more to see if Robert Jaworski, Philippine basketball’s Living Legend, would join the squad – as a member of its coaching staff. There were reports that Jaworski is being considered in handling a key position in the team’s coaching staff. Jaworsk was the Reddy Kilowatts' biggest star when the team was still competing in MICAA. Aside from Jaworski, the team was bannered by Francis Arnaiz, brothers Alberto and Tino Reynoso, Orly Bauzon, Alfonso Marquez, Jimmy Mariano and Larry Mumar. Handling the team was Lauro “The Fox" Mumar. They won the championship in 1971. But the team was forced to quit competing in MICAA, then the most glamorous commercial league before the PBA, when Jaworski alongside Big Boy Reynoso, were banned for life by Basketball Association of the Philippines president Lito Puyat and the MICAA for two years. According to basketball historian Jay P. Mercado of MYPBA, a rich source of basketball information, Jaworski and Reynoso reportedly mauled referees Joe Obias and Edilberto Cruz in the game against the Crispa Floro Redmanizers in December 1971 that led to their suspension. Possible coach Aside from Jaworski, grandslam coach Norman Black, who joined the Tropang Texters as consultant in the PBA, looms as the strong candidate for the head coaching post. Black, owner of 10 PBA championships, including a rare grandslam with San Miguel Beer in 1989, also handles the Ateneo Blue Eagles in the UAAP. The Blue Eagles are also being strongly supported by Pangilinan. Two other teams – the Smart-Gilas national developmental team and the San Beda Red Lions – are also being bankrolled by the man known as MVP. Ironically, Black and Jaworski were together with the first all-professional RP team that finished silver in the 1990 Asian Games in Beijing. Black, along with Rino Salazar, was assistant to Jaworski. - GMANews.TV