The Philippines premier basketball league returns to Cagayan de Oro and Northern Mindanao with a bang on Saturday, 21 February 2015 when recently crowned Philippine Cup 2015 champion San Miguel Beermen clash with hitherto undefeated Meralco Bolts in game 33 of the ongoing PBA Commissioner’s Cup at the Xavier University Gymnasium.
SMB vs MERALCO
The 2015 Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) Commissioner
The tournament allows teams to hire foreign players or imports with a height limit of 6’9″ for the top eight teams of the Philippine Cup, while the bottom four teams will be allowed to hire imports with no height limit. The tournament started January 27, 2015 and is set to finish around April 2015.
Ticket prices are pegged at P2,000 (courtside); P1,200 (stage); P900 (lower box) and P450 (general admission).
“Due to the limited capacity of XU gymnasium and the high overhead costs of maintaining a PBA franchise, we are constrained to maintain the relatively high ticket prices just to break even,” said Robert Dy, president of Buffalo Promotions. “Rest assured when the Cagayan de Oro Convention Center becomes available, hopefully in the near future, we can substantially reduce the ticket prices to more popular levels.”
Mr. Dy assured every ticket holder is guaranteed a seat since all seats will be pre-numbered and they have tightened security against fake ticket holders. In addition, no food and drinks will be allowed to be brought from the outside (these can be purchased inside the XU gym) for security reasons and no one will be allowed back inside the gym once they leave the gym premises for whatever reason.
SMB - Philippine Cup
Reinforcing the Beermen in the import-laden conference is 6’8” Ronald Roberts, who is coming off a stint with the Sta. Cruz Warriors in the National Basketball Association Development (D-League) League. In his senior year with Saint Joseph’s, Roberts averaged 14.4 points, 7.4 rebounds and 1.3 blocks.
Roberts, 23, is the team’s third option after Arinze Onuaku and backup Eric Griffin chose to try their luck in the NBA. He is expected to fortify San Miguel’s frontline which already has reigning PBA most valuable player June Mar Fajardo and Arwind Santos in tow.
But Roberts isn’t merely a replacement import. Shortly before signing with the Beermen, he was named as the D-League Player of the Week for averaging 29.5 points, 13.5 rebounds and 2.0 blocks with the Sta. Cruz Warriors.
Also joining the Beermen in the Commissioner’s Cup is big man Jay-R Reyes who they acquired earlier in a three-team deal with the Barangay Ginebra San Miguel Kings and Barako Bull Energy. In the deal, Barako Bull veteran Dorian Peña was sent to Ginebra who in turn gave up Reyes to San Miguel. The Beermen then released reserve Justin Chua to the Energy.
Josh Davis
Meralco, for its part, has been given a jolt by 6’ 8” Josh Davis, 24, (22 points, 21.5 rebounds and five steals in 39.5 minutes) while also getting steady firepower from leading scorer Gary David (23 ppg).
The Bolts made some off-season moves prior to the start of the season. They acquired “El Granada” Gary David from GlobalPort in exchange for Chris Ross, Chris Timberlake and Meralco’s 2016 and 2017 second round picks.
They also traded Asi Taulava to Air21 for Mike Cortez, shipped Mark Cardona to Air21 via a three-team trade and acquired Rabeh Al-Hussaini. They also traded Jay-R Reyes for Kerby Raymundo from Ginebra. Raymundo has yet to play for the Bolts since he was traded because of a nagging knee injury, and is contemplating retirement.
Midway through the eliminations, they signed up Danny Ildefonso for the rest of the conference, who was unceremoniously let go by Petron. After realizing that Danny I still has what it takes to play, and can still help the team in terms of his leadership and positive influence, the Bolts signed him for the rest of the season.