PBA '78 First Conference First Five (Sports Weekly, 1978)

Sports Weekly Magazine 

July 28 – August 04, 1978

Pyke F. Jocson

 

No PBA Conference, especially the All Filipino, would be complete to the eyes of the thousand followers of the premier basketball league in the country without the usual MVPs and other notable awards.

 

Hence, the mythical selection is played up not only by top weekly magazines but also by those who have religiously watched majority of the games at the Big Dome.

 

For this year’s All Filipino, SPORTS WEEKLY has come out with its own version of the mythical five, a recognition of the top five players for their distinguished performance in the conference.

 

Robert Jaworski, Philip Cezar, Ramon Fernandez, Danilo Florencio, Fortunato Co.

 

                                         

 

Robert Jaworski, the Toyota superstar, is our hands down choice as the conference’s number one, a most valuable player of the first magnitude. With the recognition, the Big J easily emerges as our first choice for one of the two slots in the backcourt department over other noted guards Atoy Co, Francis Arnaiz, Lim Eng Beng and Freddie Webb.

 

Joining Big J is the Fortune Cookie, for, despite a not too revealing act in the conference, manages to cling on to second spot with a presence that has always been considered a threat, a point he enjoys over Arnaiz, who was off in the early part of the contest, Beng, who was overly-trying, and Webb, who had some inconsistent nights.

 

Then the powerhouse, the pointmakers. The forwards who sizzled with their mastery of the offense.

 

Our original list came up with five: Danilo Florencio, Jaime Manansala, Alfredo Hubalde, Adriano Papa and Philip Cezar.

 

The final choice for the wings: Florencio and Cezar.

 

And here’s why.

 

Florencio proved to be Toyota’s scoring ace, a role some doubted he could play when Dante Silverio acquired him to bolster the Tamaraws’ offense. With such a star-studded lineup at Toyota’s, Florencio managed to reaffirm his supremacy as PBA’s top winger.

 

Cezar, whose hands may not be as comparatively hot as those of Papa’s or Hubalde’s or Manansala’s, made our selection nonetheless, because he best represented the other kind of a forward, a shooting threat and a tiger in defense. The latter quality made Cezar the forward with a difference, a star all his own.

 

Without this very strong point to back him up, our choice would be the gangling greenhorn, a top Esquire in so short a time, Jimmy Manansala, who could easily make it to our next five had there been any.

 

Hubalde, last All Filipino MVP, was off and on, while the veteran Jun Papa was strongly supported by Billy Robinson.

 

In the pivot, Ramon Fernandez, the Toyota beanpole, was another hands-down choice. Other names mentioned during SWM’s deliberation were Alberto Guidaben, Jaime Taguines and Rudolf Kutch.

 

“Without Fernandez, we doubt very much if Toyota would have gone this far. Of course, there were the other stars in his team. But his holding his own against Billy Robinson in the championship round was something which just cannot be ignored.

 

Robinson was not included in the deliberation.

 

Robert Jaworski, Philip Cezar, Ramon Feranandez, Danilo Florencio, Fortunato Co.

 

Indeed,a. dream first five.

 

They represent the conference’s best.

 

****

 

JPM Note 1: The individual awards were given out after the first conference (the All Flipino) of the season) from 1975 to 1979. It was only in 1980 when the PBA decided to hand out season-ending awards.

 

JPM Note 2:  The selection was done by SWM writers. The actual Mythical Five for 1978 were Robert Jaworski, Lim Eng Beng, Freddie Hubalde, Philip Cezar and Ramon Fernandez.

 

 

Finally, Toyota Got It but Via the Hard Way to Top of PBA All-Filipino (Sports Weekly, 1978)

Sports Weekly Magazine

July 21-28, 1978

On the Line, Vic Villafranca

 

 

“You asked for it. You got it.” – Toyota slogan.

 

Finally, last Saturday, on its 22^nd playdate, 91 days after it opened its campaign and two weeks after it sputtered and floundered in the semifinal round and made Coach Dante Silverio seemed like a very old man at 39, Toyota “got it” – the 1978 PBA All-Filipino championship, the coveted, most prestigious local pro circuit title that has eluded Toyota these past three years.

 

It was the Tamaraws’ second straight title in six months, their fourth since the PBA’s fledgling year in 1975 and Silverio’s crackerjack crew of Toyota originals and ’78 recruits pulled off the coup with a pressure-ridden 132-113 victory over Cinderella finalist Filmanbank in the fourth game of the pennant playoffs before a whopping crowd of 15,000 at the Araneta Coliseum.

 

 

 

With the win, the Tamaraws pegged the playoff count in their favor at three games to one, their only loss coming last Thursday when the Bankers got off the floor after dropping their first two games with a stunning 124-117 turnaround triumph.

 

Toyota’s 19-point winning margin in the fourth game should seem to indicate that the Tamaraws danced through it all, but as a still tense, still drawn Coach Silverio at the windup: “it’s been a hard game….a hard campaign…and you better believe that.”

 

It really has been that kind of a season for the touted Tamaraws since they got bumped by defending champion Crispa towards the tail-end of the first round eliminations of the double-round qualifying tilts for the semifinals.

 

Their 13-point, 123-110 setback to their arch arivals didn’t actually blur the Tams’ first round won-loss record since all that it did was to pull down Toyota’s slate to the same level as Crispa’s at 6-1, but the jarring defeat left a dent in the ’78 Tamaraws’ widely-hailed armor of invincibility.

 

It showed that the supercharged Tams were only human, after all, and in the second round, in an out-of-town match in Davao City, it was the pesky Tanduay Esquires who showed up the Toyota machine for what it was not – flawless, finely-tuned and purring – when they pulled the rugs from under Toyota, 133-128.

 

 

 

The Tams somehow made up for that sneak punch by Tanduay by turning its wrath and mangling the Crispa Redmanizers in the last game of the second round, 158-127, and things got to be shaky for Toyota.

 

In their second round game, the Tams got even with Tanduay, 137-125, but then two days later, came their crippling 143-127 loss to the Redmanizers, and they were in a bind, serious enough to dump them by the wayside should they suffer another setback.

 

With two losses against only one win, the Tams must now win all their three games in the second round to figure in the finals, a feat which at that stage seemed unlikely with the way the Tams had sputtered and hiccupped and had generally done everything short of self-destruction in the first round.

 

It was set to be sure, the lowest point in what earlier in the season had looked like a no-sweat Toyota trip to the finals, and both the friends and critics of Coach Silverio didn’t lose any opportunity to condole with him. Silverio himself conceded that things really looked bleak for his ballclub at that stage, although he made it clear that he was not about ready to throw in a towel or to put in a call ot the nearest undertaker.

 

As he grittily put it: “We may be in trouble, but we’re not dead.”

 

Brave words these, coming from a man whose team had its back against the wall and its left foot in the grave, but it probably indicates – more than anything else – Silverio’s confidence in the resiliency of his outfit.

 

And true enough, the Tams staved off outright elimination by bouncing back against Filmanbank in the second round, 143-124, and then making it two wins over Tanduay in the semis, 166-147.

 

In the meantime, while Toyota was snapping out of its first round death wish, Crispa was plunging towards what eventually would lead to the Redmanizers’ inglorious exit as a shoo-in finalist with two successive losses – first to Tanduay, 105-102, and then to Filmanbank, 103-101.

 

For its part, Filmanbank went 1-1 for the second round and a 3-2 overall to move only a win away from qualifying in the finals. To make it, the Bankers had only to get past Tanduay. This, they did to hurl the other game between Crispa and Toyota into a sudden death, it’s-you-or-I matchup.

 

In the end, it was Toyota which survived, winning by eight points, 116-108, to move into the finals against Filmanbank and write finish to the dynastic reign of the Redmanizers in the All-Filipino series of the PBA.

 

Stretching the momentum of the winning stride that it picked up in the second half of the semis into the pennant playoffs, Toyota quickly threatened to take the title on a sweep when it hammered out decisive but hard-played wins in the first two games of the best of five playoffs. But in the third game, just when it seemed as if all that was left for the Tams was to order the bubbly to whoop up its ascendancy as the best All-Filipino ballclub in the PBA, the Bankers threw a damper on the proceedings with a turnaround, 124-117 win.

 

The upset, deftly executed by Coach Lauro Mumar with his effective utilization of the slow break to unhinge Toyota’s swirling fastbreak, set back New Year’s Eve for the Tams and quickly brought back the ghost of their 1975 season when they led 2-0 only to blow the whole thing by losing three straight against Crispa.

 

It was not to be this time around, however, because late in the third quarter of the pressure-packed fourth game, seen by the biggest crowd ever to turn out in the playoffs, just when it appeared as if they would be going through the agony of a monumental fold-up, the Tams sprang back to life to take a seven-point lead at the end of the period and go on from there to bust the game wide open midway in the homestretch. To win looking back on the Bankers, 132-113.

 

It was a crackling comeback by a team which had earlier taken a 17-point lead and then blown it, had once been down by as much as six points, and the Tams who touched it off was Danny Florencio, the sneaky hit man from the old Tanduay Fire Station basketball court who rampaged for 38 pointsa against his former teammates, and, would you believe, Quirino (Rino) Salazar, the one-game wonder of the old YCO Redshirts in the old MICAA who played one of the most stirring walk-on acts in the finals of the series by putting the cuffs on Larry Mumar and knocked in three clutch hits.

 

Earlier, Ramon Fernandez got off 30 points in a centerstage one-on-one battle with Billy Robinson, and Sonny Jaworski ran rings around all his guards to set up the Tams’ dazzling finish. 

 

 

 

The way the Tams pulled away by as much as 20 points going into the last four minutes of the game it would seem as if Toyota had a picnic Saturday evening. But the victory, despite its indecisiveness, was a hard-earned effort.

 

“It wasn’t easy, I’ll tell you that,” said Silverio afterwards, and the way he looked and sounded – with his back drenched in sweat and his voice raspy from yelling and ranting on the sidelines – one knew that Dante really worked himself into a frazzle as he finally got for Toyota’s fans what they’ve been asking over the past three years.

Statistically, It's Jaworski (Sports Weekly, 1978)

Sports Weekly Magazine

July 14-21, 1978

 

 

            Even the guys from the other camp, notably Filmanbank Coach Lauro Mumar and Big Billy Robinson, concede that at this stage a week away from the balloting, only a “major disaster” can sidetrack. Toyota’s Sonny Jaworski from running away with the most valuable player of the 1978 PBA All-Filipino.

 

            “He’s got it made,” says Robinson, the Filmanbank slotman who, if he had been a Filipino, probably would have offered the Toyota court general a tight run down the wire in the race for the most coveted individual award in a series generally conceded as the PBA’s most prestigious.

 

            Robinson observed that for a while before Crispa missed out in the finals of the PBA first conference, it looked as if the deposed defending champs’ two most devastating performers this season, Philip Cezar and Atoy Co, would be crowding Jaworski for the honors. But, Billy said, with Toyota in the title picture and Crispa out of it. “Jaworski has got the field all by himself.”

 

            Replying to the hypothetical question as to who in his view would be the Crispa player likely to press Jaworski for MVP honors if the Redmanizers had gone all the way, Robinson surprisingly picked Co.

 

            And why Co when the general consensus appears to swing towards Cezar?

 

            “Let’s put it this way, man,” said Robinson, “Crispa can win without Cezar, but it definitely can’t win without Co.”      

           

            It’s the same thing, he said, in the case of Toyota. “Without Sonny,” he said, “Toyota isn’t the same.”

 

            As for Coach Mumar, he would rather fall back on his statistics in his choice of Jaworski as PBA All-Filipino MVP.

 

            “It’s all there from the time the conference started,” said Mumar, “and with what Sonny has compiled in terms of awesome statistics to underscore his claim to the honor, it would seem as if only a major disaster can stop him from making it as MVP.”                  

 

            And indeed, a study of the Toyota superstar’s performance chart shows how from the time the first conference started last April and all the way to Toyota’s ouster of Crispa in last week’s sudden death match between the two ballclubs for the last finals berth, Jaworski had proven himself the league’s most outstanding all-around player.

 

 

 

            In seven games played in the first round, the 31-year old two-time Olympian was seventh in the list of scoring leaders with a 21.43 average per game. In free throws, he held the 12^th place with an 81.48 conversion average from the 15-foot line. In rebounds, he ranked next to topnotcher Manny Paner of Great Taste Discoverers with a 14.14 average per game. In assists, he topped the field with an average of 7.71 assists per game. He also figured in the first round’s list of players with most steals and interceptions, his 1.43 average for this department of the game earning him a fifth-place ranking.

 

            Also for the first round, Jaworski ranked fourth in the list of players with the highest time exposure with his 38.41 minute per game average.

 

            In the second round, Jaworski went down from seventh to eight in field goal scoring although his average for the stretch – 21.71 – was higher than his first round average. In free throws, Jaworski remained among the league’s top 31 foul shooters, his 82.35 average earning him a tenth-place ranking.

 

            In rebounding, Jaworski was the highest Filipino rebounder, his average of 13.57 per game only bested by Billy Robinson’s 21.62 and Cisco Oliver’s 15.57. In assists, Jaworski remained the top man with his average of 9.57 per game. In steals, he held seventh place in the second round with 1.86 average. In time exposure, Jaworski was second only to Robinson with his 39.51 average per game.

 

            Going over the Jaworski chart with Sports Weekly, Coach Mumar had only one word to describe it: awesome.

 

            And “awesome” it really has been – the Big J’s performance in a PBA series that had seen the Toyota Tamaraws survive a round of four crisis that for a while, had threatened to lay to waste Jaworski’s almost undisputed claim to the league’s highest individual honor for its 1978 season.

Bernard Fabiosa - Back as the Fabulous (Sports Weekly, 1978)

Sports Weekly Magazine

July 7-14, 1978

Pyke F. Jocson

 

 

            Bernard Fabiosa’s greatest hardcourt virtue is his big heart, no doubt.

 

            In a sport punctuated by guts and daring, defiance and asperity, ruggedness and stubbornness, the 5’9 Fabiosa stands several inches taller.

 

            “I have to make up for my lack of height. Speed would be the easiest solution to this problem,” Crispa’s gritty number 15 said.

 

            The Boholano ace, with curly tops and boyish gait, a former national youth campaigner (1974), has distinguished himself in the star-studded lineup of Crispa due mainly to a fine physique and sturdy legs that make him a hardcourt speedster of the highest degree.

 

            Hustle is the name of his game, and a lot more!

 

 

            He gets to be Coach Baby Dalupan’s answer when the team needs a push. He is a sparkplug because he has never played the game half-heartedly.

 

            Earlier criticized in his stint with Crispa as nothing but speed, Bernard has learned how it is to be a speedster with a difference and faster than any of his contemporaries with the same playing brand.

 

            “He now has ball control and has become an able assist man. Besides, he is one of our best receivers on fastbreak plays,” a sports analyst commented on teevee.

 

            For two consecutive years, he has been in the PBA’s mythical second five, a recognition of his talent and contribution to Crispa for making the team what it is today.

 

            To many who watch PBA games, Bernard’s dribble is close to spectacular. He seems to toy with the ball rather than work on it.

 

            “Natuto akong mag-dribble sa maliit na bola. Dito ako tinuruan ng father ko,” Bernard told this writer once.

 

            Middle of last year, Fabiosa was on a slum. There seemed to have no fire in his playing. And if ever he tried, he overdid it, and the results were far from attractive.

 

            This conference, Fabiosa is back as the Fabulous, a moniker I gave him when he scintillated in the 1974 ABC Youth tournament. He scores. Assists. And live up to the pesky and peppery image that he is.

 

            “It’s because he hustles a lot,” defends somebody close to the Redmanizers on the question why he gets the goat of top players from the opposing teams.

 

            “I have done some misbehaviors in the past. Sawa na rin ako sa mga gulo-gulo. Good boy na tayo ngayon,” he said while the team was in Iloilo for a game against Tanduay.

 

            Of course, Bernard was just being honest about the whole rugged setup.

 

            “Minsan siyempre, tumatalab na rin ang pressure sa iyo, kaya napapasama ka sa gulo. Pero I always try hard not to be affected by it.”

 

 

 

            One of the friendliest in the Crispa bench whose head has yet to swell, a common sickness among super cagestars, Bernard still has that little boy attitude he was already possessed of when I first did an article on him sometime back.

 

            His playing might have changed and has improved, his outlook in life might already been influenced by the demands of the jungle city, but Bernard is still the same, likeable and easy to talk to. No airs, no put-ons.

 

            That Bernard has mellowed is another factor in his playing.

 

            “Wala na yung takbo ng takbo lang. Ngayon, ang pagtakbo niya, may direksiyon,” observed Augusto Castillo, an avid Crispa follower.

 

            Fabiosa’s big leap as a supporting player in the Crispa lineup to star category is something which he himself finds surprising.

 

            “I still have a lot to learn. Ayokong isipin na nandoon na ako. There is still more room for improvement. That’s why, I try to get pointers not only from my coach and teammates every game, but also I try to learn from the opposition,” he told me once.

 

            No wonder, Bernard’s star is a-gleaming.