Why Dante Quit - "To Preserve Honor, Purity of Basketball" (Sports Weekly, 1979)

Sports Weekly Magazine

December 14-21, 1979

Dante Silverio

 

 

            For years, doubts had been cast on the integrity of our basketball games, particularly in the major leagues. My involvement in the sport over the last few seasons provided me with an intimate opportunity to confirm these doubts, which, in some ways, had led me to take certain actions against some of my players.

 

            For one, I did not renew the contract of Danilo Florencio because of suspicions that he purposely did not give his best in some games. Rather than entertain these doubts, I decided to cut off my ties with him.

 

            Now comes an identical situation. Only this time, not just one, but at least three players, are the ones at the other end.

 

            Ever since I refused to use Ramon Fernandez, Abe King and Ernesto Estrada at the start of the Third Conference, I had been constantly under pressure from all quarters. Everybody interested in basketball – the fans, my co-coaches, officials, the broadcast and print media, and even some of our management people – had wanted to know the reasons behind my move.

 

            I must say once again that my action against the three was based on my belief that they did not play their best on several occasions. So rather than worry about their possible action on the court, I deemed it better to keep them out of the team.

 

 

 

            I felt that by so doing, I helped preserve the purity and honor of the sport, which, I think, are more important than just winning.

 

            Without the three players, our team has reached the final, and in the process, has come close to proving my point. However, circumstances beyond my control have denied me the opportunity to continue my personal crusade. Our management has decided to give Fernandez, King and Estrada the chance to play again because it believes our club should not be left alone to carry the fight which other teams in the PBA should be waging collectively.

 

            Management may have other reasons for taking this action.

 

            I felt, however, that involvement in sport carries a duty to the public such as keeping it above reproach. Because of the difference in my belief and that of management, I feel it would be to the best interests of all parties concerned for me to relinquish the position of coach and manager of the Toyota basketball team effective immediately.

An Insider's Story: Why the "Absence" of Mon Fernandez, Abe King, Estoy Estrada (Sports Weekly, 1979)

Sports Weekly Magazine

November 30-December 07, 1979

Peter N. Acosta

 

 

Ab’sent (ab-sent) adj. – not present; not in a certain way; away        

                                                                                                                        Webster’s Dictionary

 

            The official line is they’re absent, which means, according to Webster, they’re “not present,” not in a certain place; away….

 

            “Let’s just say they are absent,” said Coach Dante Silverio by way of explaining why, in Toyota’s first game in the third conference against the GIlbey’s Gin, three of the team’s key men. Toyota’s ace Filipino slotman Ramon Fernandez, 1979 All-Filipino most improved player Abe King and veteran forward Ernesto (Estoy) Estrada, Toyota’s 1978 acquisition from Royal – were missing from the Toyota bench.

 

            It was pretty much the same thing when the Tamaraws, after scoring their first win in the series with a crackling 125-120 decision over the upset-minded Gins, went on to their second victory two days later, this time, a 137-113 romp over the Great Taste Discoverers, third place finishers behind Toyota in the second conference.

 

            Pressed once again by the boys along press row why Fernandez, King and Estrada remained out of the Toyota bench, coach Silverio fell back on his previous explanation.

 

            “The official word,” said Dante, “is that they are absent.”

 

 

 

            Other than confining himself to this cryptic remark, the 38-year old Tamaraw coach declined to disclose the real or official reason for the continued absence of the three players from the Toyota bench.

 

            From sources close to the Toyota camp, however, this writer learned that one probable reason Silverio had all but opted not to use the three in the current PBA series where undoubtedly, they could further boost Toyota’s offensive and defensive power and add more depth to the team’s bench, is Dante’s apparent lack of confidence in Fernandez, King and Estrada.

 

            It all began, SWM’s sources said, during the best of five playoffs between Toyota and Royal for the second conference championship eventually won by the Orangemen by the count of three games to one.

           

            SWM’s sources said that a careful review by Silverio of the performances of the three during the series and immediately afterwards when he studied videotapes of the four RTO-Toyota title playoff games led him to conclude that the overall performances of Fernandez, King and Estrada “left a lot to be desired in so far as consistency is concerned.”

 

 

 

            “Osbok (the way Silverio is called by his players) has been in the game too long and is all too familiar with the playing styles, moods and idiosyncracies of his boys to know when any of them is not playing up to par deliberately,”said SWM’s informant.

 

            “Obviously,” he went on, “he discerned such a letdown in the performances of the three players during the playoffs.”

 

            Talking of Dante, the man and the coach, SWM’s informant pointed out that “one thing about Dante is he is the kind of guy who feels that because he has always gone all out to give his players everything they want, he expects nothing less than reciprocity and absolute loyalty from them.”

 

            “He is a very trusting man,” he said, “but once he loses his trust and confidence in you, that’s it, you’re out of his graces.

 

            SWM’s informant believes that more than anything else, it was Dante’s feeling that he can no longer depend on Fernandez, King and Estrada to play every game in the third conference as he believes they should, that primarily led him to shelve all three men if such a move may well mean an uphill struggle by Toyota to go into the finals of a PBA conference which it had won two years in a row – in 1977 and 1978.

 

            “And I can’t blame him,” he said. “After all, what’s the use of having players on the bench whom you can’t trust to deliver or play as they should?”

 

            “It’s hard to say,” said SWM’s informant. “But right now, what best describes their standing in so far as Coach Silverio is concerned is that all three are in the cooler.”

 

            As to how long they’ll be “in the cooler,” he wouldn’t venture a guess. “It all depends on Osbok (Coach Silverio),” he said. “Only he can decide how long the three will remain absent or when they’ll finally be present.”

 

            As things stand, there are thus far no signs that Silverio has relented in his decision to can the three, all of whom hold new three-year playing contracts with Toyota.

 

            A review of Toyota’s rocky performance in its title playoff series with Royal showed that on at least two occasions, Silverio all but blew his top over the performances of several of his key players, notably Fernandez and King.

 

            At one point, he castigated them publicly, airing his ire over their “strange” behavior, especially when in Game 2 of the series the Tamaraws blew a 21-point lead to lose by five points at the windup.

 

            “You saw the first half?” Dante asked a sportswriter after the game. “Beautiful, no? The real Toyota game. And then came that terrible third quarter in six minutes, what we earned we threw away by errors, loose defense and overconfidence.”

 

            In the fourth game of the series, Toyota also led by as much as 21 points before leaving the match and the title, and one notable feature of this encounter was Dante’s decision to put Fernandez on a leash almost all throughout.

 

            It may not have been too apparent then, but the decision that was to stir a lot of speculations in the third conference may have been borne right then and there.

 

 

 

 

            Here’s a chronological account of how Toyota’s Ramon Fernandez, Abe King and Estoy Estrada found themselves in the “cooler.”

 

-       A week after the second conference title playoffs where Toyota lost, three game to one to Royal Tru Orange, the members of the team, including Fernandez, King and Estrada, were called to a practice session at the San Agustin gymnasium.

 

-       After the practice, team trainer “Legs” Legaspi, obviously under instructions from Coach Dante Silverio, informs Fernandez, King and Estrada that they are no longer to report to future practices and games of the team until further notice.

 

-       The following day, the three requested for a meeting with Coach Silverio, apparently to seek an explanation as to why they have been more or less canned. Silverio was busy that day but agrees to meet them the following day.

 

-       At the first face-to-face meeting between Silverio and the three, Dante confronts them with his grave findings regarding the letdown in their performances during their title series with RTO and some key games of Toyota in the past.

 

-       On November 20, the opening of the third conference where Toyota played and won over Gilbey’s Gin, Coach Silverio informs sportswriters who asked him why Fernandez, King and Estrada were not in the Toyota bench that “the official word is that they’re absent.”

 

-       And “absent” the three have been since, although they remain on the team’s payroll and continue to receive their salaries.

So Guess Who’s Highest Paid Toyota Tamaraw? (Sports Weekly, 1978)

Sports Weekly Magazine

September 29-October 6, 1978

 

 

 

            With his position of prominence in the Toyota ballclub, it would seem as if the Tamaraws’ take-charge guy and the winner of the “most valuable player” award in the last PBA All-Filipino series, Robert (Sonny) Jaworski, would be drawing – at the very least – a five-figure monthly paycheck.

 

            But it is not so, according to the official figures of the Games and Amusements Board on the salary of each member of the Toyota team based on the contracts furnished the GAB by the PBA.

 

            In fact, Jaworski is not even the highest-paid player in the Tamaraw lineup, the GAB figures show. The highest paid is Ernesto (Estoy) Estrada, the former Royal Tru Orange star forward picked up by the Tamaraws from Filmanbank following Filmanbank’s purchase of Seven-Up’s PBA franchise early this year.

 

            Estrada, who holds a 22-month contract with Toyota starting April, 1978 and due to expire January 31, 1979, receives Php 6,000 from Toyota.

 

            Estrada’s pay is PHp 1,000 more than the pay scale of the team’s original “Big Three” – Jaworski, Ramon Fernandez and Francis Arnaiz – who were listed in the GAB list as receiving Php 5,000 a month each. The current contracts of Jaworski, Fernandez and Arnaiz started April, 1977, and like Estrada’s, are also scheduled to expire January 31, 1979.

 

            After Estrada, Jaworski Fernandez and Arnaiz, the next highest paid Tamaraw player is Nicanor Bulaong, whose salary is listed at Php 3,500 a month.

 

            After the Php 3,500 a month Bulaong comes a bunch receiving Php 2,500-a-month salaries, namely, Fort Acuña, Quirino Salazar and, would you believe, Danilo Florencio?

 

            There is, however, one possible explanation for what appears to be a low scale for a player of Florencio’s stature. Since Toyota only absorbed Danny’s Seven-Up contract when Florencio was acquired by Filmanbank, this meant that Toyota was not obligated to pay Florencio higher than what he was getting in his old contract, which was absorbed by Toyota, and which won’t be expiring until April, 1979.

 

            Then, there is this fact that when Toyota got Florencio, it paid off U/Tex, Florencio’s old ballclub (before Seven-Up), the amount of Php 100,000, reportedly corresponding to Florencio’s advances from U/Tex.

 

 

 

            After the team’s top four highest paid players and the three receiving Php 2,500, the GAB figures show the rest of the players in the Tamaraws’ lineup with Php 2,000-a-month salaries. These are Pablo Javier, Abe King, Jr., Emerito Legaspi, Jesus Sta. Maria and Oscar Rocha.

 

            Rocha no longer sees action with the Tamaraws, but he is still listed in the team roster and is presumed to be still receiving his Php 2,000 a month because his contract won’t run out until January 31, 1979.

 

            Computed annually, this is how the yearly pay rate of each Tamaraw shapes up:

 

            Estoy Estrada, Php 72,000; Sonny Jaworski, Francis Arnaiz and Ramon Fernandez, Php 60,000; Nicanor Bulaong, Php 42,000; Fortunato Acuña, Danny Florencio and Rino Salazar, Php 30,000; Pablo Javier, Abe King, Emer Legaspi, Jess Sta. Maria, and Oscar Rocha, Php 24,000.

 

            The same annual computation shows Toyota’s yearly expenditure for the salaries of its players at Php 504,000. In comparison, Crispa, the first team featured in this series, has an annual outlay of Php 353,700 for the salaries of its players.

 

 

The Night Toyota Ran over Crispa (Sports Weekly, 1978)

Sports Weekly Magazine

June 23-30, 1978

On the Line, Vic Villafranca

 

 

Editor’s Note: Two hours before the Toyota-Crispa game last Tuesday, SWM columnist Vic Villafranca looked like he needed a stiff drink. He kept asking everybody: do you think Sports Weekly magazine will taste better with mustard or catsup? The reason for this was a week ago, in the last issue of SWM, Vic had vowed to eat a whole issue of SWM for breakfast if his prediction of a Toyota win by at least four points over Crispa didn’t come true.)

 

            Put away the mustard, Sim and Pyke, you may do the same thing with the catsup.

 

            That’s right, fellows, it’s off – the spectacle of this full-grown columnist chomping on the latest issue of Sports Weekly magazine for breakfast because Tuesday night at the Araneta Coliseum, before a packed house that included a big batch of keelhauled Crispanatics, a fired-up Toyota team, playing as if there’s no tomorrow, unloaded its big bombs against a badly outclassed Crispa outfit, 158 to 135, to round out its qualifying round playdates with a 12-2 won loss record.

 

            It was the same record posted by the chastised Crispa Redmanizers for the same stretch – Crispa’s first loss coming off an opening day setback to the U/Tex Wranglers, and its second, the drubbing that was almost cold-bloodedly administered Tuesday by Toyota.

 

            As for the Tamaraws, their two losses came at the hands of the Redmanizers in the first round and to the Tanduay Esquires Friday last week in an out-of-town match in Davao.

 

            So the two ballclubs, both of whom had wrapped up semifinal berths earlier than usual, came to the end of their respective qualifying round campaigns all square, although it seemed Toyota had all the more reasons to whoop it up with what they pulled off before a turn-away crowd estimated at 25,000 at the Big Dome.

 

 

 

            It was murder; plain, unadulterated murder.

 

            Playing as if in one evening they intended to make up for the humiliating that they suffered in Davao and, a month earlier, in Manila, the numbing aftermath of a crushing setback to the Redmanizers, Coach Dante Silverio’s boy went full steam all the way against Crispa in their second meeting with the Redmanizers this season to walk off the hardcourt with their prestige back in their pockets.

 

            Right from that time late in the first quarter when they pulled away by as much as 17 points, the back-with-a-vengeance Tamaraws never gave the Redmanizers a chance to breathe.

 

            The first period ended with Toyota’s lead down to 11 points on two quick hits by Philip Cezar and Tito Varela, but when Sonny Jaworski and Danny Florencio opened the second quarter with two completed fast break plays, the Tamaraws were again off and running.

 

            After two minutes, Toyota’s bulge had ballooned anew to 17, then 20 and all the way up to 23 when Francis Arnaiz, back in the groove as Toyota’s best clutch hitter, teamed up with Estoy Estrada and Jaworski to touch off an 11-4 Toyota blast that closed out the first half at 78-57.

 

            In the third quarter, the game assumed the character of a public slaughter of the once-dreaded Redmanizers when the Tamaraws relentlessly banged in 45 points against Crispa’s 26 to bust the match wide open going into the final period.

 

            In this torrid third, it was the “old” Toyota gang of Jaworski, Arnaiz and Ramon Fernandez who presided over the carnage. By the time the buzzer sounded, the Tamaraws were way out in Bangkok by 30 points.

 

            From this point on, it was all downhill for the Tamaraws although earlier in the fourth, the game was threatened by a melee and with 8:33 left, the Redmanizers had attempted a last gasp turnaround by bringing down Toyota’s lead to 21 points.

 

            The Redmanizers, however, never got farther than that because promptly, the Tamaraws unleashed a 12-4 barrage that sent Toyota’s lead up again to 31. Toyota’s margin of victory eventually settled at 23, which was deceptive because until the game swung into a you-shoot contest, the Tamaraws were wielding the axe at will on a hapless Crispa team.

 

 

 

            As in their previous encounters, the latest episode in the four-year old running gun battle between the two ballclubs was staged amid the pressure cooker atmosphere of an epic struggle.

 

            Standings-wise, the match was a no-bearing affair since both teams had assured themselves of semifinal round berths as early as the third playdate of the second round of the double-round qualifying run. Just the same, they went at each other’s throats as if Tuesday night was already championship night.

 

            As in so many Toyota-Crispa encounters, Tuesday’s night fever pitch confrontation was not without its share of tense moments and its roster of players sent out of the hardcourt due to injuries or by allowing their tempers to run amuck.

 

            For Crispa, the injury list was headed by Abet Guidaben, the Redmanizers’ 6’5 center, who suffered a busted jaw when he got hit by Fernandez as he was driving in for a lay-up. Toyota’s loss was Fort Acuña, who was thrown out of the ballgame when he touched off a melee after 1:25 in the final quarter.

 

            Jaworski was earlier sidelines because of a sprained ankle, but turned out not to be a serious injury because Jaworski was able to get back into the game. Fernandez had his lip split, but this didn’t stop him from finishing the game.

 

            By dealing the defending PBA All-Filipino champions the worst beating ever administered to Crispa this season, Toyota fully settled a two-month old score with the Redmanizers.

 

            But more than this, the Tamaraws, who are shooting for their second All-Filipino tournament championship, have emerged from the grey shadow of their two qualifying round losses and established themselves anew as the team most likely to win what is often known as the most prestigious title of the year-round PBA series.

 

            One runaway decision over Crispa doesn’t of course mean they’ve got it made, but with that awesome run and gun performance the Tamaraws have left no doubt about their being the most awesome ballclub in the All-Filipino when they are on. As undoubtedly and convincingly they were Tuesday night at the Big Dome when they all but reduced the Redmanizers to the category of a pedestrian that got hit by a runaway truck and never got to know what really hit them until it was time to take off their casts.

 

            Quote unquote –

 

            Atoy Co, upon reading SWM’s prediction of a Toyota win by at least four points: “Because of that, we’re going to beat Toyota.”

 

            Coach Dante Silverio, a week before the Tams went up against Crispa: “We’re going to beat them, Buddy.”

 

            Crispa owner and manager, Danny Floro, when asked if he was “nervous” about the outcome of the second Crispa-Toyota game in the All-Filipino: “I am always very nervous when we play Toyota.”

 

            Crispanatic, Naty Redublo, on SWM’s prediction: “So you think Toyota is gonna beat us by four points, huh? Man, you must be dreaming or out of your mind.”