CHICAGO – After a dominant 10-1 elimination round romp, San Miguel quickly punched a ticket to the PBA Philippine Cup Finals by razing through the playoffs with a 5-1 mark.
The Beermen are a machine. Clockwork, automatic.
Led by a 6-foot-10, 268-pound beast in June Mar Fajardo, can the SMB juggernaut be stopped? If so, how?
I asked four current PBA coaches who have actually been in the crucible of San Miguel’s fiery run. Their takes were fascinating, educational.
“Offensively, you need to push the ball all the time,” said Phoenix coach Jamike Jarin.
“And you need to do a lot of change-ups on defense to confuse them a bit, but with a talented and veteran team like them, it’s still gonna be tough.”
Coach Frankie Lim of NLEX wonders, “Nobody in the PBA has tried playing zone against SMB. If there was, pa sundot-sundot lang. I will zone them the whole game and keep the score low.”
San Miguel’s high-octane offense churns out 107.4 points per game and Lim makes a valid argument that once June Mar gets the ball in the low post, teams zone anyway.
“Eh, di tuluyan mo na. Pareho rin,” Lim added.
STICK WITH JUNE MAR, MAKE HIM WORK.
“Put a body on June Mar wherever he goes. Make him defend ball screens,” Aldin Ayo of Converge said.
But Ayo also acknowledged the potential liability of such a scheme.
“You have to choose your poison. Every time you double June Mar, you run the risk of getting Marcio Lassiter and other shooters free.”
Photo by: Jerome Ascano
To Ayo’s point, the Beermen are a dangerous team. In 17 games played this conference they converted 51.8 percent of their 2-point field goals and 37.5 percent of their 3s. Lassiter is a nuclear weapon from long distance, hitting triples at a 50 percent clip.
“Hehehe. I’m not sure if I’m the right person to answer this question,” Rain or Shine coach Yeng Guiao, whose team was swept by San Miguel in the semis, said in jest.
A WING AND A PRAYER.
“We tried everything against JMF. Nothing worked. You pick your poison with SMB.
“If you scheme Fajardo with a double team or a zone, their wings/guards get open and are high efficiency off cuts and catch-and-shoot. If you play June Mar single coverage, he is 70 percent efficient within 12 feet from the basket.
“After the exit of Greg Slaughter, JMF has no physical match-up in the league.”
Photo by: Jerome Ascano
In the end, Guiao said it might not be a bad idea to try religion, although it doesn’t guarantee anything.
“The best we could do was complete our novena but it still did not work.”
Per the odds, Meralco is a plus 6.5-point underdogs in Game One tomorrow. The Bolts are also underdogs to win the best-of-seven series.
