By REY C. LACHICA
PARIS, France – Basketball leagues – pro and amateur – have sprout like mushrooms in the Philippines, but the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) remains the “king” of all sporting shows.
Challenges came left and right, but the PBA, Asia’s first pro basketball league, has weathered it all on the way to establishing a record income of more or less P200 million last season.
That pleasant news was jointly announced Friday, May 26, by PBA Board Chairman Ricky Vargas of the TNT Tropang Giga and Commissioner Willie Marcial who were accompanied by other team governors and TV 5 officials in this lovely French capital teeming with great historical achievements..
Marcial credited the all-out support of the board and loyal fans for embracing the innovation they made, including the invitation of the Hong Kong-based Bay Area Dragons to play in the league.
Apart from the whopping income, the league broke several records on social media, including 4 million people reached per game, second most viewed channel on Cignal play and 5 million “PBA hours watched” via youtube.
“We reached an average of 4.2 million fans (in the Governors’ Cup finals),” Vargas. “And that represents something like 10-something percent share on television audience.”
The pivotal Game 7 between Ginebra and Bay Area was also one for the books as it attracted close to 55,000 fans at the Philippine Arena in Bocaue, Bulacan.
For helping steer the league to several firsts, Marcial, 61, was rewarded with a fresh 3-year term by the board, that included Ginebra’s Alfrancis Chua, Rain or Shine’s Mamerto Mondragon, NorthPort’s Erick Arejola, Phoenix’s Raymond Zorilla, San Miguel’s Robert Non, Blackwater’s Siliman Sy, Terrafirma’s Bobby Rosales, NLEX’s Rod Franco and Bill Pamintuan.
Marcial is the 10th commissioner of the league since the legendary Leo Prieto.
The extension of his term will assure Marcial to become the third longest-tenured chief of the PBA after Jun Bernardino and Prieto.
But the league’s sacrifices, especially with the staging of the FIBA World Cup this August, will certainly affect the revenues of the league.
“We expect to lose around 30-percent of that in the coming season,” Vargas said after the first round of the board’s marathon meeting. “It’s our sacrifice for the national team for the coming Fiba World Cup.”
The coming season will only have two conferences – the Commissioner’s Cup and All-Filipino. The Governors’ Cup will not be held this time.
Meantime, the league also plans to stage six games in Macau during the Commissioner’s Cup elims – all to be televised live by TV5.
TV5 President Guido Zaballero and Sienna Olaso, Cignal’s VP for content said they are upgrading their facilities and equipment to make their coverage much livelier and entertaining.
