Joe Devance’s second chance

Forty-two-year-old Joe Devance is having some serious déjà vu moments. After having left the Barangay Ginebra Gin Kings in 2022, he had been busy grooming his three sons for what he hopes will become NBA careers. But the PBA was not done with him yet.

Devance had decided to call it a career as his children were thriving in the US. He happened to be in the country as the team was headed into the playoffs. They needed a big man to spell Justin Brownlee and Japeth Aguilar. Devance knew Tim Cone’s system very well, having been with him from Alaska to the Grand Slam team of San Mig Coffee to Ginebra. The timing seemed perfect. The result was a Game 1 win.

“I missed the people, I missed my family,” the 6’7” forward told The Star and DWAN 1206 AM. “Being here in the Philippines, this is my home. My kids were born and raised here.”

Joe has been Cone’s “glue guy,” the one who holds the team together and keeps everyone focused, like Jeff Cariaso before him. His people skills and basketball aptitude have brought him 12 PBA titles since he arrived in the country in 2005. When he joined Cone at Ginebra, the game had evolved to the point that their formidable triangle offense was no longer in fashion. Devance thought that his career was over, that the game was done with him. He was recently reminded by Cone and his deputy Richard del Rosario about their greater responsibility.

“We don’t realize as players the effect we have on people, just with the game of basketball,” Devance explained. “Us winning or losing can really make people happy or sad. They literally take that to heart, from little kids all the way to their lolos, you know. It’s really a humbling experience and I hope that the Ginebra players really don’t take that for granted.”

Devance is grateful for having played with two of the best franchises in the league, and is even more grateful for his relationship with Cone and Del Rosario. He’s hoping that his second dance with fickle basketball brings the same joyful results.