Hard task to pick Hall of Famers

The Honors Committee has the unenviable task of choosing those to be enshrined in the fourth batch of the PBA Hall of Fame and if the work that wracked the brains of the members of the Nominations Committee is an indication, it won’t be easy naming the new inductees.

The first batch of the PBA Hall of Fame was honored in 2006. Columnist Al Mendoza was the pioneer chairman of the Nominations Committee whose mandate is to name candidates and submit a short list to the Honors Committee for the final selection. The initial inductees were founding commissioner Leo Prieto, former commissioner Rudy Salud, Emerson Coseteng, Robert Jaworski, Ramon Fernandez, Bogs Adornado, Francis Arnaiz, Philip Cezar, Atoy Co, Baby Dalupan, Danny Floro and broadcaster Joe Cantada.

The second batch was enshrined in 2008 with Franz Pumaren as chairman of the Nominations Committee. Honored were Ambassador Eduardo (Danding) Cojuangco, former PBA president Domingo Itchon, Danny Florencio, Abet Guidaben, Manny Paner, Norman Black, Ron Jacobs, Dante Silverio, writer Tony Siddayao and broadcaster Pinggoy Pengson.

The third batch was inducted in 2010, citing Carlos Palanca III, Jun Bernardino, Hector Calma, Allan Caidic, Samboy Lim, Ricardo Brown and Bobby Parks. Chito Loyzaga acted as chairman of the Nominations Committee.

There are four categories to qualify a candidate for the Hall of Fame – player, coach, league or team official and a member of media (TV, print or radio). A player must be retired for five years or must have played his last PBA game at least five years before the start of the nomination process. A player must have played at least five PBA seasons. A coach must be either fully retired or must not have coached in the PBA at least five years before the start of the nominations process. A league or team official must be either fully retired or must not have been part of the PBA or a PBA team at least five years before the start of the nominations process. To qualify, a member of the print media must have followed the PBA for at least 10 seasons and for radio or TV, at least five seasons.

The Honors Committee is composed of the PBA chairman, vice chairman, commissioner, previous chairman, the Philippine Sportswriters Association president, a representative from the TV coveror, two senior newspaper editors and a PBA personality in any of the four categories of player, coach, league or team official or a member of media. A candidate needs at least six votes to be enshrined.

The Nominations Committee is made up of the PBA operations and technical director, media bureau chief, the PBA Press Corps president, a former PBA player, a PBA TV analyst and three senior sports columnists.

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Last Thursday, the Nominations Committee got together at the PBA office to put names on the table and decide on a short list to submit to the Honors Committee. 

Operations and technical director Rickie Santos sent in his nominees on paper. Media bureau chief Willie Marcial, PBA Press Corps president Tito Talao, PBA legend Alvin Patrimonio, TV analyst Sev Sarmenta, Mendoza, Ronnie Nathanielsz and I labored for over three hours before agreeing on a short list of 15. Nathanielsz was unanimously chosen as Nominations Committee chairman.

There were 50 names considered for the short list – 23 local players, 14 imports, three coaches, four league executives, a referee and five members of media. 

Patrimonio insisted to remove his name from the list. He was nominated by the other committee members who overruled his objection.  “It would be unfair to scratch out Alvin’s name just because he was named to the Nominations Committee,” said a member. 

“After all, the question is whether or not you qualify as a nominee. We appreciate Alvin’s position but in the end, it came down to a question of does he deserve to be nominated or not.”

The Committee agonized in trimming down the list to 10 by secret ballot. During the selection process, the members looked into the career statistics of players, examined the list of the PBA’s 25 greatest cagers and leafed through the pages of PBA history books. There was much discussion and debate.

Finally, a vote was taken. Topping the first vote were Carlos (Bobong) Velez, coach Tito Eduque, Patrimonio and import Billy Ray Bates with seven votes each. Next was Grand Slam coach Tommy Manotoc with six. Collecting five votes were former commissioner Mariano Yenko, Freddie Webb and 1977 MVP Freddie Hubalde. Coach Ed Ocampo and broadcaster Romy Kintanar took four apiece.

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The Committee then decided to expand the short list to 15. That meant choosing five from eight surviving finalists. In the end, the last five were Benjie Paras, Miguel Bilbao, Bernie Fabiosa, Jerry Codinera and the late newspaper editor Rudy Navarro. Nearly making the cut were Lim Eng Beng, referee Igmidio Cahanding and Toyota team executive Pablo Carlos.

Others who picked up votes were Ato Agustin, Estoy Estrada, Jun Papa, Rudy Kutch, Yoyong Martirez, Rudy Soriano, Abe King, Glenn McDonald, Andy Fields, Bryon (Snake) Jones, Cyrus Mann and writer Tito Tagle.

Among those who almost made it to the previous Hall of Fame were Hubalde, Paras and Manotoc. They are included in the front-runners list for the fourth batch.

 The Honors Committee will be convened late this month. The fourth group of Hall of Famers will be enshrined in glitzy ceremonies in September.

The previous batch had the least inductees with only seven after 12 in 2006 and 10 in 2008. Now, the Honors Committee has a short list of 15 from whom to choose the fourth class of the PBA Hall of Fame----Velez, Eduque, Patrimonio, Bates, Manotoc, Yenko, Webb, Hubalde, Ocampo, Kintanar, Bilbao, Fabiosa, Paras, Codinera and Navarro.