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dpinoycosmonaut · 3 years

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ANOTHER PUREFOODS ICON GOES

by Bert A. Ramirez / June 3, 2021

Marc Pingris blocks a bigger Asi Taulava in a defensive play typical of the Purefoods frontliner’s PBA career. (Photo from philstar.com)

How do you remember a legend? Obviously, this question is now being asked after Marc Pingris, the last remaining member of the Magnolia Hotshots’ iconic Big Three that also included James Yap, now in his last legs with Rain or Shine, and Peter Jun Simon, who retired from the game last year to start a family of his own, announced his own retirement from basketball last week.

Pingris, or simply “Ping” or the “Pinoy Sakuragi” to fans who have identified him with that anime character in “Slam Dunk” that their favorite has declared a liking for, leaves behind a legacy that in basketball parlance may be considered as revolving around the intangibles and character he brought to the sport. If one were looking for gaudy statistics, the 6-foot-4 native of Pozorrubio, Pangasinan will pale in comparison to other all-time greats. In a 16-year career spanning 658 games, after all, he never averaged more than 9.8 points, 9.4 rebounds, 1.6 blocked shots and 3.1 assists, finishing with career averages of just 7.9 points, 7.3 rebounds, 1.7 assists and less than a block.

But Pingris is one of those players whose value would go way beyond the usual numbers, whose presence provided the team he played for the leadership, the hustle, the intensity and the winning ingredient that’s so essential in any team sport. He never cared about stats; all he cared about was winning a damn game and, at the right opportunity, a championship. His value was like that of a Ben Wallace, the former Detroit Pistons center who was recently elected to the Hall of Fame despite never scoring in double figures in his career (although he did lead the NBA in rebounds twice), yet was always considered an indispensable cog on the team he played for. The similarity between Pingris and Wallace may be reflected in the fact that both were multiple-time Defensive Player of the Year awardees in their respective leagues, with Pingris winning it three times and Wallace four.

“He was the consummate soldier,” former coach Ryan Gregorio said of Pingris, whom the then-Purefoods TJ Hotdogs acquired in a 2005 trade from the now-defunct FedEx Express, who picked the power forward third in the 2004 draft after Rich Alvarez and Yap, the future Purefoods superstar with whom Pingris would form a long partnership along with another player, Simon, whom Gregorio also signed as a free agent in the same year both Yap and Pingris were drafted.

Gregorio was trying to rebuild the Hotdogs who had then fallen on hard times with the retirement in 2004 of Alvin Patrimonio, the face of the franchise the previous 16 years, just after Yap and Simon had come aboard. And Pingris appeared to have completed that rebuild.

"His raw enthusiasm. That is where it all started," Gregorio said of Pingris. "And we would always have a discussion on where he came from. This guy came from the school of hard knocks, and every time you see people like that, you know that they're gonna fight to survive, put food on the table, and will always try to wiggle off from any challenges just to make sure that their head is above water."

Indeed, Pingris had humble beginnings, providing a classic rags-to-riches story where one’s perseverance would pay off in the end. Brought up by his single mother, Erlinda, after his French father, Jean Marc Sr., left them when Marc was just three years old to work in Morocco, they eventually lost touch for some reason and Marc thus eventually had to help his mom make both ends meet.

"We really had a difficult life growing up,” Ping related. “So after I got drafted, the first person I really looked for was my mother. I hugged her and thanked her for helping us get through such incredibly difficult times in Pangasinan. No matter what happened, she always managed to put food on the table and never allowed me and my siblings to miss even a single meal in a day.

"Basketball truly gave my family a comfortable life," he continued. "Who would imagine that a kid who worked and slept in the wet market would become a PBA player? When my name was called on draft night, I told myself that this is the start of great things, that I will not let go of this opportunity."

True enough, Pingris became the prototypical workhorse, particularly when Purefoods traded for him a year after being drafted. But perhaps because of that survival baggage that he carried, Pingris was at first short-tempered and literally fought his way around the court. But Gregorio found a way to tame him, partly because Marc was a really good guy and partly because Ryan knew how to push the buttons.

"When I acquired him in 2005, I got a player who was basically a live wire – he could not control his emotions and he would easily get into a fight," recalled Gregorio. "But my message to him then was just to channel your raw emotions into a positive energy and just focus on three things that you're good at."

And Gregorio found a guy who was willing to do anything and lay it all out on the court. "When people would say that things can't be done, Marc Pingris would say, 'ako na bahala dyan, coach,'" Gregorio looked back with fondness.

Pingris quickly led his new team, now called the Giants, to the Philippine Cup title in 2006, the team’s first title victory since 2002, in the process clinching Finals MVP honors as Purefoods defeated Red Bull 4-2. In Game 2 of the series, he scored 21 points to lead the Giants to a 93-82 victory.

Still, the partnership would take a turn. After then-incumbent center Rommel Adducul was diagnosed with nasopharynx cancer, the Giants in 2008 traded Pingris to the then-Magnolia Beverage Masters (now San Miguel Beer) for center Enrico Villanueva, thinking that Villanueva would make for a perfect replacement for the stricken former San Sebastian star. It was a huge mistake that Gregorio later had to anxiously make amends for. While Pingris won a championship with his new team, the Giants struggled.

"I traded Ping because I thought we knew the big guy,” Gregorio later recalled. “We needed a big guy because the opposition was trying to do it (and) was starting to get bigger and heavier. Unfortunately, the experiment didn't pan out."

Gregorio had to plead with then-team president Butch Alejo as well as Patrimonio, then already the team manager, and governor Rene Pardo to find a way to bring back Pingris as well as Paul Artadi, whom the team also traded away, as he knew the duo would vastly improve the team’s defense, especially Pingris who would “make it miserable for the opponent to at least score inside the paint.

“We would have gotten a lot of championships if I didn't break the team,” Gregorio admitted.

Pingris’ return to Purefoods was thus orchestrated before the 2009-10 season, with Marc first being shipped to Burger King and then Purefoods reacquiring him 24 hours later in exchange for the Giants’ first- and second-round picks in 2010.

"For some people, when you get traded, there is animosity but with Ping, I just told him that it was just a basketball decision," Gregorio recalled. "True enough… he was ready to heed a call to go back to Purefoods and we won a championship."

The 2010 Philippine Cup championship that the team, now called B-Meg Llamados, would clinch via a 4-0 sweep of Alaska in the finals would, however, be the last title Pingris would win with Gregorio, who then moved over to Meralco later that year to coach the comebacking Bolts.

But it also started a partnership with a new coach, Tim Cone, who came over from Alaska in 2011 and would steer the franchise to five more championships, including a historic grand slam and “four-peat” in 2014, and Pingris would be one of the bulwarks of those milestone victories along with, of course, his Big Three partners, Yap and Simon, plus such players as Mark Barroca, Joe Devance, Alex Mallari, Allein Maliksi, Ian Sangalang Rafi Reavis and Justin Melton.

None of those titles, however, would come easily. In that 2012 Commissioner’s Cup championship, B-Meg had to rely on import Denzel Bowles’ two free shots to send Game 7 of its series against Talk ‘N Text into overtime, where the Llamados pounced on the Texters to clinch it. Marc then had to play magnificently in another seven-game barnburner in the 2013 Governors’ Cup finals against the powerhouse Petron Blaze team (another of SMB’s past incarnations) for the Llamados to clinch the first of four straight championships en route to that historic grand slam, in the process earning for Pingris a second Finals MVP trophy.

Looking back at that partnership with Cone, the winningest coach in PBA history with 23 championships, Pingris thanked the now-Giñebra mentor, saying he “grew to understand the sport as more than a game.” Unknown to many, Marc’s stint under Cone did not start smoothly as he found it hard to adjust to Cone’s triangle offense to the point that he requested for a trade for fear that he wouldn’t be able to cope with his new coach’s system. Eventually, however, Pingris realized how that system would help the team win and he eventually bought into it.

Cone, meanwhile, found in Marc such a great soldier that he can only look back with fondness at his former frontcourt lynchpin. When Pingris announced his retirement, Cone referred to it as the “end of an era.

“Certainly one of a kind,” he wrote of Pingris in his Twitter post. “I loved, in every way, coaching Ping. Tough as nails on the court, gentle in spirit off it. @MPingris will be the standard from which I coach future players. My fav.”

It was that gentleness in spirit as well as sincerity and sense of humor off the court that probably attracted Marc’s wife Danica to him. Danica, the daughter of TV host and movie star Vic Sotto by actress Dina Bonnevie who also appeared in movies and TV before she got hitched with Pingris in March 2007, now has two kids with him, son Michael, 12, and daughter Micaela, eight. It was Danica who would exert tremendous effort to enable Pingris to find and later get reunited with his estranged father in 2007. They’ve since met and spent time with each other in the succeeding years particularly when Marc played with the Gilas Pilipinas national team in various tournaments in Europe, including the 2014 FIBA World Cup in Spain.

With his retirement, Pingris intends to spend more time with his family that includes wife Danica and children Michael and Micaela. (Photo from Danica Pingris’ Instagram account)

Truth is, other coaches also found in Pingris a special trait not often seen in other players. His last coach, current Magnolia Hotshots mentor Chito Victolero, thought so highly of him that he reserved a slot on the team for Marc even if he had hardly played in the last two years after suffering a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee in the 2018 Philippine Cup. That notwithstanding, an assortment of injuries, including a right calf injury that prevented him from joining the Hotshots in the bubble last year, finally made Pingris decide to call it a career.

"Coach Chito actually wanted me to start practicing again, and I told him I'll come back. But along the way, I understood that I had other priorities," Pingris explained. "So I talked to coach and apologized, and I thanked him because he really fought to keep my spot in the team. I was embarrassed, of course, but I knew he understood my decision since he was once a player himself.

"I'm really thankful that he's there not just as a coach, but as a friend and as an older brother who had my back all the way," Ping, who will turn 40 years old this coming October 16, added.

Victolero paid tribute to Marc once he has decided to finally hang up his sneakers. “A team need(s) good players like you,” Chito wrote on Twitter. “You gained people's respect for your exemplary sportsmanship, humility, hard work, right attitude and of course your Big Puso. Your success is not a surprise and you deserve it.

“Thanks for the memories, brotherhood, championships at lahat ng pinagsamahan natin. I will treasure everything. The players, the coaching staff, the support staff, the fans and the game itself will miss you always! Thank you for your years of dedication that has given us endless entertainment. You may be retiring, but a new phase of your life is beginning. Wish you a wonderful future ahead. See you around and good luck!! God bless you Ping. Salute to our Pinoy Sakuragi. I love you brother,” Victolero concluded.

Comebacking TNT Tropang Giga coach Chot Reyes, who coached Pingris on those Gilas Pilipinas teams from 2013 to 2014, said the power forward's "work ethic, selflessness and deep love for country" were what set him apart.

"Retirements are always bittersweet," said Reyes in a message to ESPN5. "On one hand I'll be seeing the last of a player who is very special to me; but on the other hand I'm glad he's retiring on his own terms and beginning a new phase of his still young life. He WAS #puso not only in 2014 but also in the FIBA Asia in 2013."

Indeed, it was Pingris who probably best exemplified the “puso” mantra that Chot first built around that Gilas Pilipinas team that won the silver medal in the 2013 FIBA Asia Championships held here in Manila, which enabled the Philippines to make it back to the FIBA World Cup for the first time since 1978 the following year. In perhaps the most memorable game that Pingris played for in the country’s semifinal matchup against South Korea before a full house that included then-President Noynoy Aquino at the Mall of Asia Arena, it was Pingris who sparked the nationals to a landmark victory over the Koreans, whom as everybody would remember had seemingly cast a spell over the Filipinos every time they met in Asian competitions. And he did it even with a sprained foot he sustained before the halftime break even as the Gilas team had lost naturalized import Marcus Douthit the rest of the game with an injury in the first half.

Pingris gallantly battled the Koreans’ big men to spark his teammates’ confidence even without the 6-foot-10 Douthit, scoring 16 points and grabbing 10 rebounds as the Philippines beat Korea 86-79 to make it to the finals against China.

“I prayed,” Pingris said after injuring his ankle. “I asked Him to help me not feel the pain. That moment when we won against Korea, that was the happiest because every Filipino was crying (out of joy). Everyone, people beside me, even if I didn’t know them, (they were saying) ‘thank you, thank you.’ Even if it was us who should have been thanking them. We were thankful for the fans because of the energy they gave us. (The fans) were really the key in that win, their cheers.”

Despite the role he played on many of those Gilas teams, Pingris still thought it was he who owed it, not the other way around. "I'm thankful to coach Chot Reyes and to the MVP Group for giving me the opportunity to play for the Philippines. I wasn't a star player in the PBA. I was just a role player. But they gave me an opportunity to try out and play for Gilas," Marc declared. "It's truly an honor wearing the Philippine jersey and playing for the flag."

Of course, his exploits with Gilas were typical of the effort that Pjngris always brought on the court, something that made him one of the most popular players in the local pro league while playing for what many consider the second-most popular PBA team next only to Giñebra, with whom Purefoods has spawned a rivalry called “Manila Clasico.”

When it was over, Pingris will be remembered for such style of play that was rewarded with not only those championships, nine of them overall, but such individual honors as 15 All-Star Game berths, three PBA Mythical Second Team selections, eight All-Defensive Team slots, and recognition as one of the league’s 40 Greatest Players when the league celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2015.

No wonder Pingris is also one of the most admired and respected players by both his peers and basketball cognoscenti alike.

Long-time Gilas captain and Rain or Shine stalwart Gabe Norwood, for example, said, "One of the true GREATS of the PBA is hanging up his kicks. Greatly appreciate you, (Marc Pingris)! Competing against you and repping the flag together are memories that'll stay with me forever. More power to you, roommate!"

Six-time league MVP June Mar Fajardo of SMB, meanwhile, said, “Salamat 'tol sa friendship at bilang kuya! Good luck sa bagong career mo at enjoy retirement! Mami-miss kita sa loob ng court!"

Another SMB star, Terrence Romeo, said, "Maraming salamat kuya Marc sa lahat ng nagawa mo sa basketball. Isa ka sa mga iniidolo ko on and off the court. Napaka-humble at napakabait mo at laging nandyan yung puso sa game! Salamat sa mga payo mo sakin kuya. Good luck sa next chapter ng life mo. God bless you and your family always!"

Fellow retirees Ranidel de Ocampo, Dondon Hontiveros and Doug Kramer also had something to say to Marc.

"Thank you 'tol sa buong puso mo! Salamat at naging part kami ng journey mo mula sa simula,” De Ocampo wrote on Instagram. “Good luck sa bagong chapter. God bless you and your family! Happy retirement!"

"Congrats bro!” said Hontiveros, a teammate with the SMB franchise during Pingris’ brief stint there as well as with Gilas in 2015. “Hindi lang sa napaka-successful na career mo, pati sa pagiging magandang halimbawa. Marami kang napahanga sa galing at tapang mo. PUSO!"

"Congrats Ping! Awesome career! Ph legend status. God bless you bro!" said Kramer.

And former PBA commissioner Noli Eala wrote on Twitter: "I first saw Marc Pingris play with the Cebuana Lhuillier National Team as a guest team in a PBA invitational when I was commish. He impressed with his energy, strength, and passion. He kept that all through his pro career. Happy I saw it all. Thanks Marc for making the game better."

The most emotional comments, of course, came from his Purefoods teammates. Yap, in his Instagram account, recalled the many wars they went through.

“Madami-dami din tayong pinagdaanan na giyera sa loob ng court, magkasama tayo sa hirap at sa saya. Sabay tayo nagsimula in 2004 kaya nagulat ako na mag-retire ka na,” said Yap. “Gusto ko na take tong opportunity na to na pasalamatan ka @jeanmarc15 sa lahat ng ginawa mo para sakin. You were one of the best teammates I’ve ever had.

“Our brotherhood and friendship started with basketball (but I know) that we go beyond that, na kahit di na tayo pareho naglalaro di magbabago ang samahan natin. Congrats on the retirement ‘tol. See you around!”

Barroca also cherished the long friendship he and Marc have forged through the years. "Congratulations sa napakagandang career!” Barroca told Pingris. “Napakaraming humahanga sayo on and off court. Higit sa lahat, salamat sa napakagandang pagkakaibigan sa mga taong nagdaan at magdadaan pa. Mahal namin kayo @jeanmarc15 @danicaspingris."

Younger teammate Jack Corpuz, meanwhile, said, “Dati, napapanuod lang kita. Pinapangarap na makalaban ka sa basketball at maging teammate. Salamat sa mga advice at pag-motivate lagi sa akin. Lagi ko tatandaan lahat ng sinasabi mo sa akin. Stay safe. God bless Idol. See you soon.”

Definitely, Marc leaves a mark in the game that not many, even those who might have had more impressive numbers, probably would simply for his persona that’s associated not only with winning but also with great comradeship. And that’s just consistent with how he wants to be remembered, which he said will hopefully influence a generation that plays with the same passion that he played with.

"I don't regret anything because I've given it my all for 16 years here in the PBA," he said. "And I gave my heart to the game. I want people to remember me for that. I wasn't the most skilled player out there, but my heart was bigger than my talents. That's why I played the way I played."

So how do you remember a legend? You remember him with fondness. With gratitude. And with the hope that someday, somehow, someone like him will emerge from the streets of one small, obscure and far-flung town in the countryside like Marc Pingris did, and create a similar legend that he did.

#Pingris Magnolia Purefoods PBA

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