San Miguel keeps roster intact
San Miguel Beer is keeping its roster intact heading into the resumption of the 45th season of the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA).
Beermen’s head coach Leo Austria said they would not do any shake up and extend the contract of their expiring players as they shoot for their sixth straight Philippine Cup title.
“We are going to use what we have in our current lineup,” Austria, a four-time PBA Coach of the Year, said.
“I think we would already reach an agreement before the expiration of their contracts comes.”
In a recent statement, PBA commissioner Willie Marcial said PBA teams have the choice to extend the contracts of their expiring players to make sure that they would still receive their monthly salaries while the league is on a break due to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus.
Those who would not be extended, however, would be free agents and could look for new teams to stay in the payroll.
San Miguel, for its part, will see the expiration of the deals of its star players in Alex Cabagnot and Arwind Santos on 31 August.
But Austria said the extension of their contracts had been on the table even before the opening of the season, where they clobbered Magnolia in the lone game before the pandemic.
“I think we have already settled it in our team because we already have negotiations with our veterans even before the start of the All-Filipino Conference,” Austria said.
“They were already extended.”