Members of fabled Toyota team celebrate golden anniversary
ON Saturday, February 18, the other half of the celebrated rivalry in Philippine basketball history that served as one of the launching pads of why the shootand-dribble sport has become the Filipino’s favorite past time, will mark the 50th year of its founding.
To commemorate that year in 1973 when the Toyota basketball team came into being and significantly dominate the country’s cage scene, surviving members of the franchise owned by the Toyota Motors gather for the first time in decades at the place where they used to hold important occasions—the Alfresco Covered Lounge on Don Chino Roces Avenue (formerly Pasong Tamo Extension) in Makati City.
Heading the attendees of the affair are long-time coach-owner Dante Silverio and, hopefully, local basketball’s “living legend” Robert Jaworski, to reminisce the teams’ rich and memorable winning tradition in both the amateur and professional ranks.
Jaworski, who, according the Gil Cortez, a Toyota member and first Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) Rookie of the Year honoree, quoting the Big J’s son Robert Jr., or Dodot, now Pasig City vice Mayor, “has just been released from the hospital due to a rare blood disorder he’s been suffering for more than two years.”
Jaworski, Cortez added, is already in fine condition and can attend the gatherings depending on the advice of his doctors.
“Best effort, according to Dodot, for coach Jawo to attend,” said the former “King Warrior” of the University of the East Cortez, who’s assigned to coordinate the affair.
Two years after its founding, while carrying the banner of the Komatsu Komets coached by Nilo Verona, Toyota ruled the 1973 Manila Industrial Commercial Athletic Association (MICAA) in Cinderella fashion.
Jaworski and company then would migrate to the first-ever professional league in Asia, the PBA, where Toyota won the play-for-pay’s historic two inaugural conferences on the way to a total nine titles before the team disbanded in 1984.
Members of that 1973 MICAA crown owners were Ronald Acosta, Fort Acuna, Francis Arnaiz, Orlando Bauzon, Edward Camus, Edilberto Canalao, Robert Concepcion, Ramon Fernandez, Cristino Reynoso, Ulysses Rodriguez, Rodolfo Segura, Alberto “Big Boy” Reynoso and Jaworski.
Along with eight other MICAA members, Toyota abandoned its amateur status to form the PBA, bringing along Jaworski, Arnaiz, Fernandez, Concepcion, Bauzon, Reynoso brothers “Big Boy” and Cris, Acuna and Segura, while beefing up the roster with new acquisitions Joaquin Rojas, Aurelio Clarino and Oscar Rocha,
And with 6-foot-8 America import Byron “Snake” Jones joining coach Silverio’s aggrupation after the first half of the preliminaryy round, the team then known as Comets, indeed, looked formidable in compiling an inviable 15-3 win-loss record going into the First Conference championship at the expense of soon-to-be fiercest rivals Crispa Redmanzers, 2-1, of their best-of-three series.
Silverio brought in 6-foot-6 import Stan Cherry for the Second Conference, making his lineup more balanced as the Comets, once again, beat the Redmanizers in the title playoff after Crispa, trailing the series 1-2, withdrew from the title playoff.
In the four-team Third Conference billed as the All-philippine Championship, Toyota lost to Crispa in the first game to win three series that went the full route to deny the Comets what could’ve been the first Grand Slam triumph of the then first and only pro-league in the country.
In the overall win-loss picture of the PBA’S inaugural year, Toyota won 42 games with 15 losses. It had a winning record against all other pro clubs: 12-9 over Crsipa, 7-2 over Royal Tru-orange of San Miguel, 6-1 over Universal Textiles, 5-2 over Mariwasa Noritake, 3-1 over Concepcion Carrier, 3-0 over Seven-up, 3-0 over CFC Presto and 3-0 over Tanduay Distillers.
Toyota scored the highest single game 159 points in its one-sided outing versus Seven-up on May 13, 1975. Comets sentinel Francis Arnaiz was named pro-basketball Player of the Year in that year’s Seven-up All-filipino Sports Award with Silverio and Crispa counterpart Virgilio “Baby” Dalupan as co-coaches of the Year.
The PBA was born and grew up in the shadow of the Araneta Coliseum in Quezon City and the age-old Rizal Memorial Coliseum in Manila. Mild turbulences as player fights attended its first years of existence but action grew as more frenzied games improved a lot. Attendance picked up and the competition became stiffer.
Before the maiden year—that was diagnosed not to last to celebrate its second anniversary—ended, the PBA grew into a full-grown adult that is now celebrating its 47th birthday.
Thanks to Toyota and Crispa whose storied rivalry that lasted a little over a decade, made the PBA what it was before its disbandment.