RAIN or Shine coach Yeng Guiao is still grateful for his other blessings after losing his re-election bid for Congressman of Pampanga’s first district.
Guiao, who has been a consistent winner in his previous political campaigns, lost to Carmelo Lazatin the fight for the representative post of the 1st district of Pampanga.
The long-time politician is now set to fully shift his attention to his other job as the Painters’ head tactician.
“It is what it is and now, I can be more focused on Rain or Shine and I’m really happy with what’s happening to our team now,” said Guiao.
He has every reason to be as the Painters are two games away from finally ending their championship dry spell, leading the Alaska Aces comfortably, 2-0, in their best-of-seven finals of the 2016 PBA Commissioner’s Cup.
As of this report, Rain or Shine, led by Guiao, is looking to move a step closer to the title as it is shooting for a near-insurmountable 3-0 series lead against the Aces in Game 3 at the Big Dome.
Meanwhile, two three-team transactions, both involving GlobalPort, were completed as the wheeling and dealing by teams, which had poor performances this conference continued.
The long-stalled trade between GlobalPort and Mahindra finally pushed through with the addition of Blackwater in the mix, while the Batang Pier continued on with more moves as it also had a separate deal with Star and Phoenix.
In the first completed deal, the Batang Pier finally received improving guard Karl Dehesa from the Enforcers in exchange for rookie Roi Sumang and Paolo Taha. The Enforcers then immediately shipped Sumang to the Elite for Keith Agovida.
GlobalPort’s second move was with Star and Phoenix as the three teams swapped several players. The Hotshots got some much-needed reinforcements as they acquired solid point guard RR Garcia, along with Rodney Brondial and Keith Jensen, while the Fuel Masters, who were also involved with a deal with NLEX last week, continued their revamp by taking Jonathan Uyloan, Mark Cruz and Norbert Torres. The Batang Pier ended up with big man Yousef Taha and Ronald Pascual.
The trades were already approved by the PBA.
Garcia has been long coveted by Star and the Hotshots were finally able to complete a deal to get him in their stable. He joins the already-loaded backcourt of Mark Barroca, James Yap, Peter June Simon, Alex Mallari and Allein Maliksi.
Dehesa was one of the top performing players for Mahindra and he is now set to take his act to the Batang Pier’s camp, where he will join the prolific backcourt tandem of All-Stars Terrence Romeo and Stanley Pringle to add more firepower.