Fajardo has huge SP lead in bid for eighth MVP

June Mar Fajardo (No. 15) lords it over Christian Standhardinger (No. 34) in the statistical race for the MVP trophy. —AUGUST DELA CRUZ

The path seems clear for June Mar Fajardo to win an astonishing eighth PBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) award after the 6-foot-10 San Miguel Beer cornerstone finished atop the statistical points (SP) race, which counts for almost half in determining the winner.

Media and players will now be left to validate that after Fajardo turned in an average of 42.1 statistical points during the two-conference 48th Season after the official tally was released on Tuesday. He has a wide lead over Barangay Ginebra’s Christian Standhardinger and San Miguel’s CJ Perez.

Standhardinger is ranked second with 37.8 while Perez, arguably considered as Fajardo’s biggest threat, is third with 37.4.

Forty-five percent of the statistics will be used to determine the MVP winner with the rest going to the media and players.

Scribes regularly covering the beat—most of the time the ones who ultimately declare the winner—own 30 percent, while the players have 25 percent.

Despite missing 13 games because of an injury, Fajardo beat out Standhardinger last season, which he added to the six he won consecutively from 2014 to 2019.

Rookie combine

No other player has won the award more than four times.

The 2023-24 campaign saw the gentle giant playing consistently despite dealing with multiple injuries, though he hardly missed games in a season that saw San Miguel win the Commissioner’s Cup crown before settling for second place behind Meralco in the Philippine Cup.

He averaged 17.8 points, 13.4 rebounds and 2.8 assists in 38 games while winning the Philippine Cup Best Player of the Conference.

Also in the top five are NorthPort’s Arvin Tolentino (35.9), TNT’s Calvin Oftana (35.4) and Terrafirma’s Stephen Holt (34.1), the pacesetter in the race for the Rookie of the Year.

Chris Newsome, who led Meralco its first PBA championship, has 31.7, while Ginebra’s Scottie Thompson (30.3), Terrafirma’s Juami Tiongson (29.2) and Phoenix’s Jason Perkins (28.8) round out the top 10.

Meanwhile, the league will start its two-day rookie combine on Wednesday at Ynares Sports Arena in Pasig City to give teams the chance to see all 70 applicants in the July 14 draft.

Converge owns the top pick, but is still figuring out if Justine Baltazar, Sedrick Barefield, RJ Abarrientos, Caelan Tiongson or any other player is deserving of having his name heard first. INQ