PBA All-Star returns with draft system

FILE – 2019 PBA All-Star Game in Calasiao, Pangasinan. 

MANILA, Philippines—Three years frozen by the pandemic, the Philippine Basketball Association’s All-Star Weekend is set to get a makeover when it rolls around in Passi City, Iloilo, this March.

The league said that the two teams will now be assembled through a drafting system by the top two finishers from a fan balloting system that opens this January 25.

“What we’re trying to do is a new format. We used to do North versus South. Now, the fans will get to pick 24 players and the top two finishers will be made captain ball (for each team),” commissioner Willie Marcial said in a short presser Sunday night during the NorthPort-Converge game at PhilSports Arena in Pasig City.

The two skippers will split the rest of the 22 finalists by way of a draft that is going to be televised as soon as the voting ends on February 15.

“For the coaches, it will also be the fans who will be choosing. Top two finishers will (call the shots),” Marcial said.

Also making a comeback are the Skills, Slam Dunk, and Three-Point Contests. A Rookie-Sophomore contest is also set to get a reboot with the teams being reinforced by noteworthy third-year players and celebrities.

Fans, according to Marcial, can vote on the league’s website and through its official social media platforms and can name any player—once per device on each day—regardless of his position.

The last time the PBA held an All-Star weekend was in Calasiao, Pangasinan, back on March 29, 2019. That culminated in the North All-Stars winning over the South, 185-170. Barangay Ginebra’s Japeth Aguilar and then San Miguel Beer’s Arwind Santos were feted as the duel’s Most Valuable Players.