The Philippines’ only pro billiards team competition is back, and here is what the “NBA of Billiards” has in store.
Last November 17 the Sharks Billiards Association league kicked off, marking the second season for this pro team league that plays out of the Sharks Arena in QC. There is plenty to report about this second chapter.
Two new squads have joined the fray
The Makati Titans and Paranaque Kings bring the league to a total of six squads. They join the Taguig Stallions, Quezon City Dragons, MSW Mavericks, and Negros Occidental Pillars.
Ramping up the number of players and teams can only be good for the league. This expands the pool of potential stars and ratchets up the appeal. Sponsors will likely take the league more seriously now that there are six teams, and hopefully more organizations make the leap in coming years.
We had our first off-season trading window
About ten players switched teams in the offseason, with Edgie Geronimo’s blockbuster move to Quezon City from Taguig being the most notable.
We have already known of one player who fled to another club for that age-old reason: not being able to get along with his coach.
Dude, pare! A La Sallian is playing in Sharks!
This season fans of the league will get acquainted with Dart Bonode, who has been signed by the expansion Paranaque Kings.
The 19-year old is shown in this recent video to be a 6.5 handicap player in VIP Billiards. 6 to 6.5 is considered roughly to be a “Super O,” or just about the highest standard of amateur play according to the generally accepted Philippine handicapping system. He is the player in the dark shirt.
Dart has likely been playing pool from a very young age. His father Cheward has been active in Makati Poolplayers Association and is himself an accomplished player.
Dart is studying BS Legal Management in Taft and is in his second year. That course is often used as a pre-law degree.
Having a player from a prestigious school like La Salle play for Sharks is a wonderful move because it helps uplift the image of the league. It also introduces a promising young player who wants to follow in the footsteps of Rubilen Amit, Marlon Manalo, and Roberto Gomez as top Filipino players who also have university degrees.
Bonode’s presence in the league is also great for the sport because it shows that smart, educated people play this sport too. It isn’t just for shady hustlers.
A Sharks player almost won a world title
Bryant Saguiped plays for the defending champion Taguig Stallions, but last October he delivered one of his finest individual performances, reaching the semis of the World 8 Ball Championship in Bali, Indonesia. Saguiped emerged from a field of 96 players to make the final four, where he lost to Alex Kazakis, 10-8. The Pangasinense shooter pocketed US$17,500.
The stellar performance from such an unheralded Pinoy just proves how good Sharks billiard players can be. Some might view the league as a repository of good-but-not-great Filipino pool pros. Where you slide down to if you can’t reliably make enough money on international pro billiards events. Saguiped’s deep run in a world-class field, even though it’s in a different discipline, belies that notion. These guys are good.
Sharks is serious about sustainability, but at the same time very patient
While the media were not supplied with hard numbers, league founder Hadley Mariano did share some of the league’s fiduciary details. They seem to be very prudent.
Team owners receive twenty percent of the total league revenue, while the champion team gets an additional five percent. Teams can keep whatever sponsorship money they get on their own.
There is a salary cap, and team owners give performance bonuses at their own discretion. How is the salary cap is enforced? I can only assume that there is a gentleman’s agreement between the team owners.
“Our goal now is to grow. Anything (money) that comes in we give out to improve the league.” Mariano was eager to explain that they are still in a “seeding” phase and are being patient with revenue generation. They are still in investment mode.
Mariano said they once had two million views for one game on RPTV, almost half of the viewership of a typical PBA finals game.
Sharks Billiards is casting their net wide when it comes to the availability of their livestream and delayed telecast. You can watch the matches in many different ways, from RPTV to Facebook Live, One Sports, Blast TV, and Pilipinas Live. It is clear to me that the league wants the content available in as many different touchpoints as possible, and that they probably aren’t charging too much for the broadcast rights. Having the action in many different places is music to the ears of potential sponsors.
Right now Konllen Cues is a major sponsor, as are equipment sponsors like Rasson tables and Dyna Sphere balls. But when I caught a few racks on the stream I noticed that Wilcon Depot has come aboard too. It all bodes well for the finaincial health of the league.
Sharks has big ambitions
Will we one day see international stars like Ko Pin Yi or Joshua Filler suiting up for Sharks Billiards teams? That is definitely part of Hadley Mariano’s vision.
“The main goal of Sharks is to be the NBA of this sport, and make the Philippines the pool capital of the world,” explained Mariano.
“And eventually, instead of sending Filipinos to the overseas tournaments, foreign players would want to join this league. Sila ang dumayo sa atin dahil nandito ang mga magagaling na players.”
This is definitely a super long-term goal of the league, but who knows? It might just happen sometime down the road.
My recommendations
Every team in this league is representing a community in their name. And yet the players do not come from those places, and neither are any of the matches played in those cities/provinces. In effect the Quezon City Dragons are the home side every single time.
The league seems better-suited to commercial teams, as in the PBA and PVL.
The league format is five days of two teams playing each other. There is one match per day that is worth one point. There are different formats every day. At the end of the season, the two teams with the most points meet in the final.
Could the format be a bit simpler, so viewers would have a better idea of what is going on? Maybe.
Lastly, we have a new generation of female players coming up through the ranks. Having one female per team could really spice things up.
But there doesn’t seem to be any sophomore slump on the horizon for the Sharks Billiards Association league, and this season two really looks very promising.
Images from Bob Guerrero