The presence of resident import Justin Brownlee will be hardly felt when Barangay Ginebra San Miguel marches to the Commissioner’s Cup of the Philippine Basketball Association.
Kings coach Tim Cone said their new import, Tony Bishop, is doing great in training, prompting them to retain the firepower they lost when they decided to sit out Brownlee for the season-opening conference that started last Sunday at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.
Brownlee was supposed to return to Ginebra for another tour of duty.
But he is facing a lengthy suspension from the International Basketball Federation after testing positive for a banned substance in the wake of Gilas Pilipinas’ historic conquest in the 19th Asian Games.
With that, the Kings had no choice but to look for a replacement import, and Cone immediately tapped Bishop, who powered Meralco in the finals of the Governors’ Cup last year.
Cone said it looks like they made the right choice.
“In his first day, he was great, he was unselfish, he scored when needed to and he defended really well. He has all the things you wanted in a very good import,” Cone said, adding that they had a chance to test Bishop’s chemistry with the Kings in a friendly match with NorthPort last week.
“We had a practice game against NorthPort and he did well. So we’re firing in all cylinders. I’m happy that he’s here and the players are extremely happy as well.”
Cone said their memorable finals series against Bishop and the Bolts made his decision of hiring him a lot easier.
“I was tasked with looking for another import when I was told that this would happen. One of the guys that popped off my head was Tony Bishop because we knew Tony from our series in the finals,” Cone said.
“When you play in a championship series with another team, you get to know that other team; their strengths, their weaknesses, and you get to see how they interact with their teammates. Everything we saw in Tony Bishop was positive for us.”
