Back in the 70s and 80s, PBA popularity was at its peak, reaching legendary status in Philippine pop culture. PBA stars were considered equals of movie stars. Fanaticism was at its height when Toyota and Crispa were the two most dominant teams, and brawls among fans outdid the occasional on-court altercations. When both teams disbanded in the early 80s, everybody thought that was the start of the fall of the PBA. But Tanduay, Purefoods and of course Barangay Giñebra saved the league, even surpassing the Toyota-Crispa games in gate receipts and TV ratings.

These days however, gone are the scrambles for tickets to watch the PBA games. Except for its out-of-town activities, the games are not packed and one rarely hears post game buzz on the streets. PBA stars, while as good and even probably better (and better paid) than yesterday's stars, do not captivate the hearts of mainstream society. In its place, college basketball, i.e. the UAAP games, especially games between Ateneo and De La Salle have become the new sports spectacle for Filipinos, at least in Metro Manila.

What happened to the PBA? More importantly, what will it take for the PBA to bring back its glory days? Several issues come to mind.

Sustained Involvement in Asian Competitions. The decline in the league's popularity may have started when we sent professional players for the first time to international competition and lost in the 1990 Asian Games. Before this, we all thought that the Filipinos were the best hoops players in the region because we clung to the notion that the PBA was the "NBA" of Asia. This was bolstered by the belief that Filipino individual talent could overcome the gigantic but "robotic" players of China. We didn't even think of South Korea because our players more or less had the same height and heft. Among the teams competing, we were only wary of China because of their players' height, which averaged at 6-7. The Philippines had its superstars led by Ramon Fernandez, Allan Caidic, Samboy Lim, Benjie Paras, Alvin Patrimonio, Hec Calma, Ronnie Magsanoc and coached by Sonny Jaworski. This was the first Philippine "Dream Team".

But similar to what has happened to the United States in international basketball competition, our self-created myth of invincibility was shattered as China defeated us twice - the last one in the championship game where they beat us by 65 points. All of a sudden, we realized that the robots had become highly agile athletes, and more countries were fielding these new breed of basketball players. Our "NBA-ish talents" suddenly were not enough to be considered best in Asia. From there on, fan interest in the PBA declined.

The Philippine quest to regain lost glory in the Asian competitions is in the great interest of the league. It cannot afford not to lend its helping hand to the National Team as the success of the National squad is connected to the success of the league considering that the country's best players are all playing in the PBA.

But one can argue that the PBA did not lend its players to the National Team in the 70s and 80s and yet the league was still successful. Yes, but in the 1970s and earlier, our college and amateur players were still good enough to win at the Asian level. By the 1980s, international tournaments were becoming highly competitive as China's fielding of increasingly athletic tall players and resulted in other countries' rapid development of their basketball programs. The Philippines had the fortune of Danding Cojuanco's patronage of basketball that created the last competitive national team. With or without this level and magnitude of support, the country must rely on the PBA to form the core of future national teams. While it may not be realistic to expect future success, the PBA can better rekindle interest in the league not by indifference or token interest to the national effort but by fully involving itself in the quest. The PBA stands to lose more fans by being indifferent despite its inability to win in top-level international competitions. Conversely, it stands to gain more interest by full commitment and dedication even if it does not win against China or the new basketball powers in Asia. After all, Filipinos are natural fans of underdogs and of heroic quests fighting against all odds.

Developing An Affinity-Based Format. The defunct MBA had a very good concept on an affinity-based format but just decided early to collide with the PBA head on. As they say in business, sometimes perfect timing is everything. The MBA had the backing of the country's number one broadcast network, ABS-CBN but this was not enough to stir the league to greater heights as operating expenses to run a home-and-away format were just too hard to bear not to mention when the league also decided to match the salary scales of the PBA players (remember the Vince Hizon and Rommel Adducul cases?). The MBA was just not yet ready to go all out at that time.

But fans need to connect to the teams. This is the reason why the NBA and the collegiate leagues are so successful because their respective fan base can identify with the teams. Now, the UAAP and NCAA have already surpassed the popularity of the PBA in terms of TV ratings and gate receipts. In fact, this is the reason why the PBA has decided to move its schedules after the collegiate season because it cannot afford to go head on with the UAAP and NCAA.

Taking a cue from the MBA experience, former PBA commissioner Noli Eala established the Liga Pilipinas which practically has the same MBA concept. A masterful stroke indeed, Eala avoided the MBA's costly approach of forming all the teams from scratch, and instead moved to merge the Mindanao Visayas Basketball Association (MVBA) and the National Basketball Conference (NBC) and added a few more teams to represent the other provinces or cities nationwide. Likewise, Eala chose to organize Liga Pilipinas as an amateur league to keep costs down. In this manner, Liga Pilipinas is set to compete directly with the PBL, whose games are now played almost exclusively in the provinces as part of commissioner Chino Trinidad's strategy to cultivate a bigger fan base.

The PBA has to shift to a similar format. To ensure profitability, the current teams may institute a revenue-sharing scheme from the revenue pool that the league can generate from gate receipts and advertising under the proposed format. At the end of the day, the fans identify themselves with a team that can mirror their community. Sooner or later, the PBA will have to face this reality and shift its exclusively corporate focus to a more natural community-based but still corporate focus. After all, adding the words "Batangas" to Coke, or "Laguna" to Alaska, does not mean coke's market will be limited to Batangas, or Alaska milk to Laguna. In some ways, the PBA can take the cue from the NBA on this set-up.

Cultivate Rivalries. In the 70s, we had Toyota and Crispa. Then, we had Ginebra vs. Tanduay, and Ginebra vs. Purefoods in the 80s. Since the mid-1990s, there have been no prominent rivalries and coinciding with this, the league's decline in popularity occurred. The PBA needs to develop and sustain rivalries just like Toyota and Crispa in the old days, or Ateneo and La Salle in the UAAP, or resurrect old such as LA and Boston in the NBA. A possible key stumbling block in the PBA is that the players are now more "controlled" by the corporate image requirements of their teams. Without actually encouraging extremism and fan hooliganism, the PBA must carefully cultivate healthy player and team rivalries. Fans like intense rivalries.

Revise the Games' Structure and Format. After decades of sticking it out with the three-conference formula, the PBA should consider a single conference format similar to the NBA, and common to other professional team sports around the world. At this point, three conferences corresponding to three short tournaments do not will make the annual season more meaningful and exciting. At least we can just have one long All-Filipino Conference with as many teams possible say 6 months of regular and finals games and a 2 month format for an Invitational Tournament with foreign teams joining in. The champion team in the all-Filipino can represent the country to join the next conference where champion teams also from different countries can compete with. This will become a rallying point for our people to support the team that will represent us in that kind of Invitational Tournament. In this case, we will not need imports anymore.

Plan Out a Marketing Strategy that Would Enhance the PBA Brand and Logo. The PBA is Asia's first professional basketball league, and at 33 years, the wealth of history and tradition in the PBA is a public relations marketing paradise. The PBA should develop a more sophisticated marketing campaign to restore its popularity, including a sustained employment of tri-media and through non-traditional media such live video and audio streaming in the Internet and thru Filipino TV Channels abroad. Equally important is the development of a full range of merchandising items that not only attract a bigger fan base, but also provide a steady source of more revenue. Similar to the NBA, the league should develop a PBA store where fans can troop to and purchase posters, caps, replica jerseys, films and DVDs of classic games.

These are only some of the things that may help bring back the PBA to its glory days. I'm sure there are a lot more brilliant ideas out there. As a marketing tool, the PBA was a trailblazer in Asia. Not adapting to the countless revolutionary marketing developments for the last three decades was unwise, to say the least. But to be conservative about adapting to such trends would be corporate foolhardiness, and a great tragedy for Philippine basketball.