IS the league Christian Standhardinger's for the taking?
That's certainly the notion with the Fil-German forward suddenly looked at as the next great big in a race as wide open as the 2020 PBA Philippine Cup.
But the 30-year-old refuses to entertain those talks even with a number of big men missing the first conference.
"For me, I'm just trying to play with my teammates, have great chemistry, trying to work together to a common goal which is to compete out there and win as many games as possible," said the NorthPort forward.
The Batang Pier are regarded as a dark horse in the all-Filipino conference, especially with Standhardinger bracing for his first full season with the team.
His bulldozing presence is definitely one of the biggest ace up coach Pido Jarencio's sleeves, all the more with five-time PBA MVP June Mar Fajardo sitting out the season for defending champion San Miguel with a fractured right tibia.
Meralco will also miss the services of Raymond Almazan for the next five weeks due to a meniscal tear on his left knee, while Blackwater's Mac Belo will sit out at least a month due to a knee injury.
Meanwhile, Ginebra's Greg Slaughter has decided to take an indefinite sabbatical.
Standhardinger, however, believes that those absences still don't change NorthPort's place in the totem pole.
"We're definitely underdogs and we just have to work hard every day and see what we can get out of it," he said.
"We still have so many great teams. There's Ginebra, Magnolia, and TNT's gonna be my personal favorite when they get Poy Erram in the trade."
Standhardinger also thinks that the Beermen are still a lot to handle, even without Fajardo in the roster.
"You cannot count out San Miguel with or without June Mar. Obviously, they're really a great team and whoever's counting out San Miguel now that June Mar is out doesn't really know basketball. They don't really know how much potential they have over there," he said of his former team.
The 6-foot-9 bruiser's attention, though, is now with NorthPort as it aims to ride the wave of momentum it had last conference, where it reached the semifinals for only the second time in franchise history.
"At the end of the day, the focus is still lays on building a winning culture. So you can't really be results-orientated," he said. "I just see us competing like hell. Honestly, there's so many other great teams. We have some injuries right now, we have to fight together first. There's so many factors. I just have expectations of us to go out there and compete every single game. As long we fight out there, I think we'll be just fine. If we win or we lose, it doesn't matter."
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"The focus is building a winning culture, and right now, there's so many different factors that we still have to figure out. It's too fast to say if we can win it all or not. We just have to go out there and play the best basketball that we can play."
Source: Spin PH
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