THE lovable, laughable power cager-turned-actor Venancio (Benjie) Paras has finally gotten his dues, making it to the growing list of members to the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) Hall of Fame this year.
The honor was long overdue for the only same-season Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player in PBA annals. Making it only until the fifth Hall of Fame class of four personages was hard to accept considering that Paras has long surpassed the required five-year wait, having hung up his jersey in 2003, and his achievements were remarkable.
Under the guidelines established for the PBA Hall, only players, coaches, league and club officials, team owners, and media people are eligible for induction.
A player must be retired for a minimum of five years or must have made his last PBA appearance at least five years before the start of the nomination process to be eligible for consideration.
A coach must be either retired or must not have been a part of the PBA or a PBA club for a minimum of five years before he can be considered for nomination. Media honorees are on a posthumous basis.
While the PBA Hall of Fame only inducts new members every two years (in contrast, the U.S. Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame comes up with new honorees annually), still it was very strange of the previous members of the Honors Committee to have snubbed Paras through the years.
Through the four previous Hall of Fame classes, only four MVP awardees from the pre-2008 era (or the PBA’s first 34 seasons) were not voted to the Hall – Kenneth Duremdes (1998), Johnny Abarrientos (1996), Vergel Meneses (1995), Renato (Ato) Agustin (1992) and Paras (1989 and 1999). Of the quartet, only Paras earned MVP honors twice.
Known as the “Tower of Power” for his Hercules-like work around the shaded lane, the 6-foot-5 Paras is the only PBA player ever to win Rookie of the Year and MVP honors in the same season, accomplishing the feat with Shell in 1989.
He also was selected the league MVP in 1999, a gap of 10 years that is the longest in PBA annals as well. During his distinguished 15-year PBA tenure (1989-2003) with Shell and San Miguel Beer, the 45-year-old Paras posted averages of 17.7 points, 7.6 rebounds and 2.3 blocks in 586 games.
He is one of only 13 men in PBA history to collect at least 10,000 points in his career. His 17.7-point clip is the fifth highest on the all-time PBA local list, trailing only Ricardo Brown, William (Bogs) Adornado, Ernesto (Estoy) Estrada and Allan Caidic.