The Top 5 Centers entering the 2016-2017 PBA Season

Images by Paul Ryan Tan.

*This was written on Nov. 16, 2016.

The opening ceremonies of the new PBA season will commence on Sunday, November 20, 2016, and it will user in another year of amazing and exciting action from Asia’s first play-for-pay basketball league. In a few days’ time, we will finally be treated, once again, to the high-flying and buwis buhay feats of the best basketball players in the country. Before that, however, let’s look at some exciting players to watch heading into the 2016-2017 PBA Philippine Cup. In the previous post, I wrote about the Top 5 Power Forwards, but now let’s look at the Top 5 Centers heading into the 2016-2017 season.

*This is based on the Player Efficiency ratings as calculated by PBA-Online.net. Stats are accurate as of November 16, 2016.

The Top 5 Centers of the #PBA2016 so far

June Mar Fajardo leads an amazing cast of big men who are among the PBA's finest.
(images by Paul Ryan Tan/Marlon Bernabe/Sports5)

Sometimes I get the feeling that the PBA is no longer the small man or even wingman’s league. Sure, we’ve always had outstanding big men like Ramon Fernandez, Alvin Patrimonio, Jerry Codiñera, Dennis Espino, and Asi Taulava, but having the league completely dominated by frontliners like June Mar Fajardo and Greg Slaughter is another thing altogether. Seeing guys like JMF, Gregzilla, and Raymond Almazan put up double-doubles left and right just opens my eyes to the reality that the game really has completely changed.

Without further ado, here they are – the top five centers of the 2015-2016 PBA season:

*This is based on the Player Efficiency ratings as calculated by PBA-Online.net. Stats are accurate as of February 7, 2016.