IS CALVIN ABUEVA MVP MATERIAL FOR THIS SEASON?

Of course he is.

Or is he?

He already was on-track to be the league’s second ROY-MVP by mid-2013. A dip in his numbers in the third conference, coupled with not exactly being the most well-loved personality in the PBA, however, doomed him to finish behind the likes of Arwind Santos, LA Tenorio, and Jayson Castro in the MVP race.

Now that we have a new season, though, maybe it’s time to think and project – will the Beast have another season that will make us think of him as an MVP-worthy candidate, or will he suffer the dreaded sophomore slump and end up reflecting on the what-might-have-beens?

Let’s look at how Abueva has done since the season started. The following table contains key stats from his first six games (he missed Alaska’s game against GlobalPort because of a sprained ankle he sustained in practice):

VS.	PTS	REBS	ASST	STL	BLK	FGA	FOULS	EFF
ROS	7	13	0	1	1	9	6	25.26
SMC	7	9	4	0	0	11	4	24.15
BAR	9	9	2	0	0	8	5	29.00
TNT	14	5	2	0	0	8	6	28.50
A21	19	9	4	2	1	17	5	42.66
PET	17	9	0	0	0	13	6	32.40

Right off the bat, there are a few of things that stand out. The first is that his scoring has gone up considerably in the last three games. He averaged just 8.3 points in his first three outings and then nearly 17 per in his last three. That kinda compensates for the fact that his rebounding has gone down. The second noticeable thing is that he is being more aggressive in looking for his own shot. This is a guy who normed around 11 FG attempts last season but averaged just about 9 attempts through his first three games this season. In his last three matches, however, Abueva has been more active offensively, chucking nearly 13 attempts a ballgame. The third thing is that Abueva has been in foul trouble in nearly every game this season so far. He has finished with 5 or more fouls in five of Alaska’s six games, and he has actually fouled out in three of those contests. The last thing is that his EFF rating is generally on an upward trend, which I’m interpreting as his way of getting more acclimatized to the new season. In short, despite the foul trouble, the Beast actually seems to be getting better as the season wears on.

Now let’s look at another set of stats. This time, let’s compare how Abueva did last season and how he’s doing in the current season.

*With the exception of 3pt% and EFF, all of the following are averages.

There really isn’t much of a difference, is there? Well, except for two areas – three-point shooting and minutes played.

The “N/A” under 3PT% for the current season doesn’t mean Abueva hasn’t made a single three. It means he hasn’t taken any – not even one. This is a guy who attempted about two triples per game last season. Right now, though, after six games, he hasn’t taken a single shot from beyond the arc. Was this a conscious choice on his end? Was he told not to shoot threes? Or have opposing defenders overly respected his sniping to the point of not allowing him to let fly even one trey? I choose to interpret it this way – with a plethora of bombers in JV Casio, DonDon Hontiveros, and RJ Jazul, why will Abueva need to jack it up from long range? Perhaps Abueva realized he is most effective when he attacks the basket, which actually makes sense.

The other glaring area of difference is in minutes played. Last season, Abueva played upwards of 26 minutes per game, but this time, no doubt due to his penchant for getting into foul trouble, he has normed just over 22 minutes per contest. For a team that really rode Abueva during much of the previous season, having the super soph for less than half a game is definitely a big blow.

And yet there is a flipside to this. Abueva’s EFF rating this season is not far off from what it was last season. This in spite of his playing about 4 minutes less per game in the ’13-’14 Philippine Cup. Now let’s do some crazy Math and dissect this even more. If Abueva’s current EFF is at 30.44 and he plays 22.2 minutes per game, that means that his EFF per 48 minutes would be at around 65.91. Crunch the same stats from the previous season and Abueva’s EFF per 48 minutes in ’12-’13 was actually 57.49 – much lower than his EFF/48 this season!

Let’s put that into perspective. The top two guys in terms of EFF, as of this writing, are June Mar Fajardo with 47.68 and Japeth Aguilar with 44.33. Crunch their numbers even further, and we will come up with Fajardo’s having 60.55 EFF per 48 minutes and Aguilar with 56.59 EFF per 48 minutes. Needless to say, Abueva actually edges the league’s arguably two most productive players! The Beast is more productive on a per minute basis!

The caveat for the Aces, however, is can they actually play Abueva as much as they want? As long as he continues to get himself into foul trouble, then the answer is, sadly, a resounding NO. For all his wonderful traits, one of the things Abueva still needs to master is the art of being able to consistently play major minutes in a game. I mean, imagine if he can play upwards of 30 minutes per joust. If that happens, Abueva might be, statistically, the PBA’s most productive player bar none!

And then maybe, just maybe, Alaska can climb out of the 2-5 hole it’s currently in. Wins – that’s another thing Abueva has to give his team if he wants to return to the MVP conversation. Otherwise, he might as well kiss the plum goodbye.

Enzo Flojo is new here on the PBA site, but he has been writing about all things basketball for quite some time now. You can read more of his stuff on his nationally-recognized blog, HoopNut.com, on the college hoops site, InboundPass.com, on Rappler Sports, on Asia-Basket.com, or you can follow him on Twitter — @HoopNut.

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