After a four-point, five-rebound PBA debut last May 9, Christian Standhardinger seemed to have adapted to the San Miguel Beermen’s ways, producing 17 markers and 15 boards against the Rain or Shine Elasto Painters, Sunday night.
The Beermen, however, lost in overtime, 119-123. And for Standhardinger, Sunday’s game, despite the excellent numbers he put up, only made him realize that he still has a long way to go in terms of feeling at home in the PBA.
One of them is being used to the league’s physical play.
“I’m literally making big adjustments,” he said.
“I’m gonna lift heavier weights to be stronger, because this is a… How do I say this? This is like a different sport, a little bit. I’m learning a different sport. It’s a lot of grabbing, holding.
“Now I know why in Gilas… When we play in Gilas, I’m wondering why we’re always [first] in team fouls, because here is a country that you call so much less, and you let play more things,” furthered the 28-year-old Standhardinger.
“While in Europe, as soon as you don’t have position anymore as a defender, that’s it,” he recalled. “Here, you can kind of like, come from the side, and still run him out of his lane, which is a new adjustment I have to make.”
Even Beermen head coach Leo Austria seconded his prized forward’s claims of comparing his adjustments to the league to playing another sport.
“He told us its a combination of boxing and martial arts dahil naninibago siya sa kind ng physicality in the PBA. Sabi niya, ‘I will start lifting weights to cope with the physicality in the PBA,'” narrated the reigning Coach of the Year.
“And I told him this is the game we’ve been playing since even before. And as long as this is legal, nothing to worry about. So you have to adjust. And he said, ‘I will,’” Austria added.
With all the ruggedness he had seen in his first two games in the Filipino pro league, Standhardinger now sees the need to tweak some things from his game not just on offense, but on the defensive side of the floor as well.
“I have to change how I play defense, because if you don’t use your hands, but your body… That’s my experience from the two games, you can kinda use your body to bully him out of his lane, and that’s the adjustment I have to make,” the PBA rookie shared.
“I made already adjustments in the post, I’m not posting up, I’m more facing up, that worked actually fine today. I need to keep adjusting.”
