A COMBINATION to look forward to.
That was how Ginebra coach Tim Cone described Justin Brownlee and Christian Standhardinger teaming up together for the first time, hoping this prop up the Kings’ title-retention bid in the coming PBA Governors Cup.
“Now that he (Standhardinger) has Justin with him, and we have a healthy group around him, I think that he’ll be able to play the role that best suits him,” said Cone during a recent edition of Radyo5’s Power & Play.
“I think that he will be a much, much better fit with someone like Justin around, to take the scoring load off Christian and allow Christian to do the things that he does really, really well,” added Cone.
Standhardinger, acquired from NorthPort for Greg Slaughter last March, failed to do that in the last Philippine Cup due to several reasons.
The 6-foot-8 Fil-German reported for practice late due to a lingering injury and was ultimately thrust into the unfamiliar role of main guy when injuries to the likes of fellow starters Japeth Aguilar and Scottie Thompson hobbled the Kings.
“Christian is a dirty work guy and I think one of the things that we tried to do with him in the bubble… we really tried to make him a true go-to guy. And he’s really more of a dirty work guy,” Cone said.
“He’ll do all the dirty work for you and he’s gonna score. But… if you force him to be the scorer, it’s going to be more difficult. He’s not a natural scorer. He’s not gonna shoot 3s, he’s not gonna pull up for jump shots. He’s really limited to offensive rebounds and putbacks, and put the ball on the floor and driving and running the floor. Kinda like a bigger Rudy Hatfield, if I may use the thing,” added Cone.
“He’s really a guy that plays with great energy. And he can defend just about anybody. And he’s a great denial, one-on-one defender. (But) he’s a round peg and we were trying to put him in a square hole because we lost Japeth, we lost Scottie. So we were looking for scorers at the time and we were (also) looking for inside presence.”
Standhardinger sure tried, eventually finishing with 12-game averages of 14.63 points and 10.75 rebounds.
More than those numbers getting better, Cone foresees Standhardinger doing the things he does best with Brownlee around for another tour of duty with Ginebra that started in the 2016 Governors Cup.
