Tim Cone hoping to land another ‘gem’ in upcoming PBA draft

Tim Cone is hoping to find another ‘gem’ in the upcoming PBA draft which is considered by league insiders to be one of the deepest in recent years.

Brgy. Ginebra owns the 12th pick in the first round and the league’s winningest coach firmly believes that a blue-chip player would still be available by that time.

“From what I understand, this coming draft is supposed to be a deep draft. However, we are drafting at No. 12. It’s really hard to find a true impact player at that spot. But you’ll never know, this is a deep draft so we’ll take the best player available irrespective of position,” said Cone.

“We will certainly use our pick very, very carefully. We’ve got our eyes on a couple of guys, and we are hoping they will drop to where we are,” he added.

In the previous draft, the Gin Kings were able to land Arvin Tolentino with the 10th overall pick and the 24-year old forward didn’t disappoint as he played a significant role in the team’s successful title run in the 2020 Philippine Cup inside the PBA bubble in Clark, Pampanga.

Aside from Tolentino, Cone plucked Jerrick Balanza and Kent Salado from the same batch and the 63-year old mentor is looking forward to the duo’s continued development in the upcoming season.

“It was like a leap of faith for Arvin and we gave him the minutes. But we’re still very, very high on Jerrick, we’re very, very high on Kent and we expect these guys to be impact players down the line.”