The knee injury which sidelined Crispa\u2019s scoring machine and PBA\u2019s first back-to-back Most Valuable Player winner William \u201cBogs\u201d Adornado prompted Atoy Co to work double time in offense that it made the Redmanizers equally formidable enough to win more championships.<\/p>\n
And so it was, on this day, May 17, 1979, Co didn\u2019t realize that he became the fastest player to reach the PBA\u2019s 5,000-point club.<\/p>\n
Looking back, \u2018The Fortune Cookie\u2019 wasn\u2019t even paying attention to the 5,000 points as he had more important things to focus on \u2013 stepping up in the bigger shoes left by Adornado.<\/p>\n
\u201cWala nga sa isip ko yung 5,000 points. Na-injured si Bogs, so siguro kailangan lang may mag-step up para punuan ang puntos na mawawala galing sa kanya,\u201d wrote Co in a text message to Pinopystep.com.<\/p>\n
But Co was just one of those players who filled in the huge void left by Adornado.<\/p>\n
Freddie Hubalde had a breakout season in 1977, thus enabled him to win the MVP award that season.<\/p>\n
\u201cHindi lang naman ako yung kailangan pumuno doon sa 20 to 25 points. Nagkataon lang na gumaling ako nung nawala si Bogs,\u201d added Co.<\/p>\n
Year 1979 was Co\u2019s year as he not only helped Crispa in winning the most prestigious title All-Filipino, but he also wound up with the MVP award.<\/p>\n
But the motivation to play better in the 1979 season was brought about by speculations that he\u2019ll be traded by Crispa, which was coming off a title-less campaign the previous year \u2013 the first time in franchise history that the team wasn\u2019t able to bring home a championship in one of the three conferences.<\/p>\n
\u201cMay mga alingasngas noon na \u2018ti-trade daw si Atoy\u2019, nag-enroll ako sa gym, nagpakundisyon ako. Kaya yung 1979, bumalik yung laro ko,\u201d added Co.<\/p>\n
Co was able to do it consistently \u2013 every game \u2013 as not only he became the first player to reach the 5,000 points, but the first one to reach 10,000 points five years later.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The knee injury which sidelined Crispa\u2019s scoring machine and PBA\u2019s first back-to-back Most Valuable Player winner William \u201cBogs\u201d Adornado prompted Atoy Co to work double time in offense that it made the Redmanizers equally formidable enough to win more championships. And so it was, on this day, May 17, 1979, Co didn\u2019t realize that he…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1447,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[157,23],"class_list":["post-1446","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hoops-basketball","tag-atoy-co","tag-pba"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t