.svg) Official logo of PBA | |
| Sport | Basketball |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1975 |
| First season | 1975 |
| Commissioner | Willie Marcial |
| Motto | Angat Ang Laban[a] |
| No. of teams | 12 |
| Country | Philippines |
| Headquarters | Eulogio Rodriguez Jr. Avenue (C-5 road), Eastwood City, Bagumbayan, Quezon City |
| Continent | FIBA Asia |
| Most recent champion(s) | 2024 Governors' – TNT Tropang Giga 2023–24 Commissioner's – San Miguel Beermen 2024 Philippine – Meralco Bolts |
| Most titles | San Miguel Beermen (29 titles) |
| TV partner(s) | See below |
| International cup(s) | East Asia Super League |
| Official website | pba.ph |
 2024 PBA Governors' Cup 2024–25 PBA season | |
The Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) is a men's professional basketball league in the Philippines composed of twelve company-branded franchised teams. Founded in 1975, it is the first professional basketball league in Asia and is the second-oldest continuously operating professional basketball league in the world after North America's NBA.[1][note 1]
The league played its first game at the Araneta Coliseum in Quezon City on April 9, 1975,[1] and its regulations are a hybrid of rules from the NBA and FIBA. As of the 2022–23 season, the PBA season consists of three tournaments known as "conferences": the Philippine Cup, the Commissioner's Cup, and the Governors' Cup. The Commissioner's and Governors' Cups allow each team to sign a single foreign player known as an "import". Meanwhile, the Philippine Cup is exclusive for Filipino players and is considered the most prestigious of the three conferences. Although the three conferences have minor variations in format and rules, each consists of a single round-robin elimination round followed by playoffs to determine the champion. The winners of the conference cups do not face each other at the end of the season to determine the season champion; instead, each conference champion team are considered PBA champions. The achievement of a team winning all three conferences in a season is called the Grand Slam.
The San Miguel Beermen are the most successful team with a total of 29 championships, including a Grand Slam in 1989. They have also won the most titles in each of the current conferences: 10 Philippine Cups, 5 Commissioner's Cups, and 5 Governors' Cups. Meanwhile, the defunct Crispa Redmanizers are the only team to have achieved two Grand Slams.
As of 2022–23, the PBA earned ₱200 million in net revenue and had an average television audience of 4 million per game.[3] The PBA also has an official developmental league, the PBA D-League.
Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).
- ^ a b Bartholomew, Rafe. Pacific Rims. New American Library, 2010, p. 13.
- ^ Stein, Marc (March 23, 2020). "Boris Stankovic, Who Paved Way for N.B.A.'s 'Dream Team,' Dies at 94". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved October 5, 2023.
- ^ Henson, Joaquin (May 28, 2023). "PBA sets record in revenues". The Philippine Star. Archived from the original on May 28, 2023. Retrieved May 28, 2023.
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