Should the UP Maroons retire JD Cagulangan’s jersey?
Photo Source: UAAP Media Team
Happy new year, ALL-STAR readers! I hope everyone had a restful holiday vacation.
Now then…let’s get back to work. In the words of the reigning WWE Champion Cody Rhodes, what do you want to talk about?
We can exchange speculations about Jimmy Butler and the next whereabouts of his “joy.” (I like him in Golden State, to be honest.) We can talk about the upcoming inaugural season of Unrivaled, the 3×3 full-court league that features WNBA stars like Sabrina Ionescu and Angel Reese. We can even discuss Jamie Malonzo’s long-awaited return to Barangay Ginebra’s active roster. (I’m writing this mid-afternoon on Sunday, so I have nothing to link yet. Sorry.)
Or, we can talk about a “hanging” question from 2024. That’s an unintentional dad joke, but what I truly intend to write about is the proposal to retire JD Cagulangan’s Fighting Maroons jersey.
As far as basketball goes, the Fighting Maroons have never retired a jersey and enshrined it in the rafters—a tremendous honor that essentially elevates a player to iconic status. Mikee Reyes, one of my favorite sports personalities, was adamant about wanting to see Cagulangan’s No. 12 as the first UP jersey retired. After posting this idea immediately following UP’s Game 3 win over DLSU, Tito Mikee doubled down on his thoughts in the Dec. 18 episode of Shoot First.
“My case is: four Finals trips in four years, two championships, game-winner, Finals MVP,” argued Reyes, who is a product of both UP and La Salle Green Hills like Cagulangan.
Without a doubt, that resume is impressive—the most impressive, in fact, among all other hoopers who ever wore maroon for Peyups. But, while Reyes made a compelling case for Cagulangan’s jersey retirement, he brought up two other UP legends and an inescapable caveat.
“Other than Benjie Paras, Ronnie Magsanoc, and JD Cagulangan, I don’t think anyone [else’s jersey] deserves to be retired,” Tito Mikee added.
This is the part where we scratch our heads and have a barber shop debate. Sino nga ba ang uunahin mo sa jersey retirement?
On the one hand, Paras and Magsanoc were instrumental in UP’s conquest of the 1986 men’s basketball title—the second title overall in the history of the program, not to mention the first in the post-World War II era. Surely their legacies need to be recognized, as they reached the mountaintop 14 years before Cagulangan was even born?
And what of the other Maroons who made significant contributions to the Maroons’ winning ways over the years? What about Eric Altamirano, who scored 27 points in UP’s title-clinching Game 2 win over UE and was named Season 49 Finals MVP over Paras and Magsanoc? Can we forget Malick Diouf, who’s only the second Maroon after Altamirano to win both Finals MVP (Season 84) and regular season MVP (Season 85)? Is there an argument to be made for the likes of Carl Tamayo, CJ Cansino, and Zavier Lucero as well?
On the other hand, Cagulangan has one more ring than any of those other UP stalwarts. While the Bullpup battalion of Harold Alarcon, Gerry Abadiano, and Terrence Fortea also have two titles apiece, none of them has the same cache of clutch baskets and individual accolades that the Butuan native has.
I suppose you can retire multiple numbers at the same time, but the way jersey retirements work, that would look farfetched. Para kang nagsampay ng mga labada kapag sumilip na ang araw.
So, what to do then? I have a suggestion of mine for the powers that be in UP.
Let’s do away with the idea of jersey retirement. Instead, let’s have a Fighting Maroons Hall of Fame.
I got the idea from—surprise, surprise—WWE, which has welcomed multiple inductees into its Hall of Fame on an annual basis, for the past 21 years (with the exception of 2020, when the pandemic broke out). To me, this is a solution with merits that far outweigh the demerits. Because basketball is a sport predicated on team play, why not honor multiple key figures of the UP program at the same time? Instead of, you know, doing it one at a time?
That way, athletes of different generations can be duly recognized in a collective legacy for the UP faithful to cherish. Imagine Papa Bear and the Point Laureate standing next to Mr. Cash Money himself in a setting like the UP Diliman Amphitheater. That’s a snapshot that would unite grandparents, mothers and fathers, and the current Isko and Iska community. (Shoutout to UPLB alum Nikko Ramos—your call in that S84 Game 3 was legendary.)
For the inaugural class of the Fighting Maroons Hall of Fame, you can have three to five names. After a fixed interval—say, every two years or every five years—a handful of players or even coaches can be added. The discussion of who gets included in each class is an entirely different discussion, but I’m sure director Bo Perasol and his brilliant team at the UP Office for Athletics and Sports Development can come up with effective criteria for nomination and final selection.
Heck, I’m not even going to hog the ball in this situation. If other UAAP schools want to have their own Hall of Fame, why not? Whether they’ve already retired jerseys of their own (like DLSU did with Kurt Bachmann, Lim Eng Beng, and Renren Ritualo; and FEU with Johnny Abarrientos and Arwind Santos), or they’ve yet to decide whose number will hang from their rafters, these schools have an alternative they can explore.
I want the Finals MVP of the defending UAAP men’s basketball champs to be immortalized. But I want the trailblazers of the distant past to be commemorated as well. Simoun says: Let’s do both by having a Hall of Fame.
By the Numbers
5
The number of candidates that the UE men’s basketball program is reportedly considering to fill the head coaching vacancy left by Jack Santiago, whose contract was said to have expired on Dec. 31. As per Matthew Li of Tiebreaker Times, these candidates are Frankie Lim, Ariel Vanguardia, Boycie Zamar, Mike Buendia, and—hey, we were just talking about him!—Eric Altamirano. I think the bigger question here is: Given the coaching situation in Recto, how will the Red Warriors’ roster look like in Season 88?
38.9%
The percentage of attempts taken by the Cleveland Cavaliers in the first nine seconds of the shot clock this season. This is one heck of a stat pointed out by Yahoo! Sports’ Dan Devine, who believes that the 2024-25 Cavs are shaping up to be one of the most dominant NBA teams ever. It’s simple: If you’re playing with pace and scoring points frequently in the process, you’re bamboozling opposing teams before they can even get their bearings on defense. I’d be thrilled to see a Cleveland-Boston slugfest in the Eastern Conference Finals.
Tweet of the Week
The Tweet of the Week for the first-ever Simoun Says column featured Derrick Rose. It’s fitting, then, that the Tweet of the Week for the first Simoun Says of 2025 highlights the Windy City Assassin as well. The teary-eyed reaction on Rose’s face says it all. For a team that has already retired the jerseys of Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen, this gesture is priceless.