MANILA – Import Charles Garcia believes he could have done better than his underwhelming performance for Barangay Ginebra San Miguel Kings in the PBA Commissioner’s Cup.
Despite outscoring his TNT KaTropa counterpart Jeremy Tyler, who had 2 points and 15 rebounds – Garcia had 15 points and nine rebounds – his effort was not enough to power Kings to its first win in the conference.
“I got to be patient. Obviously. I’ve given up nothing. I’ve got to be more aggressive. I think I let my team down, I could do better out there but it’s a long season,” said the 29-year-old Garcia.
“It’s a process, I’m new to the program and the team. It’s still a long season, I believe in my guys, we’re gonna battle out there, I’m not worried. It’s basketball,” added the 6-foot-9 center.
Garcia – a late replacement to Kings’ original import Shane Edwards – said he believes he is close to producing decent numbers as he slowly adapts to the system of Kings head coach Tim Cone.
“It’s a system. Whatever coach Tim’s system is, I’ll go do it. It’s not about my skillset, I know what I can do. But I’m playing in a system that got them far, they got back-to-back championships and that’s what I’m playing,” Garcia said.
Cone refused to pin the blame on Garcia for their close 92-96 defeat to KaTropa and instead wanted his local players, led by Negrense Joe Devance and Japeth Aguilar, to step up further.
“I don’t really know what to say. I know all eyes are on our import but I just feel like it’s more than that,” Cone said.
“Our locals are not playing well either,” he pointed out. “And we’re not just playing at a high level at this point. I don’t know.”
“We always get to slow starts and I always wonder why we do but we have a lot to learn, a lot to teach on our system and we’re kind of vulnerable to that,” he added.
But Cone remained open to replacing Garcia with 6-foot-5 resident import Justin Brownlee, who was fresh from leading San Miguel-Alab Pilipinas to the ASEAN Basketball League title./PN
