By Ivan Saldajeno
MANILA--PBA Commissioner Chito Salud sidelined Rain Or Shine's J.R. Quiñahan for Friday's Game 5 of the PBA Commissioner's Cup finals as a penalty for throwing the ball to Talk 'n Text's Matt Rosser late in Game 4 on Wednesday.
In a statement released on Thursday, Salud slapped the burly enforcer with the one-game suspension plus a fine totaling PHP50 thousand for the said incident against Rosser and the succeeding sequence where he challenged Ivan Johnson to a fistfight.
"This Office considers the act of hitting an opponent with the basketball as a highly-provocative and treacherous act," the commissioner said.
Rosser, however, did not escape fine as he and Jireh Ibañes will each pay PHP40 thousand for the near-fight during the 9:47 mark of the fourth quarter which preceded Quiñahan's actions.
Salud concluded, "These non-basketball moves and actuations will be called. As we remind both teams that the responsibility of playing the game on its merits ultimately rests on them, the game officials have been directed to take the appropriate measures to prevent the recurrence of these incidents."