Federal Express, the top international courier service, will be the exclusive presentor of the kickoff leg of this year's three-phase MBA 2000, which fires off simultaneously in two venues Sunday.
Dubbed the FedEx MBA Cross-over Cup, the four-month tournament will feature the north and south teams in home-and-away games in a format that is expected to further drum up interest in the community-based league.
It will be launched at 11 a.m. today at the Holiday Inn Manila where Multi-Regional Basketball Inc. (MRBI) chair and president Bert Lina, whose company - Air Freight 2100 - is the Philippine franchise holder of FedEx, will sign a multi-million peso contract with the MBA and broadcasting giant ABS-CBN.
"FedEx is a proud co-founder of the MBA through the Laguna Lakers and subsequently contributed to the league's growth with various sponsorships of other MBA teams and television ads in the live coverage of the games," said Lina.
Socsargen will host last year's champion Manila in the first cross-over game with Cagayan playing Laguna in Sta. Cruz in the other game.
Rolly Cruz, chair of ABS-CBN's sports broadcast group, lauded FedEx's sponsorship, saying "we are optimistic that the other sponsors will rally behind us in our common goal to take the league to greater heights and revolutionalize the coverage of pro basketball in the country."
MBA commissioner Ogie Narvasa said that the three phases of the MBA 2000 are autonomous but are inter-linked with each other to preserve the spirit and gains of the one-season-a-calendar year format of the league's first two editions.
The FedEx MBA Cross-over Cup will precede the MBA Intra-Conference Cup (June-October) with the final phase will have the top four teams from each of the first two conferences clashing for the MBA National Championship crown slated Oct.-Nov.
MBA 2000 will have a minimum of 207 and a maximum of 219 league games. Two MBA games will be staged each playing day, thrice a week and broadcast live on Studio 23. Saturdays and Sundays from 2-7 p.m. and from 4 p.m. on Wednesdays.