Christian Standhardinger bags Governors’ Cup Best Player plum

From a mere back-up to San Miguel starting center June Mar Fajardo to NorthPort’s main man and now the Best Player of the 2019 PBA Governors’ Cup.

Christian Standhardinger made that journey and became the first player in league history to win the much-coveted award after being traded in the middle of the conference. He also became the second, after Gary David did the trick during the 2012 Philippine Cup, to come from an 8th-seeded team.

The 30-year olf Fil-German amassed a total of 1,011 points to emerge as the winner over Fajardo (657), TNT’s Jayson Castro (615), Columbian rookie CJ Perez (506) and NLEX star Kiefer Ravena (481).

“I have to really appreciate my teammates, they put me in a great position. It was so much fun last conference to play with them, to fight with them,” said Standhardinger who was still a part of the Beermen when the team won the 2019 Philippine Cup and 2019 Commissioner’s Cup titles.

“I feel like it should be a team award and I’m really thankful to my coach and my teammates that it worked out well,” he added.

Standhardinger, who also became the first Batang Pier to bag the award, posted averages of 22.7 points and 12.8 rebounds to lead the Pido Jarecio-mentored squad past top-seeded NLEX and a spot in the semifinal round of the season-ending conference.