PBA: No such thing as bad publicity for Beau Belga - Guiao

After getting physical with opponents and taunting the crowd last Sunday in Rain or Shine's victory against Barangay Ginebra, Beau Belga made himself a villain in the eyes of many fans.

Even former PBA player Ricardo Brown spared a few words to comment on the big man's rough play during the game, which included flagrant fouls on Mark Caguioa, Eman Monfort, and Chris Ellis.

For his coach Yeng Guiao, however, the negative reaction just spurred more publicity for the burly big man.

"I've guested in some basketball openings since it's summer, and everybody's asking me about Beau Belga. I think it just made him even more popular," said the coach about the former Philippine Christian University standout.

Belga also provoked the already agitated Ginebra crowd after the buzzer, doing the "suck it" move commonly seen in wrestling fights as a victory dance. Earlier in the game, a mineral water bottle was thrown towards the court by two angry Ginebra supporters.

He was the talk of the town in social media after the game, inspiring memes and fueling discussions among fans.

"It's either you love him or you hate him," Guiao said. "But either way, he's being mentioned. He's catching some attention. For us, that's good."

On Tuesday, the Elasto Painter was summoned to the PBA office along with teammate Raymond Almazan. They were fined P40,000 for taunting the fans and an additional P30,000 was charged to Belga for the flagrant fouls.

Belga apologized after getting reprimanded by Commissioner Chito Salud, but Guiao said he does not necessarily want his player to change his ways.

"I really don't want to change anything naman e," he said. "He's being able to exact some intimidation on the part of the opponents." - RAF, GMA News