For Jacque Ruby, basketball is more than just a spectator sport. It is the foundation of a career that would span sports marketing, television broadcasting and digital media, while keeping him closely tied to the community that first opened the doors for him.

After serving as marketing chief of the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA), Ruby is finally back, serving as representative of the Macau Black Knights, a squad that aims to push Filipino cagers to their limit and bring a new level of excitement to Philippine basketball.

Ruby and the Black Knights have big shoes to fill. After the success of the Bay Area Dragons and the Hong Kong Eastern, the Black Knights are expected to come up with a strong performance to give league heavyweights like reigning champion TNT Tropang 5G, Meralco, San Miguel Beer and Barangay Ginebra a run for their money.

Leading the Black Knights is veteran mentor Garrett Kelly together with a slew of standouts like Damian Chongqui, Jenning Leung and Phoenix Shackelford with Tony Mitchell as import. They also have Filipinos on the bench with four-time PBA champion Rich Alvarez and team manager Frederic Dandan.

Ruby said he may be wearing a different hat now, but the PBA still occupies a special place in his heart.

“I owe a lot to the PBA. It really opened a lot of doors for me,” the 56-year-old Ruby said in the latest episode of Off the Court, the weekly sports show of DAILY TRIBUNE, last Thursday.

Familiar territory

True enough, Ruby owes his career to the PBA.

The Ateneo de Manila University-educated executive first entered the league in 2005 when then commissioner Noli Eala appointed him as marketing director.

At that time, social media wasn’t yet a big deal, while the league was entering into an exciting period of transition marked by individual star power, intense rivalries, and innovative marketing initiatives that turned it into a household name.

Ruby took advantage of this growth and was successful in pulling the league closer to its fans.

“In 2005, I became the marketing director of the PBA under commissioner Noli Eala. That was the time of James Yap, Willie Miller, Mark Caguioa and Enrico Villanueva were all dominating the league,” said Ruby, recalling how they were able to boost gate attendance from an average of 4,000 per game day to 7,000 by selling upper box seats for as low as P5.

“We had many successful projects like ‘Gimme Five,’ and that was also when the Molten eight-panel ball started in the league.”

True enough, his success in leading the PBA to its glory years gave Ruby a chance to test the waters in other ventures like television, where he led some of the most recognizable channels in the region, allowing him to shape programming that reached millions of viewers.