PBA Commissioner's Cup

PBA Commissioner's Cup

The PBA Commissioner's Cup trophy won by the Alaska Aces in 2013.
Location	varies per season
Month played	February to May (during the 2015–16 season)
Established	1993
Format	See tournament format
Rain or Shine Elasto Painters (1st title)

The PBA Commissioner's Cup is a tournament of the Philippine Basketball Association. The tournament require teams to hire a single import. The event was the league's second conference from 1993 to 2002. However, in 2003, the tournament was scrapped and was replaced by an Invitational tournament. The tournament was revived in 2011 after the league re-adopted the three conference format.

The Commissioner's Cup also refers to the trophy awarded to the champion team.

During the 1993 PBA season, the league moved the All-Filipino Conference as the first tournament of the season and made the Second Conference as the Commissioner's Cup, a reference to the PBA Commissioner. The conference was the second tournament held in a PBA season.

The Swift/Sunkist franchise won the tournament in 1993 and 1995. Purefoods, with Kenny Redfield as import and Chot Reyes as head coach, defeated Alaska in 1994.

During Alaska's grandslam season of 1996, they won the Commissioners Cup title over Shell in a grueling seven-game series. The Gordon's Gin Boars ended their six-year drought, winning over the Milkmen in 1997, giving playing coach Robert Jaworski his last PBA title on both capacities. A year later, Alaska had Devin Davis as import to win the title over San Miguel.

From 1999-2000, San Miguel won the Commissioners Cup with Terquin Mott and Stephen Howard as imports. But in 2001, the Beermen was upset by the Red Bull Thunder, with Best Import Antonio Lang in six games.

In 2002, with most of the team's star players are with the national squad, the PBA once again allowed team's to take two imports with a 12-feet maximum height limit. Red Bull won the series over Talk 'N Text in seven games.

The tournament was retired in 2003 after the re-introduction of the Invitational Championship as the second conference of the season but was eventually reactivated in 2011 after the league restored the three-conference season format.

From 1993 to 1997, the teams were divided to two groups in the elimination round. The teams in the same group will play against each other once and against teams in the other group twice. After the eliminations, the top five teams will advance to a double-round robin semifinals. A playoff incentive will be given to a team that will win five of their eight semifinal games should they fail to get the top two finals berths. The top two teams (or the #1 team and the winner of the playoff between team with at least 5 semifinal wins and the #2 team) will face each other in a best-of-seven championship series. In 1995, a slightly modified post eliminations format was adopted. Instead, the top six teams will advance to the quarterfinal round for another single round robin. The top four team will then be seeded in a best-of-five series with the winners advancing to the finals.