SIX personalities who made their mark in their respective fields in the year just passed are among the top contenders vying for the 2007 Athlete of the Year honor to be presented by the Philippine Sportswriters Association.

Boxing sensation Manny Pacquiao leads the list of nominees for the top award handed out by the country’s oldest media organization, composed of sportswriters from national broadsheets and tabloids, during its annual Awards Night next month. The date will be announced later.

Other athletes nominated for the coveted award are swimmer Miguel Molina, reigning International Boxing Federation flyweight champion Nonito Donaire, current world 8-ball king, and former world 9-ball title holder Ronnie Alcano, golfer Frankie Minoza and chess whiz Wesley So.

San Miguel Corp. will sponsor the rites at SM Mall of Asia, with the Philippine Sports Commission and Shakey’s among the primary sponsors.

Pacquiao, Alcano and Minoza are all past recipients of the Athlete of the Year honor while Molina, Donaire and So have been nominated for the first time.

Although 2007 was not as spectacular as the previous year, the 29-year-old Pacquiao put himself in a position to duplicate the feat he did in 2006, 2004, 2003 and 2002 when he was voted PSA Athlete of the Year, following a less-than-impressive eighth-round knockout of previously unbeaten Mexican Jorge Solis and a one-sided, 12-round beating of legendary warrior Marco Antonio Barrera in a rematch of their memorable fight four years ago.

Donaire, the sleek, mean-punching 112-pounder armed with a devastating left cross, knocked out a cocky world champion and gave the country another boxing outside of Pacquiao.

Born in Gen. Santos City and now based in San Leandro, California, Donaire, 25, stunned the boxing world by outclassing erstwhile undefeated IBF flyweight champion Vic Darchinyan, the Australian punching machine from Armenia whom he knocked out in the fifth round of their title fight in Bridgeport, Connecticut, last July 7.

The stunner pulled off by the younger of the two fighting Donaire brothers was too good to be ignored by the famed Ring Magazine, the ‘Bible of Boxing,’ which named it as the ‘Knockout of the Year’ and ‘Upset of the Year’ for 2007.

Showing his victory over the 31-year-old Darchinyan wasn’t a fluke, Donaire successfully defended his title five months later, scoring a resounding eighth-round technical knockout of Mexican Luis Maldonado

at the Foxwoods Resort Casino.

Molina, the dusky tanker with a long hair, was the saving grace of the country’s worst finish ever in the Southeast Asian Games, winning four gold medals to emerge as the biennial meet’s Best Male Athlete.

The International Relations graduate from the University of California-Berkeley topped the 400-meter individual medley, 200-meter individual medley, 200-meter breastroke and anchored the 4x100-meter men’s relay team to victory as he distinguished himself as the most bemedalled among the 595 Filipino athletes that made up Team Philippines.

Molina being adjudged as the SEA Games’ Best Male Athlete marked the first time a Filipino was bestowed the prestigious award since Eric Buhain achieved the feat back-to-back in 1989 and 1991.

Like Pacquiao, Alcano was also honored with the same award a year ago when he became only the third Filipino to win the World Pool title. While in the midst of his reign as the best 9-ball player in the world, the lanky pool idol added the world 8-ball crown to his collection by beating compatriot Dennis Orcollo in the race-to-11 final at the United Arab Emirates, becoming only the second player in billiards history after Wu Chia Ching of Chinese Taipei to reign as double world champion.

Minoza, Athlete of the Year in 1990 and 1998, rediscovered his deadly swing last year, bagging a second RP Open title to make himself only the 10th two-time winner of Asia’s oldest golf championship.

The 48-year-old pride of Bukidnon also copped the ABC Championship in Japan while finishing a strong second behind champion Mikko Ilonen of Finland in the Indonesia Open of the Asian Tour.

So did the country proud with his exploits in chess and became the country’s youngest grandmaster at 14. Likewise, the high school student became the world’s seventh youngest GM of all time.

The PSA Board led by president Aldrin Cardona of the Tribune is also in the final stage of completing its honorees for major awardees in pro and amateur

basketball, Horse of the Year, Jockey of the Year, the President’s Award, the Tony Siddayao Award, the Most Outstanding NSA and other citations.