PHILIPPINE BASKETBALL IS IN A STATE of distress. A win-win solution to the misunderstanding between the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas and the Basketball Association of the Philippines is unlikely because their top officials are always locked in conflict.
?The basketball arena is being pulled from so many directions by so many disparate interests, however good-intentioned,? once said Cebu Rep. Eduardo Gullas, a basketball diehard.
Voted Coach of the Year in 1957 by the Philippine Sportswriters Association, Gullas piloted the unheralded University of the Visayas to the national intercollegiate championship, upsetting favorite Ateneo in the title match.
Said he: ?So many want the best for the sport, but certainly, not those who wish the best will be able to do what is best for the sport.? Basketball leaders should stop bickering, Gullas added.
Obviously, Gullas? words of wisdom have fallen on deaf ears. Why did I say that?
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Allow me to illustrate. Just recently, SBP vice chair Ricky Vargas and BAP president Prospero ?Butch? Pichay exchanged opposing views on whether the SBP should attend a special commission meeting called by the International Basketball Federation (Fiba) in Geneva, Switzerland, on July 20 to 22.
The SBP had earlier announced plans to boycott the meeting, but reportedly changed its mind and agreed to attend the session, which is aimed at threshing out local basketball problems.
Pichay had cautioned that a snub could put the country at risk of another Fiba suspension. ?If they (SBP officials) don?t attend the meeting, we may indeed be suspended, he said.?
But Vargas said: ?I?m confident we will not be suspended.?
Citing the SBP?s track record in the past two years, Vargas, who represents Talk ?N Text in the PBA board, said Fiba should look into how well the SBP handled local basketball affairs.
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Still, the Fiba has a long history of suspending the Philippines from competing in tournaments under its aegis.
It first suspended the Philippines in 1962, when the national government, under then President Diosdado Macapagal, refused to grant entry visas to the players and officials from Yugoslavia, a socialist country and a bona fide member of the Fiba.
As a result of this political blunder, the Philippines lost the right to host the Fourth World Basketball Championship. Then BAP president Ambrosio Padilla, who later became a senator, and secretary general Dionisio ?Chito? Calvo, hurriedly flew to Fiba headquarters in Munich, Germany, in a bid to save the championship.
But the best they could get was a permission to stage an invitational tournament. The Fiba also excluded the country from the next world championship and imposed a fine of $2,000 on the BAP.
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On June 30, 2005 when former Sen. Jose Lina was the BAP president, Fiba again suspended the Philippines. The BAP was expelled by the Philippine Olympic Committee and bestowed recognition on the newly organized Pilipinas Basketball, which later evolved into the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas.
The suspension cost the Philippines participation in three international tournaments, namely, the 2006 Doha Asian Games, the Fiba Asia Men?s Championship and the Southeast Asian Games, where the Filipinos had been perennial champions since 1987.
