The Philippines threw a sick-man’s punch at the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) with its withdrawal from the Asian Games basketball championship slated in Indonesia in August.
The blow, utterly foul, has no place in a sports conclave reliant on noble Olympic ideals.
The withdrawal by the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas (ruling basketball body in the Philippines) was wholly abnormal; it was at first thought to be fake news.
It was senseless, equal to sacrilege in a country where basketball has been played and practiced like religion.
Coming on the heels of the basketball brawl inside the vast Philippine Arena involving the national teams of Australia and the Philippines, the withdrawal further tarnished the image of the country in the sporting world.
Unfortunately, the Phillippine Olympic Committee (POC), under neophyte president Ricky Vargas, has played it lame and helpless, to the point of saying the dirty pullout would prove beneficial to the development of basketball in the Philippines.
Pardon please, but SBP has no sensible national basketball development program in place. Its biggest efforts have been concentrated on the basketball World Cup which it will host in 2023.
Let’s all pray for the SBP to find a way to cure itself, and save poor Philippine basketball from total decay.
Baseball begs for Asiad stint:
“To concerned officials of Philippine Sports Commission, Philippine Olympic Committee and Philippine Amateur Baseball Association:
Our National Baseball Team has proven its readiness to face the much tougher challenge of the Asian Games by upending its counterparts in the East Asia Cup held recently in Hong Kong. The team earned the right to represent the country in Asian Baseball Championship technically due to this achievement. The team may not be 100 percent ready to beat teams like Japan, Korea and Taiwan or even China but definitely it is ready to give these Asian baseball giants a challenge if we send them to Indonesia this August.
Baseball is substantially a skill-based sport and the best way to gauge a team’s total ability is by making it cross bats with the best so we can continue assessing our players’ talent and team chemistry.
This is coach Roselito M. Bernardo, appealing, in behalf of our National Baseball Team, that we participate in the upcoming Asian Games 2018. This tournament will surely boost our competitiveness for the Southeast Asian Games which our country will host in 2019 and the Asian Baseball Championship also in 2019. It is inspiring to note here that being in these tournaments we take a shot—at least a shot—to be in the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.
We cannot even think nor dream of winning if we do not participate.”