The Philippine Open: Distraction or destination?

SACRAMENTO—The party’s been calendared for a while, the venue prepared for the big dance. Invitations were sent out ahead of time, with great expectations of a blue-ribbon turnout.
Meantime, the RSVPs are trickling in. And what do you know? A high-profile guest expected to spark excitement at the gala is not coming at all.
Juvic Pagunsan, the Asia Tour’s reigning Order of Merit champion has sent word he will be a no-show for golf’s grandest local soiree—the Philippine Open at the Wack Wack Golf and Country Club in Mandaluyong.
The region’s best golfer is bailing out to play in the $2.5 million Omega Dubai Desert Classic. The more prestigious, more lucrative stop of the European tour is scheduled on the same dates—Feb. 9 to 12—as the Open, Asia’s oldest and longest running golf championship first held in 1913.
Picking Dubai over Mandaluyong was said to be a no-brainer for Juvic. There was no public agonizing on his part either, whether to show up at all in the ICSTI-sponsored $300,000 tournament.
Is Juvic’s choice to snub the Open infuriating? Not by a long shot, says Jun Arceo, secretary general of the National Golf Association of the Philippines in an e-mail swap with me last Monday.
Pagunsan has proven himself to be the best golfer in Asia, Arceo gushes. “He needs to chart new territories. What would be a better way than to compete on the European Tour.”
“The NGAP throws its full support behind Juvic’s decision,” says Arceo. “His success will also be the country’s success. That’s the bigger picture.”
In a nutshell, Arceo was saying that in present-day golf campaigns, opportunity trumps loyalties and friendships anytime.
Arceo hinted that Pagunsan’s pick between his show of patriotism and gratitude and his shot at a win on the European circuit is not lost on national golf officials and supporters, ostensibly including the sport’s benevolent godfather and Juvic’s sponsor, who let the golfer make up his own mind. They are aware of the fact that Juvic is one major victory away from the prestigious US PGA Tour.
Organizers also trumpet that at the Open, a slew of Filipino standouts will be ready to face a foreign field of “tested champions” coming to match what American Berry Benson pulled off last year—keep the title away from local golfers.
But on the third year of the flagging tournament’s return to the Asian circuit, Juvic’s absence becomes a big blow. It is a brutal reminder that the granddaddy of all Asian golf championships has lost its allure, has tumbled in standing even in the eyes of homegrown phenoms. It is a stinging measure of how the storied Philippine Open has become a distraction, not a destination for top-flight touring pros.
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There are images from childhood that will always be on my mind.
Those pleasant memories include that of my grandfather on the porch of our ancestral house in Cuyapo, Nueva Ecija, as he received distinguished-looking men who respectfully took his hand and touched it on their foreheads for the time-honored ritual of “Mano Po.”
“Who are these gentlemen?” I often asked my mom during those wonder years. She would tick off their names and status often with a caveat. “These are people your lolo helped out, morally and sometimes financially when the chips were down.”
“They always come to pay their respects,” mother would say. “They always return to Cuyapo whenever they can to see how far they have gone.”