Inquirer awards event honors ‘top talkers’

There were very few sports events during the pandemic, and the one thing that carried stories in the Inquirer’s sports section was the interviews with athletes and other sports personalities.

The best of these interviews will be honored when the Inquirer Sports Awards (ISA) hands out the Quote of the Year trophy on Feb. 11.

The ISA will be broadcast at 3 p.m. over Inquirer.net’s Facebook account.

Apart from honoring the best interview, the ISA will also hand out a humanitarian award to an athlete who went beyond the call of duty to help those in need during the pandemic.

Among the nominees for the Quote of the Year are boxer John Riel Casimero, Barangay Ginebra coach Tim Cone, Phoenix coach Topex Robinson and karate star Jamie Lim.

“The people’s voice, it’s a cry for help. It should be heard, not silenced,” Lim, a Southeast Asian Games gold medalist, told the Inquirer in a special feature on athletes being active in sociopolitical causes.

“And 20 to 30 years from now, maybe when they look back and they say, ‘You know that bubble championship?’ They’ll remember our team because we had the most unique championship in the history of the PBA (Philippine Basketball Association). It’s really cool,” said Cone after steering the Gin Kings to the Philippine Cup inside a bio-secure environment.

“I can’t think of anything to improve my game; only my English needs improvement,” cracked Casimero in a press conference last year.

“Yeah, mile markers are important. But we’re here to play the infinite game,” said the oft-philosophical Robinson.

Interviewing these personalities helped sports writers at a time when there was very little events as nothing beats hearing, or in this case reading, things straight from the horse’s mouth.

There were other quotes also considered, including nuggets from Rain or Shine mentor Caloy Garcia, who outed big man Beau Belga’s stress eating habit to reflective responses from the likes of PBA standouts Matthew Wright and Bobby Ray Parks Jr.