Maintenance medication to cure PH basketball?

HE WAS not hired to be an apologist but former PBA commissioner Sonny Barrios had no choice but explain and provide a more savory tag for the Smart Gilas national squad misadventure in the Fiba Asia Champions Cup.
Smart Gilas was described in this column as an overspending, underachieving national squad.
No, Barrios said, it’s in fact a tough, hardworking team.
The team did not meet its assigned goal and finished out of the medal.
They did a creditable performance, Barrios countered.
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Of course, Barrios, now working as executive director of the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas, need not be reminded that coach Rajko Toroman had himself expressed disappointment over the national team.
First, Toroman rued the team’s atrocious outside shooting in a decisive semifinal match.
But what visibly took Toroman’s goat was the poor, spiritless stand by the team in the battle for the bronze against the Qatari team.
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We had hoped Barrios would be able to use the failed national team games as diagnosis of its ills and weaknesses.
“We must not forget that the Champions Cup was a very tough tournament,” he explained. “Other squads were allowed to field two foreign reinforcements each.”
The truth, added Barrios, is that preparations for the London Olympic qualifying tournament are not yet over.
There will be succeeding stints for Smart Gilas, like the Southeast Asia Basketball Association (Seaba) championship next month, to be followed by more foreign trips to Portugal, Turkey, Taipei for the Jones Cup, and three pocket tournaments in China.
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Ironically, there’s now the threat, hopefully distant, of Smart Gilas members being lured to join this year’s PBA Rookie Draft.
But what stands out is the urgent need for a cure to all the glaring basketball ills hereabouts.
True enough, Barrios ticked off a series of moves, like meeting with regional heads during the SBP congress next week, “to explore areas of interest in nationwide grassroots program.”
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Unfortunately, it could not be determined if they would also do something to provide cures and correct improper basketball basics and practices.
You see, you need not go far and attend pro league road shows to see how much Philippine basketball has deteriorated.
One trip to the village sandlot, where summer leaguers never fail to clamor for flashy outfits before bothering to correct flawed basics, would show how basketball here, utterly popular as it is, has rapidly gone to the dogs.
In fact, there’s a credible non-profit group offering to provide cures to these basketball ills.
However, the ruling SBP, with Barrios explaining, appears convinced they could swing it and reach the London Olympics riding on luck and borrowed maintenance medication.