Tab Baldwin: I failed as leader, coach, friend

Tab Baldwin

Tab Baldwin appeared in an eight-minute video—his first public engagement since the Ateneo training tragedy that claimed the lives of two of his basketball players—not looking as the fiery coach that he is but one showing remorse and asking forgiveness.

It was the long-awaited appearance that many sought since the drowning deaths of Rene Baterbonia and Divine Adili have become a national issue, and Baldwin was straightforward in the video uploaded by Ateneo by saying: “I failed.”

READ: DOJ: NBI to also probe death of Ateneo athletes

“I failed as a leader. I felt I had failed as a coach. I certainly felt like I had failed as a friend to Divine and Rene,” said Baldwin, breaking down. “When later, I faced the team to try to be a leader in that moment, I felt that I failed them (rest of the team), too.”

‘Deeply sorry’

He took his time apologizing to the families of Baterbonia, Adili and the Ateneo community.

“I’m so deeply sorry. I’m so deeply sorry to not just the families, but everybody that feels let down, somehow betrayed,” he said. “I pray that we all find some pathway forward to come back to hope for the future, love for one another, and forgiveness for those of us who failed and tried so desperately hard to reach a better outcome.”

READ: Tab Baldwin’s silence after players’ deaths an Ateneo decision

The video of Baldwin’s statement came at a time when he and team manager Epok Quimpo were put “on leave” by Ateneo, which had held a vigil for the two players the night before and where Baldwin made an appearance.

“I experienced the descent into the darkest place imaginable,” Baldwin said, recalling the incident as it unfolded. “And yet I knew at the same time that good people, people that had done an amazing job raising these two young men, were going to be in an even darker, more horrible place.”

Calls for Baldwin’s resignation and even a hold-departure order have come in the wake of the tragedy as government agencies have gone deep investigating the matter.

“To the depth of my being, I am sorry,” he said in the video. “I continue to beseech everybody that cared for, loves, loved, Rene and Divine, and their families, please keep praying.

“Never again would Rene’s mother and father and family, never again would Divine’s family be able to talk to their son or touch their son,” Baldwin said, breaking down again.

“Yes, as a coach, I lost my boys too,” he said. “Never again would I be able to help them develop into the basketball player they wanted to be, to help them grow into the young man that they promised that they could be.”

Two days earlier, UAAP executive director Atty. Rebo Saguisag said that the league will wait for all evidence before determining any action to be taken with regard to Baldwin and the rest of the Blue Eagles’ coaching staff coaching staff in connection with the incident.

“We go where the evidence leads. We are now in the process of gathering information and awaiting official reports that are being prepared,” Saguisag had said on Wednesday.

“What can we possibly do? We have no experts here, Ateneo’s not here yet, either,” he said. “We can’t pass judgment this early. Not to trivialize what happened but, again, due process states that everyone should be heard.”