YOU are rebuked for a mischief so cheap it amounts to reputation damage.
And, in the process, you get suspended one game for a misdeed so deemed childish it smacks of stupidity.
That is Aldin Ayo for you.
Suddenly, the much-revered coach is in the news again. But this time, for the wrong reasons.
For not liking a referee’s call, Ayo grabbed the eyeglasses of his assistant coach, chased the whistle-blower and tried to stick the lens on the poor umpire.
Hey, what was that?
The height of madness. Simply shocking.
Before Ayo got himself thrown out for that thoroughly unprofessional demeanor—coming from a celebrated coach at that—he had hogged headlines as the hottest tactician in college/university basketball.
Flashback: Ayo stunningly steered Letran to the 2015 NCAA championship, a feat so magnificent it became a magnet for La Salle bigwigs to lure him to coach the Archers this year.
If his Letran salary was tripled, quadrupled, to make him accept the La Salle coaching job was none of our business.
Accepting it was for his own good—both coaching-wise and, yes, financially. Let’s applaud. One doesn’t get chances like that in a lifetime.
La Salle, having super backers like Danding Cojuangco and Ramon S. Ang, has a tradition of cornering only the best that is why it has this enviable tradition of winning crowns as often as Digong laces his speeches with expletives.
Ayo’s quick hop into the rival UAAP backyard became grist for sports headlines for days. It was Cloud 9 stuff for La Salle.
Ayo would not disappoint.
He torpedoed six foes in succession virtually in cold blood. Only that in his last outing (his sixth), Ayo got into that eyeglasses glitch in La Salle’s 84-78 win over University of the East to hand UE an awful 0-6 card.
Yes, Ayo got thrown out and the ejection went with a one-game suspension. Costly. Ayo couldn’t coach in the expectedly blockbuster Ateneo-La Salle game tomorrow (Sunday).
What a shame.
La Salle has appealed. What for? Ayo’s infraction was as clear as De Lima’s outburst last Wednesday. It deserves punishment.
And so, not for anything but if I were La Salle, I would even indict Ayo further. Such indiscretion by a well-paid personnel, done in public at that, has no place in a school steeped in honor and dignity.
(alsol47@yahoo.com)