Mendoza: Gilas victory as sure as 2016 DU30 win

WINNER but not champions.

That’s Gilas Pilipinas in the SEABA Basketball Tournament.

We can never be champs but winners only in a tournament laden with also-rans.

Nothing to crow about.

We can only lose by forfeiting all the games. Absolutely.

It is even absolutely crazy for us to celebrate after the tournament.

Real men don’t do charades.

Even for us to just raise the champion’s trophy could mean we are a bunch of hopeless fools.

In this tournament, we don’t compete; we put on a show.

SEABA is barangay league for Gilas.

In this tournament, we don’t fight to win; we merely report for work, punch the bundy clock and go home.

No job to do. Just show face.

Next, do a French leave? Maybe. But it’s best to say bye to the host aka referee—albeit, secretly—to avoid technicalities.

When we beat Burma by 107 points in our Friday debut, was that an ominous sign we’d tear, rip, the entire field apart?

Of course, not.

That was as totally expected as Digong’s victory at the presidential polls in May last year.

I bet you, the Burmese cagers do not even know the difference between a dribble and a dunk.

So that even if all 12 Gilas players played with one hand each and with one eye closed, they’d still defeat Burma by 106 points.

What happened was, we had looked bizarrely brilliant against Burma, when the truth is Burma made a fallacy of us.

It’s just too bad that unlike boxing, basketball has no rules on knockout.

If someone from Gilas had crowed, beaten his chest, after that 107-point zarzuela, he ought to be shot EJK-style.

To avoid that gobbledygook, why don’t we amend the basketball rule book and make a team ahead by 50 points at the half the winner by knockout?

In every sport, entertainment is the main fare.

The reason we watch games is to have fun. Thrilled by action uncommonly seen in man. That’s how it is since sports was born.

In the ongoing SEABA cagefest, the element of fun is absent. Absolutely.

Thus, Gilas winning it would be a mere statistic in the Fiba books. Absolutely unexciting.

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