THIS made me laugh—and cringe.
It’s right down the alley of “Ripley’s Believe It or Not?”
So, class, listen up.
CJ Perez was barred from playing Game 1 on Tuesday (Nov. 6) of the NCAA best-of-three Finals between Lyceum and San Beda. Isn’t he Lyceum’s top gunner?
Perez also happens to be the NCAA’s No. 1 shooter, averaging 18.7 points a game. Both his 3.3 steals and 8.4 rebounds an outing are league tops, too.
With him virtually nailed helplessly to the bench in the Finals’ opener, Perez, in sheer agony, watched San Beda bamboozle Lyceum 73-60. With his 18.7 points per game output, who knows? Perez might have transformed that 13-point loss into a five-point win for Lyceum the challenger.
And why again was Perez canned? The NCAA ManCom (Management Committee) found him breaking a rule when he didn’t inform officials he’d join the next PBA Draft.
Was that miscue severe enough as to cause the league’s fold-up?
For the ManCom to ban Perez from seeing action right in the very first game of the Finals was beyond logic. That verdict essentially allowed the ManCom to hand Game 1 to San Beda on a silver platter.
If the punishment did not make San Beda a winner, it could have even meant goodbye to Boyet Fernandez’s coaching career.
Too brutally unfair it was that it also defied all forms of justice.
It is worse than seeing Lyceum suffer a 50-percent decline in enrolment in the next schoolyear.
But if you think Perez’s championship-threatening penalty was idiotic enough, what about this?
Lyceum coach Topex Robinson is in hot water, too.
That’s because he criticized Perez’s suspension, which naturally triggered his Pirates’ defeat that even a kindergarten cannot deny. A natural reaction by a human being hurt by pure nonsense.
I don’t know if I’d cry or laugh because his punishment will come only after the championship.
Meaning, Topex can coach Lyceum in Game 2 Monday (Nov. 12) and, if necessary, in Game 3, too. Why was Perez denied the same concession—postpone his suspension?
Is Robinson special to the Frank Gusi-headed ManCom but not Perez?
Talk about idiocy in its supreme irony.