MOST views regarding how bad the officiating was during the finals of 2015 FIBA Asian Cup between Gilas Pilipinas and China are valid. While we are reasonably aghast at the despicable degree of partiality in an international tournament of such caliber, is it possible that we can admit that in a way, Gilas Pilipinas was not strong enough to overcome the hump despite the odds added to the obvious strengths of the China’s national team.
In this FIBA championship in Changsha, China, led by MVP Yi Jianlian, entered the finals with a spotless record. Yi, 7 foot tall, saw action in the NBA when he was drafted by the Milwaukee Bucks. From 2008 to 2012, he was traded to the New Jersey Nets, Washington Wizards and Dallas Mavericks and now plays for the Guandong Southern Tigers. In the NBA, he sports a lifetime average of 7.9 points per game (ppg) and 4.9 rebounds per game (rpg). In the Chinese Basketball Association, his averages were 18.3 ppg and 9.2 rpg. Entering the FIBA finals, Yi had averaged 16.7 ppg and 8.8 rpg while there were three other players hovering above seven feet alternately pitted against Gilas’ bona fide center. For huffing and puffing 7 foot Blatche who was visibly short of being conditioned to a tee, playing against four centers of the same height was literally a tall order. Whatever competitive advantages the planners of Philippine basketball had seen in naturalizing Blatche had evaporated. Despite his NBA pedigree, his productivity and efficiency was effectively neutralized. That’s just the way the game of basketball is played.
On the other hand, were we so vain to believe that international sport is immune from the practice of partiality? This is not to say there aren’t games fairly called. The heavens would cheer that man would desist from making one-sided calls on earth but the fact is the earth has become a battleground of darkness and light. Have we forgotten the Pacquiao-Mayweather controversy? Did the Philippine national basketball team forget that in the backdrop, there is the raging and ongoing dispute of ownership between the Philippines and China concerning a number of islands in the West Philippine Sea? And in this patent occupation by China’s military force, impartiality was never a consideration.
Did we really expect the Maoists to give coach Tab Baldwin’s brilliant basketball mind an opportunity to put them to shame and offset their advantages? From this humble column I would find it a sorry sight that a brilliant corporate strategist as MVP and his team would not account for this possibility. In the local BBEAL, one coach (I knew) had considered that because of former bonds of friendships and familiarity between the opposing coach and the umpires, there was always the possibility that a slim winning margin could be reversed by a series of controversial judgment calls. Hence, he conditioned his wards to play passionately and put the game beyond the reach of an arbiter’s controversial decision.
I am however sure that the national team’s managers had an inkling that this could be coming but their guts were torn between hope and fact. Hope is a powerful force.
In this case, there was a shared hope that the mystical puso hyperbole would slay the giant Goliath as the biblical David did, stain China’s perfect record in the FIBA, and bring about untold dividends to Philippine basketball. Ultimately, puso would receive vindication. On the other hand, the fact was daunting. In pitting strength with strength between personnel on the floor, theirs and ours, there were not enough human resources, weapons and gadgets in the Philippine arsenal which could objectively decimate China’s clear, distinct and stratospheric advantages. Blatche was merely singular against China’s four flagpoles. And the strategy appeared to have been that in order to slay the Chinese dragon, the long tom would be the three pronged spear - Jason Castro, Terence Romeo and Dondon Hontiveros. It was a decent and noble attempt to play small ball basketball except that the local counterparts of Curry, Thompson and Barnes lost their touch and consistency. There is sadness in failure of execution but it happens to the best of us. The least that can be done is to return to the drawing board and redefine the facts no longer from our cherished position of a former Asian basketball power but from a global perspective. We should begin with the undeniable premise that the sleeping giant has awakened.
Again, where to Philippine basketball?
Perhaps, there is after all some merit to the “pusofication” of Philippine basketball not ala Chot Reyes but ala coach Tab Baldwin. Many deify athletes and put too much value on egghead ball huggers. In case Philippine sports missed it, this column reminds that the old paradigm of mere star power has faded unexplainably. In this time, bench strategists at the helm are as valuable and prized as talent on the hard court or the field. With them and in their own right as Greg Popovich of the Spurs and Steve Kerr of the Warriors, teams under their direction have outplayed and humbled many star-studded squads. The coach has become the difference. We may not give coach Tab Baldwin enough credit but the gentleman has done the most wonderful job in harnessing the “rarara” puso energy into something concretely productive and strategic and the silver albeit short of the desired glory shined brighter this year because of coach Tab.
I sincerely hope Philippine basketball’s ears and purse are open.