CONGRATULATIONS to marathoner Mary Joy Tabal for winning the country’s first of hopefully many gold medals at the 29th South East Asian Games in Kuala Lumpur, which started over the weekend.
Tabal clocked two hours, 48 minutes and 26 seconds, beating Natthaya Thanaronnwat (2:58:17) of Thailand and Hoang Thi Tanh (2:55:53) of Vietnam.
There were a lot of circumstances and controversies bordering from the exclusion to the eventual inclusion of Tabal in the national team two months before the Games.
To those who were on the outside looking in, it’ll seem like politics once again reared its ugly head. This is because of a difference of awareness and lack of facts. Before jumping to conclusions about Tabal’s exclusion and inclusion, let’s get our facts straight, research and get information from all sides of the story.
Tabal’s case is an example of good things happen when one complies and follows instructions. The Philippine Athletics Track and Field Association (Patafa) was walking on egg shells—damned if you do, damned if you don’t. If Tabal was reinstated despite noncompliance, then the Patafa officials would’ve been accused of giving her preferential and special treatment and it would set a bad precedent for future God forbid similar cases with national athletes who refuse to comply with national sports association regulations.
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GILAS Pilipinas finished seventh in the recently concluded International Basketball Federation Asia Cup in Beirut.
After sweeping Group B, we were completely outclassed and outcoached by the Koreans, 118-86, then to add salt to an inflicted wound, we lost to Lebanon, 106-87.
I’m not an armchair basketball analyst and I’m not about to start or claim to be one but I noticed we did not make any defensive adjustment in the Korea game. We stuck to man to man all throughout. Our guards were going under screens instead of over despite the already unconscious shooting of the Koreans.
The Koreans took the Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) coaching staff and players to school on running a pick and roll to death. They gave us a clinic on running a pick and roll—Jerry Sloan, Karl Malone and John Stockton ran it to perfection in the almost 15 years that they worked together for the Utah Jazz. They’d be proud of how Coach Hur Jae and his boys kept going to it because we didn’t do squat to at least slow it down.
We stubbornly kept sticking to the dribble drive offense despite the play being well scouted already. No adjustments both offensively and defensively. No variety on offense and defense to keep the Koreans off balanced.
Why didn’t we try pressing and trapping to get them off their rythym? Why not throw a 3-2 zone defense at them? Why not a 1-2-2 zone or zone press? These professionals picked the wrong game to take a night off.
Why not even a diamond and 1 defense or a box and 1 just to throw these guys off? When you’re down by 24 entering the fourth quarter, you should be at least willing to try anything to get back into the ballgame right?
Our guys decided to dish out cheap shots in the fourth quarter with the game already decided, cheap shots in the form of two unsportsmanlike fouls.
A 15 to 30 day practice session isn’t going to get it done, 15 to 30 week practices probably will. The PBA needs to adjust its schedule. There has to be a farther foresight to plan for the future.