THE brave but ultimately failed charge of the Powerade Team Pilipinas in the Fiba-Asia in Tianjin, China, actually confirmed what we've known all along. The Philippines cannot rely on raw talent if it hopes to again excel in the Asian stage in basketball.
The Philippines placed eighth after losing to Korea in its final game yesterday, not much of an improvement from its ninth-place finish in the Fiba Asia championship in Tokushima, Japan, two years ago.
Under the agreement with the Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas, the Philippine Basketball Association now officially relinquishes the reins of representing the country to the Smart-Gilas RP team, which shall henceforth represent the country in future international competitions.
But hold it. National team coach Yeng Guiao has a better idea.
Yeng believes that the PBA should continue representing the country in international competitions. As far as Yeng is concerned, Team Pilipinas now is a much-improved team from what it was two years ago and that disbanding the team and letting Smart Gilas represent the country from now on will mean throwing away all the gains already made.
Yeng believes that the PBA should keep the Team Pilipinas intact and then send it to future international competitions. His position is that if the best RP players could barely hold their own against the Asian powerhouses, then what chances do the youngsters of Smart-Gilas have?
Additionally, Guiao believes, and I have to agree with him on this, that the PBA players will ultimately benefit from sending its best player regularly in international competitions.
Smart Gilas is a laudable effort, but the main problem with this program is continuity.
Even if assuming Smart will be willing to sponsor and carry the national colors indefinitely, what about the players? You can train a group of players for optimum performance, but then after they reach their peak what happens next?
That is the problem with the NCC RP team model. We just saw its success. We never saw what would have followed after that when its best players (Jeff Moore, Chip Engeland, Dennis Still, Allan Caidic, Samboy Lim) got older.
Would the NCC RP team have been able to sustain that level of competitiveness after its players got older, or would we have been back to square one needing to start another cycle starting at the bottom for another 10 years before the next batch of national players are trained and ready for international competition?
The Guiao model will eliminate any transition phase because that national team will always have the best RP players at its disposal.
I like where Yeng is going with this. But being that SBP is controlled by the Smart people and not necessarily the PBA, I hope an agreement will be reached on how the PBA can continue to send teams to represent the country in international competitions.
Reuel Vidal
Manila Standard Today
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Basketball, as it is played in the PBA, calls for one-on-one forays or basic pick-and-roll two man games that focus on the league’s superstars.
International competition shuns isolation plays–the cornerstone of playground basketball–and emphasizes head-on defense, quick ball rotation, multiple layers of screens and player movement, and long-distance bombing.
Iran, in sweeping nine games en route to the championship, had 7-foot-3 center Hamed Ehadadi, a player for the Memphis Grizzlies. But it also has an array of lights-out shooters who never flinched when the going got tough.
With only the certified gunners allowed to shoot from 17 feet out in the PBA, except for one or two teams, the RP team’s big men flailed around in unfamiliar territory in trying to keep pace with opponents as big, if not bigger, who were draining triples like they were free throws.
A call has been made by national coach Yeng Guiao for the PBA to keep an open mind with its initial decision to implement an exit plan after the Tianjin tournament, allowing the newly-formed Samahang Basketbol ng Pilipinas to take over the mantle of forming RP teams for future international tournaments.
But has anybody asked the players, multi-million peso minor deities, who among them is dedicated.
Malaya
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