Pulling For Team Pilipinas
I haven’t been vocal about my support for the Philippines’ Basketball Team, but I think it’s high time that we all unite as one nation under Team Pilipinas. I had my reservations because there were players in the line-up who had questionable citizenship (i.e. Taulava and Pennisi) and that casts a shadow of doubt in the legitimacy of whatever the team will achieve. This can be big - at stake are slots in the Beijing Olympics!
Ok, I just contradicted myself in two consecutive sentences, but that’s exactly how I feel. I have very conflicting feelings regarding how we’ve formed our team and how dependent we are on foreign-bred and internationally-trained talents.
To put this into perspective, look at the line-up:
 Questionable Citizenship
- Asi Taulava - deported a few years ago by the DFA
- Mick Pennisi
Fil-American (one Filipino parent)
- Tony dela Cruz
- Jayjay Helterbrand
- Eric Menk
- Gabe Norwood - just got his passport this week
- Danny Seigle
- Kelly Williams
Filipino who grew up in the US
- Jimmy Alapag
- Mark Caguioa
Filipinos who grew up here
- Ranidel de Ocampo
- Dondon Hontiveros
- Â Kerby Raymundo
- Renren Ritualo
- James Yap
Tell me that didn’t depress you a bit.
Anyway, we’ll be facing Jordan, China and Iran in the preliminaries so go wish them luck. We have to finish in the top two of our group to advance to the next phase.
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I like to think of it in a positive light…this means the Filipino gene pool is expanding. We’re everywhere and we’re reproducing. Haha.
Believe it or not, I do watch PBA sometimes. Not for the eye candy though, kung eye candy lang e sa UAAP na lang ako manonood noh!
Anyway, I do think they have the potential to go far. I’ve seen them play and mas magaling sila sa previous batches. I thought Alapag is pure-bred and trained Filipino, hindi pala. LOL.
i was kinda depressed about it, but not for long. come to think of it–the Filipino is global. the statistics might have changed by now, but months ago, i read that 10% of filipinos are abroad, and that is the legal count (meaning 8 million plus). consider those who are not documented, then it means there are more than 8 million! will you be surprised then to find the talented filipinos all over the world? they may have either been born abroad or grown abroad, but still THEY ARE FILIPINOS BY HEART. mabuhay ang PINOY!
Aside from those two with questionable citizenship, I actually like the line-up. Umaasa talaga ko ng magandang resulta.
Di ba pure-pinoy si Jayjay Helterbrand? I thought he is of filipino parents, tapos adopted by an American father, so he grew up in the states? Parang nabasa ko yun sa PEX dati.