2017 Wishes

We’ll see it often. We’ll all make our wish list for every year: columnists, fans, athletes, officials, managers and others sports enthusiasts. The most common wishes revolve around the need for more sports venues; more sports leagues or competitions and the growth of players and coaches. Surely nothing wrong here. I would love to see a state-of-the-art sports complex similar to the MOA Arena or Araneta Coliseum here in Cebu, albeit a smaller versions fit for our needs. I would also love to see more tournaments for all sports in general and across all age groups. In basketball, we still don’t have a long-wished for commercial league for players fresh from college and who may not make it in Manila. Ditto for all other sports.

 But after making the same New Year’s wishes almost every year, I just realized that this year’s wishes will have to be different. While the wish for venues, games and growth will always be there, I’d like to make a special pitch for more sports heroes to step up for Cebu Sports. This is a call for genuine sportsmen with a big heart for sports to lead the charge in growing Cebu Sports. The irony of Cebu Sports in the advent of social media is that the self-proclaimed experts/analysts love to say anything and everything about what ails our sports scene. Many love to offer criticism, analysis, suggestions and more, but that’s it. They don’t provide solutions or even take part in helping the issues and problems that they just complain about. In short, they’re all talk with no action. They end up being part of the problem instead of being part of the solution. When we all ask for a sports stadium, do we know what this means? Do we really know how much it will cost to put up a sports complex and how it doesn’t end up being a wise business decision or investment? When we ask for more leagues and games for any sport, do we realize that this also entails a lot of resources? We somehow make all these suggestions as if it was as easy as saying our ABCs.

 It’s time to walk the talk and put your money where our mouth is. Let’s all state our concerns, complaints and give our suggestions, but let’s also back this up by helping in solving the problem. Now this is the challenge for 2017. To all those who talked a lot, wrote a lot, complained a lot about sports, this is your chance to show what you can do for Cebu Sports. Join us in doing more than just write, talk or complain. Join us just doing it. If you have the resources, go ahead and contribute to growing a sport by hosting or holding competitions. This could range from weekend pocket tournaments, one-day festivals or long-running leagues. If your resources are thin, you can always partner with existing events/sports organizers to get things done. But as a word of caution, your intentions have to be pure and sincere. You shouldn’t get into sports for the money. There is no business in sports unless you reach the top level such as the NBA, PBA or world-class boxing. Your intentions have to be purely for the love of sports and the wish for sports to grow. As a matter of fact, expect to shell out some of your hard-earned money just to get things started or when things get tight (because they will). Are you up to it?

 Another way to walk the talk is by supporting a sports club. Now this is a notch heavier in terms of resources. Sponsoring a sports club will mean funding its basic needs such as salaries for coaches, equipment, uniforms and venue rental (unless you already own a sports complex). You may also have to fund the games and competitions that your club may join. What do you get in exchange financially? Nothing at all. You get to have your product or company as the name of the club and hope this helps in building your brand.

 Another path is for private companies or citizens to help fund sports competitions or clubs. There is a  branding opportunity in organizing sports events under a product or corporate name with the hope that this also helps build one’s brand which will obviously have to be related to sports. The key here is to partner with legitimate and respected sports events organizers who have the track record of staging or managing tournaments. After all, one doesn’t want one’s brand to be identified with a tournament that isn’t managed well and runs into more problems than success stories. We’ve heard of tournaments that have a great start but don’t have an ending, haven’t we?

 So I hope you’ve made a decision. I hope you just don’t complain and rant over social media about or sports situation. I hope you also join the band of unsung heroes who are working their butts off to grow Cebu Sports. Let’s do this; and it will surely be a happy new year.