A silver in Rio

Every epal and his mother is issuing a statement and posing for pictures, claiming some credit for the Olympic silver medal of weightlifter Hidilyn Diaz. Truly, victory has a thousand fathers.

Some of the epals did play key roles in the passage of laws and implementation of policies supporting sports. As for the rest, if they had done a better job, Diaz might have performed even better and landed a gold rather than silver.

As relatives of Diaz told The STAR the other day, the Zamboanga native was pretty much on her own in her Olympic aspirations. What support she received came mainly from her cousins and friends and, when she began showing promise in competitions, from the private sector.

With efficient sports development, the Philippine team in Rio de Janeiro should also be able to bring home more medals. Vietnam and Thailand bagged golds the other day. Even Afghanistan, embroiled in sustained deadly violence, has won an Olympic gold in previous Games.

Athletic prowess has to be in the Pinoy DNA, or we wouldn’t have produced a Manny Pacquiao.

Perhaps the P5-million cash incentive, house and lot, likely product endorsements, and promotion of Diaz in the Philippine Air Force where she is an airwoman second class will inspire our budding athletes to strive for world-class excellence.

Besides personal determination and discipline, however, young athletes – especially those from humble communities such as Hidilyn Diaz – need a lot of support from the government.

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Pacquiao can make himself useful in the Senate not by taking up causes contrary to his previous advocacies just to ingratiate himself to President Duterte, but by focusing on his forte, sports. The boxing icon knows what budding athletes need and he should sponsor legislation to correct years of mismanagement and neglect in sports development.

Proponents of capital punishment should dissuade Pacquiao from taking up their cause. At the House of Representatives in the 16th Congress, Pacquiao was a disaster for opponents of the Reproductive Health Act, with his rehashed arguments easily crushed by RH proponents led by Edcel Lagman.

This time Pacquiao has swung to the other side, still quoting the Bible as he calls for death by hanging for drug offenders. For sure he can find a biblical passage to reconcile his anti-RH and self-proclaimed pro-life stance with his staunch support for the death penalty.

But Pacquiao will have credibility as a champion of sports development, especially since he himself came from poverty. Surely he’s interested not only in professional sporting competitions, and would want to see Filipinos excel in the Olympics.

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Instead of Filipinos trying in vain to compete in sports where size and height matter, such as basketball, our sports officials should focus on sporting events where body build and competing ranges are specified.

Maybe one day international sports officials will develop categories in basketball where the heights of players are specified, so that shorter players who love the sport will stand a chance. How can we compete with teams whose players are all over seven feet tall?

This has led to the phenomenon of countries having to import players, who end up becoming the stars of their employer’s home team. Whether in amateur or professional sports, our country should be represented as much as possible by athletes who are Philippine passport holders.

If this is not possible, we should support athletes in sports where we have a better chance of winning in a level playing field.

Boxing is such a sport, with Pacquiao the best example. Golf, gymnastics, archery, badminton, table tennis, cycling – you don’t have to be as tall as an NBA player or as long-limbed as an African runner to be a winner in these Olympic sports.

In an archipelago of 7,100 islands, swimming should be a top activity. Filipino athletes should be able to excel in swimming and diving.

And instead of fatally shooting everybody at close range, we can re-channel homicidal tendencies into something positive, training military and police sharpshooters and civilian gun aficionados to win medals in Olympic shooting events.

Then there’s the World Cup. Younger generations of Filipinos are showing interest in soccer, and several schools are supporting it. Perhaps one day a Philippine team will do well in the World Cup.

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If we want athletes who can win in the Olympics, we must start them young. The resources needed can be formidable for aspiring athletes from humble households.

I’ve talked to some of our athletes who competed in previous Olympics, and they said they had to skip school or office work to undergo the rigorous, disciplined training that they knew was indispensable if they wanted to be at the top of their game.

This means less money for the household, and for students, a delay in the timetable for them to start contributing to the family income.

In several countries where winning in international sporting events is a serious matter of national pride, governments provide financial and other forms of assistance not just to the most promising athletes but even to their families.

In our case, the government may not have the kind of resources for that type of assistance. But the government can take charge of scouting for young talent, and then tap the private sector for help in training the athlete.

What’s clear is that we can’t go on with current sports development policies. We have four years to aim for an Olympic gold. The new team in charge of sports development must do a better job.