NCAA cleans house

The National Collegiate Athletic Association is going to ban cellular phones in light of the case against Paolo Orbeta. The new rule will not only cover players, but referees, as well. They will be prohibited from using mobile phones one hour before, and during games. Cellphones will have to be surrendered to team officials and, in the case of referees, to the NCAA technical committee.

There are quite a few complications in the case of Orbeta, who was apprehended by the NBI Thursday of last week, and supposedly given a lesser charge and was able to negotiate bail. First of all, the entrapment operation only caught the suspects (three of whom were not students of College of St. Benilde), attempting to complete the “transaction” with marked money. No other action was witnessed by any authorities.

Technically, the accusation may be construed as point-shaving, since the alleged wager involved his personal point production and therefore, indirectly, the score of the game. If, for example, a player was required to reach a certain output and hadn’t reached it late in the game, he would then take an unusually high number of attempts at the end of a game, therefore ruining the coach’s game plan. But if, for example, he had scored that number in the first quarter (Orbeta had 19 in the first half of CSB’s first game this season), then the bet would be won without hurting the outcome.

Three years ago, this writer received unverified reports of game-fixing in amateur basketball games, and was given a list of game outcomes and the supposed point spreads. However, the supposed source was not able to pinpoint who on any particular team or league was responsible, and eventually disappeared.

Why will it be difficult to prosecute the case of Orbeta? First of all, the allaged bet was not on the outcome of the game against San Sebastian College. It was on his personal score. And, for a player like Orbeta (who scored 25 points in his first game this season after coming back from injury), 11 points was not a real challenge.

Secondly, the conspirators supposedly lost their first bet on purpose, to bait their mark into gambling a larger amount, which he did not consent to. This is where the coercion and threats came in, which will be easier to prove that Orbeta was involved in, because it necessitated direct contact and specific verbal and non-verbal threats to the victim.

Third, Orbeta did not do anything obviously wrong in his games this year. To exacerbate matters, College of St. Benilde is at the bottom of the standings, although we all know underrated teams can also score big with bettors. However, in this case, the Blazers have really been struggling with their own personality clashes. Most of the time, players suspected of game-fixing play on contenders.

Fourth, it is extremely difficult to prove point-shaving or game-fixing to begin with. You would have to have corroborative testimony from someone inside the operation, and be able to establish a pattern. Since Orbeta did not play last season because of an injury, and his team is - quite frankly - bad this year, a pattern is difficult to discern. And there would be no physical evidence. A bad shot, bad game or bad decision-making on the court could happen to anybody.

Fifth, you will need other bettors or losers to step forward. But who would want to be branded a gambler, and who would want to get involved with an investigation of any kind? Furthermore, who would want to be publicly called a loser? And who would want to be messing with organized crime, to say the least?

At the very least, Paolo Orbeta made a wrong move of being involved with people who do things like this. If proven guilty, at most he will become a pariah in local basketball, and may be relegated to playing in minor provincial leagues or commercial leagues in countries like Indonesia, which accepts Filipino imports regularly. At the end of the day, his actions did not do any good for his reputation, and hurt the NCAA, in and around which many honorable people live and work.

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