Love the game

There is almost nothing that can keep me off the golf course on a beautiful Calatagan morning, with its clear blue skies and fresh clean air. Being such a health fanatic, I relish any opportunity to clean my lungs and restore my peace of mind. However, the other day was an exception.

Watching Agassi and Blake play inspired tennis brought me back in time. I recalled how and why sports was practiced, played and perfected during my day — for the exercise, for the fun of playing with your family or friends but most of all for the pure love of the game.

It’s a given that a certain amount of talent and determination must be present to play tournament tennis. However, there is this wonderful possibility for the potential of a player to be greater than his actual goal. If this is played out in a real match, the game itself is as they say "taken to a higher level" and both player and game begin to "shine." Thus, the final scores are overshadowed by the "higher level" that the game is brought to. I always enjoy watching the Grand Slams because it is here where I get to see this in action.

As I sat glued to the television for a good four and a half hours, I couldn’t help but think of what both Agassi and Blake achieved. It couldn’t have been better said by Agassi after he had just won the match: "…I wasn’t the winner here, tennis was. …It’s about authentic competition, getting out there and having respect for each other’s game, respect for each other’s person, letting it fly and letting it be just about tennis."

To this day, I am still in search of the perfect formula that makes for this ingredient they both displayed during the match. It’s this gallant and inspired attitude that enables the player to regard victory as well as defeat as a mere result of the process.

I can’t help but think it all begins in childhood.

If a child is taught how to play the game for the experience and fun of it rather than for the sake of winning, he is encouraged to know how to stay in the present moment and focus solely on being part of the game. What initially motivates him is the fun of joining the game in whatever capacity or role — be it player, spectator and even scorer. It’s also a perfect scenario to develop the child’s healthy interaction with other children.

Unfortunately, nowadays, it’s a common sight to see parents sign up their young children in tournaments and leagues where you actually see parents get all too motivated about winning.

The child’s main concern is usually simply to participate and just have a good time with his friends.

In other instances, there are trophies to take home for the children who batted the most, or ran the fastest, while the other children receive nothing. All of a sudden, the children are made to realize that there is this "prize" after all for doing something that was for them just about having a good time and joining in the fun.

The longer he is kept at this stage of the game of not worrying about the outcome, playing for the pure love of it actually increases his chances of "letting it fly", and taking his own skill and the game he is playing to the next level.

As children, we are all born with playing simply for the love of the game. You cannot force a child to play a game and play it well if he doesn’t like it. Unfortunately, it is competition and motivation, if improperly handled, that is responsible for extinguishing that which we are born with.

To avoid this, the child’s pure love for playing the game should be nurtured properly by example by his parents.

Later on, the officials of any sport should be responsible for encouraging this love the athlete and they themselves were born with.

All sports officials should love the game of the association they head for what it is and what it can bring to a player in terms of his overall development rather than for what the official can get or make out of it. Failure to do so would make a mockery out of the game and sadly, it is the athlete who pays the price.

When this happens, the official actually kills the love the player had for the game and thus his performance suffers through no fault of his own.

Officials of the association should have no vested interest in running the association. This is how it is done all over the world, except in our country.

There can be nothing worse for an athlete than to feel used by his official for the benefit of the official’s personal affairs and businesses.

Actions such as these are to be held accountable for destroying the essence of sports and its natural capacity to draw out the good in the individual who’s playing it.

Furthermore, it will wreck and distort the values of the athlete and put at risk the ability to nurture his children properly when his time of fatherhood or motherhood arrives.

For what is the role of an effective sports leader or official but to inspire and empower his followers through example and bring to the fore that which is inherently true and good in all of us?

As I headed back to the golf course that afternoon, I remembered my Dad and how he loved to play the game with us. It was always about playing hard, having a great time and the enjoyment of doing something together that we all loved. Perhaps this is what instilled in me and my brothers at a very young age a love of the game — whatever game it was we so happened to be playing. This is probably why I became a sportsman and play the games I play and in the past coached the teams I did.

It was, and still is, never about the winning.

The irony of it all is that it was thinking this way that enabled me to coach my best games and play the best golf I have ever played — and loving every minute of it!

Thus we remember Baron de Coubertin, the father of modern Olympics: "The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not the winning but the taking part. Just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well."