POC no longer keen on sending baseball team

Stranded on third base.

The chances of the Philippine men’s baseball team making it to the forthcoming Doha Asian Games remained in the balance yesterday due to the lack of funds.

Ritchie Garcia, deputy chef de mission of the RP contingent, said the failure of baseball officials to raise the funds in time for yesterday’s deadline only lessened the chances of the 22-man team to get to Doha.

Garcia, however, said the official announcement will have to come from Philippine Olympic Committee president Jose Cojuangco and Philippine Sports Commission chairman William Ramirez, also the chef de mission.

Cojuangco, according to baseball president Hector Navasero himself, is no longer keen on sending the baseball team to Doha.

Ramirez, on the other hand, said that for the sake of the athletes, baseball is given until Monday to raise the money.

Baseball officials have earlier promised to raise the P2 million that would take care of the airfare, allowances and uniforms of the team, actually last-minute inclusion to the RP delegation.

But as of Thursday, Navasero only had P300,000 in pledges. He sought the help of the PSC in form of P600,000 pre-approved financial assistance.

Garcia said even if Navasero manages to raise the P900,000, this would only be enough to buy plane tickets for the team. Each plane ticket costs almost P50,000.

"In as much as we wanted the baseball team to make it to Doha, we cannot because we’re also working on a very tight budget of P30 million," said Garcia.

"And we cannot allow them to send a skeleton force. It’s like allowing a basketball team to compete with only seven players just because you don’t have enough money.

"Or even if baseball officials can raise the money to buy tickets, we cannot allow them to go to Doha with no allowances and wear old uniforms. We don’t want them to look bad out there," he added.

With only 33 days before the Asian Games, the PSC is still short of P1 million. Equestrian, headed by Cojuangco, offered to ease some burden for the PSC by raising some money for the equestrian team.

"So, some of the money that was already allotted for equestrian could be spent for the others," said Garcia, adding that ticketing for the entire RP delegation starts on Monday.

Garcia also cited the case of women’s softball team which offered to take the place of men’s baseball since it’s capable of raising the needed funds. — Abac Cordero