Imports and naturalization

Now that college basketball season is over, many schools are surreptitiously searching for foreign players to shore up their bids for glory in men’s basketball. The exception is fast becoming the trend, particularly given the success of San Beda College in the last three years.

The only restrictions on foreign citizens playing in the major Philippine college leagues are that they pass the entrance test, can only play one at a time (with a maximum of two per team), and must be below 25 years of age. All except the playing time rule are also applicable to local players.

The Philippines is actually at the crossroads of this major development in basketball. On one hand, the country is considering naturalizing at least one seven-foot center for the next Philippine national team. On the other, we are a main source of imports playing in Southeast Asia.

Vietnam is the latest country to pull in talent from the Philippines.

Aside from former Cebuana Lhuillier assistant Ricky Magallanes coaching one major city team, the young men’s team and the national men’s team, the country’s National Basketball Championship has been reported to now allow foreign players like former UST forward Allan Evangelista to reinforce teams in the league. The Vietnam Basketball Federation (VBF) will now allow up to four foreign players per team, and all four may play at any given time.

Vietnam has also said it will not send a team to the coming SEA Games basketball competition, because the talent level remains low, and sponsors have been reluctant to come in.

In January, organizers of the Indonesian Basketball League announced that they would consider letting professional sports promoters run their league, In past tournaments, IBL teams have each had one Filipino import, including the likes of former Ginebra forward Estong Ballesteros and former Perpetual Help Daltas shooter Noy Javier.

Thailand, our perennial rivals in Southeast Asian competition, has already been scouting for taller Thai players around the world. In June, seven-foot Brian Sigafoos, who played for Harvard until 2003, supposedly asked if he could suit up for Thailand. Sigafoos, a veteran of Europe’s pro leagues, was born in Bangkok in 1981. His parents lived there for five years.

Malaysia, once reluctant to engage the services of foreigners, has followed in the footsteps of SIngapore and brought in mainland Chinese to strengthen its men’s basketball team. However, sponsors have been adamant about having only Malay players, so the issue has not fully been settled yet.

There have been unconfirmed reports that at least one university in the Philippines is studying the possibility of having two tall Chinese play for its school, a perennial doormat in their league.

The Philippines may need at least one foreign player at center for its upcoming international campaigns. But since we have been so far ahead of our Southeast Asian counterparts, we haven’t needed to do that at this level. However, our neighbors are now hiring outsiders to get on equal footing with us. It appears that we need foreign talent to go to the next level.