A Hardball resurrection?

“Think like a creator, not a consumer.” – Graham Stephan

This writer has made a career of pushing the envelope, of creating new ways to view sports. Since 1987, it has been my joy to find television projects that haven’t been done in the country before. That first project was a weekly sports magazine show, the first for ABS-CBN Sports, “Sportsweek,” which later became “Masters of the Games.” These were followed by many others over the years as I kept coming back to the network. In 1998, we created a program for all the commentators of the defunct Metropolitan Basketball Association. Immediately after, we produced the first and only televised stepladder tournament for professional boxers, “Knockout!” That series also unleashed the witty and irreverent Atty. Ed Tolentino upon an unsuspecting Filipino TV audience. Since then, he has been educating and entertaining our TV audiences with his authoritative but humorous observations about international boxing.

In 2002, I made the bold (perhaps foolish) decision to independently produce “The Basketball Show,” the only television program to ever consolidate basketball content in the Philippines. For six and a half years, we sacrificed and endured all the mistakes to deliver a quality weekly magazine show on different television networks. That was my bread and butter. It was, happily, also the first television exposure of my sons Vince and Daniel, who were entering adolescence then. There has been a consistent demand to do it all over again. But the basketball landscape has changed so much since “The Basketball Show” ended in 2008, so we’ll have to navigate the new political landscape first to see how it will go.

Then, in 2006, this writer had a once in a lifetime opportunity to create a daily sports magazine show, one that would change the way people viewed sports in the Philippines. “Hardball” was our unique blend of humor, experience and irreverence. In November of that year, the day after the rematch between Manny Pacquiao and Erik Morales, we launched at 10:30 p.m. on the ABS-CBN News Channel. In its first few years, our replay even became the highest-rating program on Studio 23. Our international audience grew. People on the US West Coast would watch us before going to work. It was the most fun I had ever had at work.

Inevitably, change overcame the show. From being daily, we shrank down to weekly, making it harder for audiences to sustain the habit. From three hosts, we ended up with two: myself and the late Boyet Sison. We outlasted other sports programs ranged against us, broke many stories, defended so many athletes. Still, “Hardball” made its mark, earning three consecutive Gawad Tanglaw Awards for Best Sports Show in its last three years. In 2019, the program was abruptly canceled. In fact, we were even ordered not to say goodbye. I will no longer comment on that.

There has likewise been much clamor for us to revive “Hardball.” Even with Boyet Sison’s untimely passing, viewers long for the good old days of laughter and discussion. It is because of this persistent demand – and in honor of Boyet – that we are studying how (and what form) such a TV show would emerge. At any rate, with old fans’ indulgence, we will figure out how to deliver incisive, thought-provoking and funny conversations about sports, from fresh perspectives.

Boyet would have wanted that. Stay tuned.