Cone apologizes for Baltazar remarks

MANILA, Philippines -- Newly installed Gilas Pilipinas head coach Tim Cone apologized to Justine Baltazar and Governor Delta Pineda for his supposed "hasty remarks" about the big man's interest in joining the Philippine team.

Earlier in the week, Cone said that they have been trying to get the 6-foot-9 Baltazar "forever," but he "never is available."

This was debunked by Baltazar and Pineda, who said no one contacted them.

Cone, in a series of posts on X (formerly Twitter) Saturday, said that he "did not mean to infer that Baltazar did not want to play for Gilas."

I don't want to start off this journey with a controversy, so I'm going to do my best to clarify it. I apologize to Justine Baltazar for my hasty remarks regarding his exclusion from the World Cup pool. I did not mean to infer that he didn't want to play for Gilas, but rather..

— Tim Cone (@manilacone) September 9, 2023

"Rather, I was told that we (someone from the SBP -- not sure who) called him or his representatives and he was not available," the multi-time PBA champion coach said.

"We really wanted him at the time because Kai [Sotto] was a question mark and we were lacking bigs. Now whether he had reasons for not joining us, or if there was miscommunication or whether he was actually not called at all, I do not know because I was not part of the process to contact him, and I spoke out of order in the press conference," he added.

He reiterated that he has not met Baltazar and Pineda in the past.

"To both, I apologize. It was not my intention to run Justine's name through this controversy," Cone said.

"In fact, I wanted to mention at the time of the press conference how much we had thought of him joining the pool. The kid can play!" he added.

Earlier in the day, Cone said that he wouldn't mind inviting Baltazar, but the issue was "he does not know him."

In an interview aired over Noli Eala's Power and Play Saturday morning, the American coach bared that the last time he saw Baltazar play was back in the big man's collegiate days with La Salle.

"We are gonna go with guys who are familiar to us at this point. If we had a pool and we could bring him in and take a look at him, then fine that would be great," Cone reiterated.

"But, at this point, if I had more time, yes we would invite him," he added.

Currently, there are four shoo-ins for the Gilas roster in this year's Asian Games, which will start later this month.

These are big men June Mar Fajardo and Japeth Aguilar, guard Scottie Thompson and naturalized forward Justin Brownlee.