Will Swimming Bring Olympic Medals for the Philippines?

Overheard at a conversation: “The Philippines has a chance to win Olympic medals from swimming”

While I am not a supporter of Olympics, I occasionally do patronize the competition (when there is nothing to do).

Does the Philippines have a chance on swimming? I doubt so.

Why? Because like basketball, swimming is a sport which favors height.

To give examples of the recent Olympic Gold medalists:

US Michael Phelps 1.93 meters, 6 feet 4 inches

US Ryan Lochte 1.8 m, 6’2

China’s Sun Yang 1.98 m, 6’6

China’s controversial female Ye Shiwen 1.72 m, 5’8

US Missy Franklin 1.85 m, 6’1

Reason?

From BBC Sports Academy:

Because of the standing start, taller swimmers can often cover a greater distance before they've even entered the pool, meaning less work to do once they're in. This is particularly important in sprint events.

They can also cover a greater distance per stroke, and turn and finish with an outstretched hand.

From the New York Times:

Tall swimmers also have another advantage: because swimmers are horizontal in the water, their long bodies give them an automatic edge. “It’s the difference between long canoes and short canoes,” Dr. Joyner said.

But height may not be everything as other physical traits also contributes, this would be dependent on the swimming stroke, particularly for breaststroke and butterfly and even in women's freestyle and backstroke events.

Again BBC.

Key characteristics
Whatever your stroke, there are certain characteristics that make the body better suited to swimming:

• Wide shoulders
• Slim hips
• Large hands and feet
• Large arm girth
• High arm span to height ratio

The average height of Filipinos is 5’4 for male and 4’11 for female (disabled-world.com). I doubt if Filipinos have the other stated key physical features required for swimming to compensate for the height deficiency.

Nevertheless, Filipinos have been enthralled with basketball, even if there barely has been a chance to get international awards, because basketball has long been a political sport.

As an aside, here is a trivia or a graphic detailing the trail to Michael Phelps’ record 18 medals. (Zero Hedge)

In tennis: British Andy Murray vindicates Wimbledon loss by whipping record world champ ‘aging’ Roger Federer for gold (Washington Post).

On Manny Pacquiao’s Boxing Career

This morning, much of the Philippines will be in a standstill as World Boxing champion local idol Manny Pacquiao goes back into the ring.

As a former boxing enthusiast (during my teenage days), I’d say that Manny Pacquiao is past his prime and will likely succumb to a younger player than he is, perhaps as days go by.

I’m not predicting that he will lose this or today’s match. But I am saying that the chances of continued victories will likely diminish if he persists to fight. This will be pronounced especially when he gets to fight younger boxers. It’s simply called the law of diminishing returns brought about by ageing.(unless technology comes to Mr. Pacquiao's rescue)

As a physical contact sport, age and mental condition are what fundamentally matters. Others like physical conditioning, ring technique and tactics are subordinate to this.

Unknown to many, most of Manny Pacquiao’s great victories came against pugilists older than he is (Marco Antonio Barrera, Juan Manuel Marquez, Oscar de La Hoya, Joshua Clottey, Shane Mosley) or at his age level (Ricky Hatton and Antonio Margarito). Only Miguel Cotto has proven to be the younger player whom Pacquiao recently beat.

In addition, the typical retirement age of many boxing legends is at the mid-30s.

The unbeaten Rocky Marciano made a comeback and retired by age 36. The great Muhammad Ali, my favorite hang up his gloves by age 39, but this came amidst back-to-back losses and the emergence of his Parkinson’s disease.

In short, based on the track record of great boxing legends, Pacquiao’s window of boxing greatness has been narrowing.

And there is always the psychological factor. Mike Tyson has been a great of example of a champion consumed by psychology particularly of hubris.

Mr. Pacquiao’s record as politician has not been smooth either. Corruption has been attributed to him, a recent dispute with the local tax agency the BIR shows that he is not an ally of the incumbent administration, and lastly, “God told me to retire”, for me, is a sign of admission of the actual state of his physical condition and of mental stress, where religion becomes his escape mechanism, or as means to endear himself with voters.

In reality, contrary to the popular opinion, it would not be Floyd Mayweather Jr., who will likely beat him, who again is older than Pacquiao and who is more mentality stressed than he is and will likely lose to Pacquiao, but some younger foe.

Of course reality bites, Mr. Pacquiao’s fame, fortune and political career have all been tied up with his boxing career. Once Mr. Pacquiao retires this privilege will erode overtime, as with all of the local celebrity sporting forebears.

So he may push his boxing career to the limits or take unnecessary risks in order to struggle to preserve this privilege.

[UPDATED to ADD: 28 years old Tim Bradley split decisions 33 years old Manny Pacquiao]

Philippine Sports: The Craze For Basketball And The Lack Of Interest In The World Cup

``Almost everywhere on the planet, people on Friday were stocking up on beer and food and readying themselves for long hours in front of the television set as football’s World Cup mania hit fever-pitch with the opening matches in Johannesburg, South Africa.”

This is from the Inquirer, who observed of the Filipinos’ lack of interest with the international football games.

The same article rationalizes such indifference...

``Fegidero said the continued failure of the Philippines to compete in major tournaments abroad had been the main reason football had not picked up here.

“We’re nowhere near the level of the world’s best teams, even in Asia, which is considered a weak continent in football,” he explained.

``The Philippines has never qualified for the World Cup since 1930, when the quadrennial meet began.

``This year, the country was only one of four countries that did not even bother to join the qualifying series for the tournament. The other three were Bhutan, Brunei and Laos.

“We don’t have the programs that can produce good players who can compete internationally,” Fegidero said. “We lack participation in international tournaments and local leagues.”

The Philippines has been obsessed with basketball, a sport, which unfortunately, we fail to excel in and continues to see rapid deterioration in performance based on the global or even regional competition standards.

The losing glory of Philippine men's basketball performance in the Asian Championship and the Asian Games, shown in the above table, where from the triumphant days in 60s to the early 70s, our competitive ranking continues to plunge, as time goes by.

But as consolation, at least based on South East Asia, we still remain dominant. (both charts from wikipedia) But the question is, given the underlying trend, for how long will this last?

Maybe we should ask first why Filipinos have been so fixated with a sport which we can't seem to win internationally due to structural reasons (lack of height)?

Yet this has been the case in spite of the active "participation in international tournaments and local leagues" in basketball, opposite to the reasoning of the expert as quoted above by the Inquirer article.

To consider, Philippine basketball teams have been complimented with Fil-Ams or Filipino Americans to fill in on the endemic height handicap, yet this has not been enough to reverse the degenerating trend.

The point is, it doesn't seem to be the lack of programs that determines the lack of acceptance of the World Cup. Instead, it is the lack of incentives brought about by the undue obsession on an unviable or unwinnable sport (basketball) and the attendant misdirection of investments that continues to feed on such delusion.

I see three reasons why Filipinos can't move away from basketball, in spite of the harsh reality that this is a sport which we simply can't compete in globally.

One, it seems a form of status signalling, which misleads Filipinos to believe that basketball is an irreplaceable cultural or social norm that needs to be conformed with. Otherwise said, to be IN (or to be identified as Filipino) means to patronize basketball in one way or another.

Second, it is part of the Groupthink fallacy, which Filipinos seem so entranced with.

According to Gloria Allendorfer Anderson, PhD., ``One of the dangers of our world today is group-think. It occurs as a person lets identification with a group cloud their reasoning and deliberations when reaching a position on a given issue. At best, it is a rhetorical device. At it's worst, it can be a very harmful replacement for sensible thought. In fact, it is considered one of the common fallacies of modern society." (emphasis added)

And groupthink is part of what shapes social or cultural norm, adds Ms. Anderson,

``When individuals identify with the state where they live, or a country of their heritage or origin, they relate to other individuals from the same state or country in their views of the world around them. This type of group identification indicates that they are part of a group of people who share the same life experience."(emphasis added)

Lastly basketball is a political sport or a sport used by politicians to attain political goals.

Basketball courts are one of the pet projects for pork barrel spending of local officials bent on achieving "accomplishments" for reelection or posterity or for financial purposes.

According to Gary W. Elliott,

``This year each of the 214 congressmen is allocated 60 million pesos (roughly USD1.5 million) for spending at his discretion, and each of the 24 senators receives twice that amount. With no real oversight or accountability, this institution is rife with corruption. Some of the funds intended for priority development projects in the congressmen’s districts, such as health care, clean water, and poverty alleviation, are typically spent on trivial projects which contribute nothing to the social and economic development of the country. Common examples are cement outdoor basketball courts and “waiting sheds,” small awnings or covered benches beside roads, where those waiting for a bus can get out of the rain. Large signs laud the congressman for spending government funds on the project (instead of just pocketing them?). Such projects are often accomplished just before elections, so signs touting the congressmen provide free campaign advertising for those seeking re-election." (bold highlights mine)

Since a basketball court has more player density per unit area, adding more courts on the local level draws in greater number of people to the sport. One may say that this is an example of Keynes' misinterpretation of Say's law where "supply creates its own demand"

So massive grassroot political investments in basketball courts impels more patrons relative to the other sports, hence more patrons translates to cultural acceptance, and the unwarranted fixation to basketball, in spite of the inherent handicaps, in terms of global standards. So goes the feedback mechanism driving the dynamics of basketball as a political sport.

So in my view, domestic politics represent as one of the key obstacles (if not the key hurdle) to the lack of diversity of Filipinos to engage in other more internationally competitive sports such as football.