UAAP “troll”

Everybody is talking about the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) Finals featuring nine-time champion Ateneo Blue Eagles and two-time champion University of the Philippines Fighting Maroons. Ateneo is the defending champion, while UP won its last championship 32 years ago in 1986.

Between 1987 and 2017, the Fighting Maroons’ basketball runs were in most parts forgettable, the monotony broken only in 2014 by, of all events, a celebratory bonfire party to mark the end of the 27-game losing streak in 720 days (a win that placed them second to the last in the standings, according Rappler).

I also find interesting what lawyer Angelo “Jijil” Jimenez wrote about the Fighting Maroons in his regular blog at ABS-CBN.com: “Yes, the laughingstock of the league! Except that it’s not funny. Call it tragi-comic. They commuted by public transport and went hungry during games. No post-match recovery meals for the boys. They practiced in a gym that has no insulation; it is an oven in summer. When it rains, they play half-court. The roof leaks on the other half.”

This year, the underdog Maroons is still composed largely of veteran team members including its leading scorer from Cebu, Paul Desiderio (he studied high school at the University of the Visayas). But the team, now known for its and its fans’ unshakeable fighting spirit, has also been reinforced by big men like Nigerian Bright Akhuetie from UP’s College of Human Kinetics.

The Ateneo Blue Eagles are not about to give up their championship trophy that easily, though. Aside from having veteran Thirdy Ravena and Ange Kouame in their starting lineup, the Eagles have what one basketball pundit calls “the synergy of the five players on the court at any given time.”

Thus, definitely this year’s finals has the ingredients of a sports spectacle. The off-court rivalry meanwhile is, as expected, intense but friendly. After all, UP and Ateneo are neighbors in Katipunan Avenue, Quezon City. I remember in the late 1990s when I was studying in UP Diliman seeing Ateneo students crossing over to the Diliman campus to eat at the famous isawan (barbecued chicken intestines) and other street food stalls dotting UP.

But this good, fun rivalry has been nearly spoiled by a posting in social media by one Spocky Farolan, a Malacañang appointee to the UP Board of Regents. The post seemed to suggest that three Ateneo players will be injured by a “composite strike team” of UP fraternities before Game 2 on Wednesday. Farolan has since deleted his post saying he was only being “ironic and sarcastic” and that it might be misconstrued as advocating violence.

My Law school classmate Mitch says it in her social media page: “The trending ‘joke’ surrounding the upcoming UAAP basketball games is not a reflection of who we are and how we compete. These people are far removed from reality and from who and what UP is.”

The fraternity council of Sigma Rho, a leading UP-based fraternity, has also stated that “the exchanges between UP Regent Spocky Farolan (who is not a member of the UP Sigma Rho Fraternity) and Mr. Ahmed G. Paglinawan do not express the sentiments of the fraternity.” Sigma Rho says that it joins the UP community in condemning Farolan’s controversial post as “highly irresponsible and definitely made in bad taste.”

UP president Danilo Concepcion also dissociated UP from the actuations of its regent, and vowed to seriously take the matter up with the Board of Regents.

Well, this should serve as a reminder that at any time, under any circumstances whether ordinary or as exciting as the UAAP Season 81 Finals, we should be careful about what we post on social media.