Show Me the Paper

Karim Abdul (left) and Alinko Mbah (right) hold the key to their teams' seasons (pic source here and here)

The Philippine Daily Inquirer writes today that aside from ADMU's Greg Slaughter and NU's Bobby Ray Parks, three other players were discussed during last Tuesday's Eligibility Board meeting, and those three were found wanting. Quoth:

"Nigerian Alinko Mbah of the University of the Philippines, Cameroonian Karim Abdul of the University of Santo Tomas and Canadian teammate Jamil Sheriff failed to submit the required documents for foreign players in the recent eligibility meeting."

It stuns me that teams have these players serving residency for two whole years and still show up with incomplete documents. When you talk about UP and UST being improved teams, a big reason why they'll be more competitive this year is because of those two foreign centers. Both teams rely so heavily on three-point shooting that having a big man under the board to rebound and score off put-backs means their offense becomes much more efficient. Both teams also lack real options behind the two foreigners (UP would fall back to Mark Juruena, UST would field Paolo Pe) so the slight chance of either of those two guys failing to become eligible ought to send fans of their respective schools into cold sweats.

Both teams will have until the July 5 board meeting to submit all the missing paperwork.