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.

Round One to Slaughter

Greg Slaughter hopes to bring a four-peat to Ateneo this year (pic source: Inboundpass.com)

Greg Slaughter took another step towards becoming fully eligible to play after a 2-1 vote from the UAAP Eligibility Committee yesterday.

According to sources, out of the five-man committee, representatives from Adamson and Ateneo gave 'yay' votes, while FEU voted 'nay.' DLSU's representative abstained from the voting, while UP's representative chaired the meeting and did not vote.

While many people rejoiced over the news, there is still a remote chance that the former University of Visayas Green Lancer will be brought up again next week, July 5, during the UAAP board meeting.

The Eligibility Committee, by my understanding, goes through the UAAP rulebook to see if a player is eligible. However, a player can still be met with an official protest during the board meeting, though new evidence would have to be brought to the table.

Schools also have until the end of the first round to file complaints regarding eligibility. A recent example of this was when UST lobbied to reinstate gunner Jojo Duncil in 2007 up until the early part of the season (though the move failed).

Worse comes to worse, the matter will be brought to a vote before the board, with Ateneo unable to vote due to the fact that it is one of their players being voted upon.

My instinct is that Slaughter will in fact play this season. Given the Eligibility Board's decision, a decision that takes into account his stint with the Gilas National team, it's hard to imagine what sort of new evidence FEU, or any other protesting school, can come up with. I also don't feel that it is right to go against your own Eligibility Board, because if you go against it, then why not bring up all eligibility issues to the board meetings instead?

That said, it is a given that FEU is fond of these backroom dealings (Soc Rivera rule, anyone?), and thus, Ateneo fans, after encircling June 28 on their calendars, now have to circle another date, July 5, and hope for another round of jubilant tweets.