Let’s play basketball

I am rooting for the Golden State Warriors. I am placing a bet for one case of SML. I know in my calculations they can hurdle the Houston Rockets in the NBA western conference finals, despite James Harden and Chris Paul. And now that Steph Curry can play, baka gawin nilang kare kare at sasabog ang Rockets. Kevin Durant, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green in the line up, how could they lose?

In the Eastern conference, well the Boston Celtics drubbed my team, the Philadelphia Sixers despite Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid. That rookie Jayson Tatum and Terry Rozier of the Celtics are superstars in the making, sans injuries. (I am wondering if Jayson is somehow related to the playmaker Tatum of Harlem Globe Trotters which made world trips in the fifties. They also displayed their wares at the Rizal Memorial Stadium if I am not mistaken).

Well enough of my yabang. I am one of the several millions of Filipinos whom you can tag as basketball crazy. Each time I have the opportunity I will be glued on my television set watching the games. Since I was young I was and still a basketball fanatic. Still in my shorts, me and other kids played in a recreational center built by the late Roberto Toledo, a half mestizo expat which has a uncovered basketball court located few meters away from a nearby rice field in our barrio Cangatba in Porac town.

Those years there were already national hoop leagues. Prominent were the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP). In these annual basketball conferences some of the popular surnames were Mariano, Papa, Ed Ocampo, Melencio, Badion, Florencio.(Sorry , I can’t remember all their first names). And before them there was Caloy Loyzaga whose shirt number I still remember