Athletes: More Fun in the Philippines (Part 1)

This is a series of posts about the curious case of attractive Filipino athletes in the international scene. Part 1 discusses football and basketball. 

James and Phil Younghusband, modern sports celebrities of Asia.

Admit it. We Filipinos have the best-looking athletes in Asia. We seem so blessed with talented people who happened to be raised with a foreign parentage on either side (father or mother), grown up somewhere else (particularly in Europe), and speak a different language other than those we used to speak. Lately, with the emergence of the Philippine national football team, fondly called the Azkals, it seemed there was a sudden boom of athletic talent and national pride that is topped with a certain sex appeal no sport pundit ever expected. Our country was soon littered with sport stars-slash-sex symbols.

In RJ Ledesma's recent column on the Philippine Star, where he interviewed Loyola Meralco Sparks and national team striker Phil Younghusband (right of above photo), Phil admits never expecting to become a "sex symbol" when he was growing up in England. He was just thinking around his football and having fun, and never bothered about his physique or how he would look like when he grew up as an adult. That could be the thought of his brother James (left) as well.

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Footie Heartthrobs

Irfan Bachdim of the Indonesia national team.

Let's look outside the country first. I would like to share this case from Indonesia about footballer Irfan Bachdim. Bachdim has Dutch parentage through his mother, and grew up in the Netherlands. When the striker-winger arrived to play for the Indonesia national team a few years back, became a national sensation, not really because of his footballing skills (he has experience in the Dutch Eredivisie with FC Utrecht), but it was because of his looks - just because he was a "mixed breed" - particularly his "green eyes."

His performance for the Indonesia national team in the 2010 Suzuki Cup made him well known among the Indonesian public. He rapidly gained a large following, particularly among women. And with that came many commercial endorsements, like the Filipino booters. But it cost him a lot. He was recently suspended by the PSSI (Indonesia's governing body in football) for not showing up with the Under-23 team for the 2011 Southeast Asian Games, just for the excuse that he was going into a "photoshoot for a magazine."

Now, if you look at the Philippines' neighbouring countries, most of their football teams do have the skills but aren't appreciated well by the general public, especially the youth, outside their playing career. Yes, they do have commercial endorsements here and there but they don't incite this certain appeal that the Filipinos booters have. Bachdim is Indonesia's only "pretty boy" footballer out there. The likes of him are very rare in Indonesia where mixed parentage, whether for the reason of ethnicity or religion, is often discouraged. It happens in other countries as well. Plus, people in these countries suggest they are not "fan friendly," even while playing club football. Reports indicate they snub out fans who want autographs and take pictures with them.

PHL U-23 vice captain Manny Ott with Indonesian fans.

So here's where the Pinoy booters come into the picture. You could take away the advantages of some of them who grew up with mixed heritage, but you can't take away their being "fan friendly." It might be due to the character of hospitality and pakikisama in Filipino culture that helps these boys get appreciation by the public. Take a look at the Filipino Under-23 team of the 2011 SEA Games. They may be the tournament's doormat, but they certainly gained fans. I had a contact with an Indonesian fan who had met these boys during the SEA Games, and she said they are more handsome, but most certainly she insisted that they were more friendly and accommodating than her national team, who "do not like being disturbed." She already met the senior team during the 2010 Suzuki Cup and the feeling is still the same for her.

If not for their looks, foreign eyes would see these guys as typically skilled players who ply their trade in Europe or having a career in the local league. But now, they are seen as models of a new generation of celebrity sport stars, where skill and appeal come together for a total package. They are the new definition of the matipuno, the strong, manly physique that is now appreciated in world standards. They might certainly not pursue a showbiz career, but they enjoy a fanbase of Hollywood-like proportions.

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Basketball Prowess, with a Hint of Gwapo

Jeremy Lin, the newest Asian craze in basketball.

Yeah, the Philippines is a basketball-crazed country, and I think will remain to be one. The NBA is still being broadcast on Filipino TV sets. The PBA is still active in AKTV (pun intended). But in recent years, foreign eyes seem to now view the Filipino cagers as "has-beens" - players who dominated in the past, but now being outplayed by bigger, stronger sides during international matches. Another disadvantage being observed is that, although Filipinos have the athleticism and determination to win, the dominant trait of having a short stature continues to come with them.


Now, with the craze encircling the popularity of Jeremy Lin, the Taiwanese-American player of the New York Knicks of the NBA, popularly called "Lin-sanity," it's becoming a slap on the face for Filipinos that their players could not even make the cut to the world's most popular basketball league. It's even sadder to think a Cinderella story could happen to this Taiwanese player who at the time was just doing his basketball at Harvard University. Our reason of height is to blame, but is the inferiority complex ingrained in Filipinos be blamed as well?

But what did the Pinoys do in recent years to beef up the team? Aside from naturalising skilled players from abroad, they recruited skilled and promising players from collegiate leagues (as usual), but with a twist. They turned out to be gwapo.

Chris Tiu, Pilipinas hard-court heatthrob.

Take a look at Chris Tiu, a player from the Ateneo Blue Eagles with Chinese heritage.He came into the limelight a few years back when the national basketball team, fondly called Gilas Pilipinas or Smart Gilas (for sponsorship reasons), was under scrutiny over very bad international losses. Tiu was a skilled player at the Ateneo de Manila University, but what was put in the mix for this guy was of his being attractive to young women back at AdMU, and now with the general female populace.

With him in the national team, popularity and interest of the sport increased, and extended to the then-young females who are well-attracted to "cute guys" in the collegiate league. This generated commercial income for Tiu, who became endorsers of numerous consumer goods, from telecommunications, to sportswear to mouthwash. He also became prominent in TV hosting as well, being seen in numerous general knowledge feature shows like the local adaptation of Ripley's Believe It... Or Not, although not well received by the critical viewing public.

Nevertheless, Chris Tiu is still a well-loved centerpiece for Philippine basketball. Although not yet playing professionally for the PBA, he is still well regarded as a skilled player.

In recent days, though, the Philippine international basketball scene became even more glamorous, thanks to the addition of another young player from Ateneo. His name: Kiefer Ravena.

Kiefer Ravena, the new boy-next-door of Pinoy basketball.

This young lad from the Blue Eagles was already a crazed personality back in university as he played for the team in the UAAP. His scoring and passing was impeccable, but his "charm" did wonders more for female fans. In that time, he was already gracing full spreads in teen magazines creating a bubbly giggle to them when they meet Kiefer during games.

 When he was called up for the national youth basketball team during the 2011 SEA Games, it became a media frenzy not only in the Philippines, but also in neighbouring countries. Yes, they already expected the Filipinos to dominate as opposed to the football team. But adding spice to the concoction was the "cuteness" of Ravena that attracted fans from neighbouring nations during the tournament. News reports indicated that after games, the female fans flock into the hardcourt wanting to get near the team, especially Ravena, for autographs and pictures. Like the U23 Azkals, the Indonesian fan I had contact with also came to see the cagers.

It's so ironic to tell how Kiefer was being so attractive to female fans, given that he grew up here in the Philippines with no dominant foreign lineage whatsoever. Was it because he was already gwapo? or his boyish charm, or whatever? I don't know exactly.

Nonetheless, our basketball dominance is now added with that gwapo factor in which foreigners now appreciate.

Next in the series is the explosion of rugby football in the country brought up by the Philippine Volcanoes, the Pinoy racing wonder Marlon Stöckinger, and next to it is the healthy influx of Pinay athletes in the Pinoy sporting scene.
KENNETH