The Pinoy Does Not Seem To Value Work

 

 

 

On the day that the curtain rises (Oct 23) on the World Series leave it to Colin Cowherd of ESPN radio to say something very poignant about human nature. He is not a Red Sox fan or a Cardinals fan but he takes a unique look at this year’s  match up. For him it was good to see people who really care about something rewarded.There is a passion to it. In the eyes of Colin St.Louis and Boston are two American cities that care about baseball 365 days a year. Now notice he said baseball, he did not say Cardinals or Red Sox. The ratings on those two cities show that people will watch baseball in the post season regardless of the involvement of the local team.

 

Colin talked about being happy when people who are passionate are rewarded. Passion is there regardless of the current situation. Many of you are parents. Are you less passionate about your child when times are tough? Or are you the type that it is during the tough times that your child needs your passion even more? Colin then discusses why he is focusing on passion. He is interested in how people were able to convert that passion into something. What they did and what they had to go through. There is something spectacular about the desire to do something hard, the commitment to stick with it and finally the satisfaction of realizing it. That is interesting to Colin Cowherd. What is not interesting to him is somebody who inherits a lot of money. Payoff without growth and challenge is rarely interesting. I discuss the journey in this older post. You can hear him say it in his own words and voice here.

 

As Colin says when you go the instant gratification route it does not feel as earned. It does not feel as crafted. He cites the 2013 Dodgers as an example. Not that they are without merit. This year’s Cardinals on the other hand are home grown. Trees that are planted and matured under their watch. Something with a foundation. You have to admit there is something unique and special when you get together with friends and each brings something unique to them. A dish made at home as opposed to calling for Shakey’s.

 

People who really read me will notice that the concept of enjoying the event as opposed to specific participants is exactly what I point out when pinoys go gaga about  international soccer,  international basketball  and international beauty contests.  The people of Boston and St.Louis care about the exercise itself.  They value excellence in something they enjoy. If  ‘their own” are involved well great but if not they will still watch and care because they love the sport and competition of baseball. They value seeing the best on display. The way I see it, pinoys do not value the World Cup or the FIBA tournament or beauty pageants. They value the ” prestige”or more accurately the pansin that they feel comes with it. What I always argue though is very rarely does a pinoy ever reciprocate that prestige to whatever country does well when the pinoys do not excel.

 

Major League Baseball may be the most international professional sports league on this planet. They don’t care if you are South American, North American, Asian Australian, African American, Italian American. If you can play you will play. I am not making a case that pinoys should adapt baseball. Actually I don’t believe they can since baseball has been called “a thinking man’s game”. What I am making the case for is baseball is an unlikely to be appreciated by pinoys because it takes work.

 

Going back to the Boston Red Sox. I was reading the box score of their series clinching game against the Detroit Tigers last Saturday. Both the winning pitcher and the pitcher who earned the save were both Japanese born and learned their game in Japan. You can never translate a baseball analogy to basketball but it is similar to a pinoy that used to be in the PBA having the most points in the last game of the Eastern Final and another pinoy who played his college ball in Adamson being the sixth man of that game. We all know deep in our hearts that will never happen. Did any Japanese people that you know yell in your ear on Saturday “proud to be HAPON!”? I doubt it.

 

Baseball does not lend itself to instant gratification. There are very few major league players in history that did not spend multiple years in the multi layered minor league system. Whether you are a position player or a pitcher , raw talent alone does not take you to the big time. Your skills have to be refined in an environment of cheap motels, small crowds and long bus rides. Hall of Famer Wade Boggs  was drafted in 1976 and did not play significantly in the major leagues till 1982. Every pinoy male knows Kobe Bryant. Sports fans in general can not comprehend a world in which Kobe Bryant toils in obscurity for 6 years after high school before playing a full NBA season. That is what Boggs went though without even playing for a college team.

 

Baseball is a game of failure. Nobody since Ted Williams has failed less than six out of then times over the course of a season. That is not a typo error. No one is baseball in decades has broken the 40% threshold of hitting a baseball succesfully over the course of a year. Just to prove Noynoy Aquino is just a blank sheet of paper, I once devoted a blog a year ago  saying never mind Noynoy’s lack of successes over his life but show me his failures. Anybody who has ever accomplished anything great whether it is Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Edison or Steve Jobs will gladly show you their list of failures. Failure is a stepping stone to breaking new ground. Not that Noynoy Aquino would ever know anything about breaking new ground. Noynoy has no failures for the same reason that I have no major league strikeouts. Neither of us was ever in the game.

 

A pinoy presence is a prerequisite for most pinoys to care. That has always been my beef. Everything is always one sided. “Look at me!! Though I won’t look at you!” . Colin goes on to say, it is about the journey. Meaning it is not about going from point A to point B but what you undergo in between. Hence my point of bandwagon pinoys. I always said KSP is the root of all evil. Pinoys care so much more about the pansin that comes from excellence than they care about excellence itself. If you don’t believe me, look at the bandwagon.

 

Speaking of excellence or the lack of it we have Noynoy Aquino. He is our nation’s idea of excellence. Like I said in my blog Its So Obvious Why We Have No Gold Medals our nation gives out one Gold Medal every six years. In that Gold Medal we see what our nation values. In 2010 , our nation could care less about track record, decision making, crisis management or even simple work ethic. Our Gold Medal was given to a trapo (tradiditional politcian) with not one noteworthy achievement in 50 years. As many GRP authors have said how can you be proud of something you are born into?  You have nothing to do with that whatsoever. For many it was an excuse not to do anything since in their minds being Pinoy is enough.

 

The more useless and the more inept Noynoy Aquino proves himself to be, the more I feel he is perfect for the emo Filipino. Pinoys love to annouce to the world they are pinoy. Noynoy Aquino in his campaign never once refered to any hardships endured or obtacles overcome. He just reminded you who his parents were. Pinoys could care less about the journey. All they care about is things like Miss World.  Where the work that is “valued” is their idealized female figure and a million dollar smile. It is about being born with a certain face and certain body type. In Noynoy’s case born into a certain family. I was never into Pac Man mania but I will not deny the work he put in over the years on a speedbag, jump rope and with sparring partners. Pinoys value Miss World. Somebody explain to me what work went into Miss World that is worth admiring?

 

Pinoys value Noynoy Aquino. Somebody explain to me the work he put in in order to be president and why is it worth admiring? What did Noynoy ever do
to earn undying loyalty of Noytards ? A better question what did he ever do to earn anything really ? In 53 years of living ? Build a business ? Raise a family ? Hold a job? Earn responsibility ? What?

 

 

By the same token, this nostalgic past that people bring up of Cory and Ninoy how magical was it really? Even for the sake of argument that it was magical, what was Noynoy’s part in it? What about that “magical ” past carries over to him? Do you guys even think these things through? You can call it a campaign of sympathy or a campaign of sentimentality. One thing you can never call it was a campaign of results or a campaign of achievements. Because pinoys do not value results or achievements or even practical abilities.

 

 

Noynoy’s  passion is blaming Gloria. I have no idea how that passion will move this country forward. All he has succeeded in doing is conditioning people for his inevitable failure and who he is going to blame. No matter what I will say from this point forward, Noynoy is indeed world class in one thing. Inserting Gloria into any conversation or context known to man. Noynoy will probably use his presidential powers that rigged the Corona verdict to get insert her into the Periodic Table of Elements.

 

 

I was at a wedding October 12th. A relative who I like as a person talked to me. She has always been nice. Second thing out of her mouth was “Why don’t you like Noynoy? ….. He is galing”. I told her that I write extensively on the topic. Her response did not seem to befit the curiosity of her question. I had fun at that wedding. I had fun because I know well enough that a wedding is not a place to discuss differences in politics. I am not here to throw this person under the bus. I am just showing you an example of people magically beholden to somebody. Curious why I am different yet will not explore a documentation of why I am different. That is pride and emotion getting in the way of forming a realistic assessment of the situation at hand. How pinoy.