Game 2 vs Air 21
September 22, 2008The rematch between us and Air 21 was played last night. It was a tighter, more physical game than game 1 (if that’s possible). The Slingers have a game report and stats that can be found here, also Jason has an excellent recount of the game here. We ended winning 98-85, and taking the series 2-0. We also saved the club $10,000 they would have paid Air21 had they beaten us.
I won’t really go into details of the game, you can read that on the other sites. I will however, give you what you are all hanging out to hear – How is Eric?
For those of you who weren’t there, with 13 seconds remaining, Eric was on the run and taking off for a dunk, when a player from A21 (deCampo I think), walked underneath him and took out his legs. Eric came down horizontally and landed heavily on his back. Everyone who knows basketball knows that this was a pretty dirty play. Eric could have been a lot seriously injured. Ian has posted up some video of it on youtube and the foul occurs at 4:55. There is also highlights of other quarters of the game.
Anyway, I saw the big guy today and it was good to see he was walking. He said his back and neck are pretty stiff (no surprise) and the doc gave him some medication to take to help ease the inflammation. From my early diagnosis, he should be right to play our next game against Purefoods.
I think everyone is a little battered and bruised from last night (I know I am!), but nothing major.
We travel to Taiwan tomorrow to play in a tournament in Hualien. From what I know there are 11 teams from Taiwan, Korea, Japan competing in this tournament which runs from 23-28 sept. I think there is some prize money up for grabs. If we make it all the way through to the finals, we will have played 6 games in 5 days! We will arrive back in Singapore on Monday night 11pm, in time to play on Tuesday against Purefoods Tender Juicy Giants 
I’ll try to keep you updated on our tourny in Taiwan, but I don’t know how readily I’ll have access to the net with 11 teams staying at the hotel, business center might get a workout. Apologies in advance if I can’t blog over there (if you have any ideas on getting internet in Hualien let me know today!). Never know, there might be free wifi for everyone…
What a tight schedule! And I am so glad to hear that Eric is doing good. I am looking forward to seeing you come back to chomp on whatever PureFoods has to dish out on the 30th!
Woah..tot you guys will be slacking off for the next week or so before meeting the Purefoods Tender Juicy Giants (I love their name) wonder if I can get their jersey..hmm..
Anyways, all the best in Taiwan and go kick some butt. Great meeting you yesterday and glad to hear Eric is holding up well. Till then…Gooo Slingers!!
WOW. I, too, thought you guys would be having a bit of time off from the games. Well, all the best anyway!
Glad to hear Eric is ok, but I guess he’ll be out of action for a couple of days? Hope it heals properly!
Hope to hear updates about the games in Hualien when you have time. Safe trip to the Slingers team!
oh, hmm. how do we email you photos? ok, maybe i’ll just post the link here.
my friend yang gao took this shot. i think it’s hilarious. hehe.
Resized: http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e68/daphnemaia/IMG_0245_Resized.jpg
Large: http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e68/daphnemaia/IMG_0245_Large.jpg
you’re airborne
All the best Darren for the overseas trip! Hope u guys would win the competition there. I didn’t like the way Air21 played. It wasn’t about the physical component about the game, but it seems that they had some ill intentions to injure Sandrin on that last play. It wasn’t really nice as guests.
Anyway, hope to see you guys back in Singapore for the Purefoods game next week. I’ll be down to support.
Hey Daphne,
as for now you can contact me via email through the contact me bit.
I’m still new at this blogging thing, haven’t figured out if you can send pics or stuff.. hmm… I’m prob sounding pretty stupid.
Anyway Thanks for the pic, I seem to get a lot of those shots with my legs split in the air.
Hey, darren! Thanx for the report. The game yesterday was very intense. Although I knew we would win deep in my heart, I still couldn’t convince my brain until last quarter. I think Janev and Eric both perfomed well, besides u, of course. For Air 21, I think Santos is the best, but my favourite is Intal.
Glad to hear Eric is fine. Pls bring our wishes to him. How abt the bruises on ur shoulder, painful? I expected u guys could rest these days to recharge for next game in s’pore, but anyway, rest well. And hope to hear good results from taiwan!
It’s been really great to know Hillary, Daphne and Francis. Hillary, I’ve received ur photos. Thanx a lot!
I have some confusion. I’m surprised to notice tat AIA is still a sponsor of Slingers. Given the condition of its parent AIG, will there b any withdrawal of the sponsorship? (Just for curiosity)
Hey darren, thanks for updating us! It’s great to hear that he’s ok. The guy that injured him was JC Intal… the one that marked you tightly throughout the first quarter. I’ve got it all on video and you can actually check that out at redsports and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYljrSXZY14
Will be checking with you about Hualian as our school will be going there this nov for a basketball competition as well.
All the best and hopefully, you’ll be able to update us on this blog!
Sorry, you’re right… That was Raidel de Ocampo (#33), not JC Intal!
Hi Ian,
Many thanks for your video of the game at redsports. For us supporters in Melbourne, it is great news!
Any chance of putting up Game 1 as well ???? (Provided you have it recorded as well)
Hope this is not too much too much to ask for.
Regards,
Peng
Jenny, I’m not sure about the AIA business, but I haven’t heard any trouble on their part.
Thanks Ian for the Video, Eric’s fall looks really bad, worse than I remember in fact. I might post it on the page.
Eric Sandrin will live, you guys are making out that he is Paralyzed. It was an accident in the first place, he know that De Ocampo was there and he still try to dunk it. I think its his fault in the first place for trying to showoff. Anyway go Purefoods, better get ready Slingers as Purefoods is 10x worse than Air21 when it comes to dirty plays hehehehhe.
BTW Darren I got nothing against you dude just dont like the Slingers
KC, no problems with u supporting another team that’s cool.
As for Eric’s fall, yes he is up and walking, but I think the fact is that he COULD have been paralysed – many players have fallen like that and come off much worse (a player in my old team for example). If you watch the video De Ocampo makes no attempt to play the ball and continues to move thru Eric while he is in the air, as opposed to standing still, which would have been the normal play. If we have more plays like that in basketball, it won’t always be such a lucky outcome.
Ian, great to know u too. (forgot to mention ur name in my previous post, since didn’t have chances to chat w u.) Both ur report and video in redsports r wonderful.
That’s good for Slingers not affected by what is happening on Wall St.
KC, I don’t think that was an accident, my camera caught the action from the time Eric was to take off to the time that he fell and the photos would tell that De Ocampo intentionally did that, and no doubt about it. You would see it on his face and how he watched Eric fell.
Eric wanted to dunk the ball, and I guess if Canaleta was in his place, he would do the same, and you would probably be cheering Canaleta and even shout “in your face dude”.
KC, not sure what you are smoking, but that was no accident. Take a look at the replay, he clearly moved in and undercut sandrin on purpose. Pretty poor sportsmanship if you ask me.
its all god guyz, Ive seen the replay and it did look like a foul play, well Darren Ng, I hope coach Gordie McLeod gives you the assignment of guarding James Yap of the Purefood TJ Giants. It will be a good match up between you’s 2 as he is a 3point shooter aswell. Best of luck for both teams
hope eric can get well soon… he always gets injured… =s
all da best
n.. haha… slingers must win the match in taiwan k.. im sure u guys can do it..
Safe trip to the darren ng
Darren,your game on tues. against PUREFOODS will be an exciting one knowing that this team is popular in Philippine basketball.My first time to watch your team also,& good luck on TAIWAN games!!!
Slinger website not soooo free…they censor my comments…
my comments may not be favoring ur team but whataheck,why censor…comments pro and against create excitements among the fans…
not good,this is really turning me off to watch Slingers games…
Jawo, I don’t think so, there have been so many posts there which are favoring Air21 and not the Slingers. Maybe you are just having problem posting your comments.
no lah!!!
i posted comments that were taken out..
anyway, ur Slingers are IMPORT SLINGERS to many…
to the organizers, i can see ur team folding up because it cannot sustain the viable crowd on its games…
im not against u darren,i think ur good and u will achive more…goodluck…
but to whoever manages the slinger site, gooo to lleh…with ur team.
darren if ur can forward my message to the slinger website administrator i would appreciate it very much…
De Ocampo – is an a**hole. Hope someone does that to him in the PBA and i ll be happy. Brainless guy man !! Someone please educate him what basketball is about. Again he is an Idiot =D
GET WELL SOON ERIC
Hi Peng,
Really glad you enjoyed the video… but i’m sorry i don’t have the video of the first match though! It’s a bit tough videoing and writing at the same time, but i guess it’s toughest on the players on court:)
Ian
Get over it Eric fan hehehehe
Purefoods TJ Giants is a team that represents a huge food company in the PH. Tender Juicy is a catchphrase of a specific hotdog. The yummiest and juiciest hotdog ever!
I still think it was so unsportsmanly of de Ocampo. Although I wasn’t able to see Eric’s fall, since we were ready to live the stadium.
Air 21 is not that really good as a basketball team. No offense to the fans. I still believe Purefoods, San Miguel, Sta. Lucia, Ginebra and Talk n Text are the best teams in the PBA. And I hope Vergara can be a part of the PBA.
And Darren, I’m such a huge fan of yours. Last Sunday’s game was my second time I watched you play. The first was when you were still playing for an AU team in July of last year.
The best of luck!
The PBA is drawing lesser crowd as compared to the crowds in the 80′s and early 90′s…I think quite a few lost faith in the league when it started to loose in international competition. That’s because, in the PBA, the competition is just among filipino players themselves and with some fil-ams and some imports.
The Slingers, I believe is going to a better direction through diversification. Competing internationally would improve their competitiveness through exposure to different styles of basketball play. Let’s be objective here and not be fans. I’m a big fan of Philippine basketball, but I think the direction of their basketball leagues wouldn’t let them become competitive enough. They will be, but not as fast as the pace of other Asian countries now. They are even thinking of hiring the coach of Iran, Rajko Toroman, to help them train and improve the skill of their young big men.
Coach McLeod acknowledged the skills of Santos, Canaleta and Intal, that if given the right break and proper international exposure, they will improve even more. Also, Philippines has a pool of talented basketball players, but the problem is, developing them in a higher competitive level. They should expose them more internationally like one Mr. Cojuangco did in the 80′s, where the Philippine team won the Jones Cup, but the team was composed of Americans “naturalized” Filipinos, and Filipinos of course.
Jawo, hi! I think you need to sign up for Slingers 6th man in order to comment, cos my friend tried without signing up and the comment bounced back too.
Jawo,
I think you have to understand what the Slingers website is for and what kind of comments you are leaving. The site is there to promote the Slingers and their upcoming games, ticket sales, etc. If the comments that are left on the site are in any way derogatory to the club, then imagine if you are a potential supporter and click onto the site and see comments sledging the slingers on its homepage. Not very professional and does nothing to help the club. I know that the NBL in australia banned forums on their club sites because of this exact reason (ppl wanting to sack coach, players, etc). If you want to comment about the slingers/basketball, maybe you should set up your own forum away from the official slingers site.
phwoarrr. so many comments in here.
it’s a li’l sad that since darren is the only one on the team that has a blog, he naturally becomes the dartboard for the slingers’ detractors.
but well, kinda funny too
wonder how the games in taiwan are going…
why other player dun wanta set up blogs? I hope every player has a blog.
Darren my comments in the Slinger website is not derogatory at all(maybe the comment i made here is yes, but this is mainly due to my furstration on the slingers censorship)…the post there now are even worst on my comments but how come they censor mine.i was just challenging fans & the organizers to bring in more teams to give exposure to ur team…
I had plans to see more of slingers game but the way they handle the site is not correct…I WILL NOT WATCH ANY GAMES ANYMORE EVEN IF IT INVOLVES THE MOST POPULAR PBA TEAM,GINEBRA….
Jawo, I seriously doubt that your comments alone were censored when worse comments were not.
It is most likely a technical error. Do give it another try.
Bring on Ginebra, I reckon it will be the very first time that the Singapore stadium will be sold out. Yeah It was pretty good that Gordy Mcleod is acknoledging the Skills of Arwind and KG.
Jawo…I think there is something wrong with the site. I also just posted something, and I still saw my post when I clicked submit. But when I returned to the main page, the comment was gone. Must be a bug so dont feel frustrated.
Notice om the highlights when Eric Sandrin did a slam, after that he pushed Homer. That was unecessary. Good on De Ocampo for trying to injure Sandrin
KC23, I did see that, it was because Homer was trying to block Erics way. If you are saying that it was good that De Ocampo was trying to injure Sandrin, then I guess you are just too mean. I have read your posts and it seems like you are a kid who doesn’t want to accept defeat. Pushing is part of the game and I saw Eric and even Darren, being pushed so many times as well. But inflicting injury is another thing.
Don’t be too bias. Admit it too, Homer Se is acknowledged by PBA commentators to be known and famous for giving out flagrant fouls.
Its too sad that you are saying this, it gives an impression that Filipinos really want to inflict injury if they are being defeated.
Damn true hehhehehe
still i think in the long run basketball here in SG will not grow unless we will train our grassroots.
i mean the slingers have only i think 2 or 3 singaporeans.
no offense but even in Philippines even football is not popular there they train or compete with at least majority of the players who are locals or have grown in the country.
it’s like hiring a hired-pros in a passionate game, and basketball is a passionate game.
no offense but just like football id rather lost my local team with local-players than win with a salaried-players. its not sport anymore.
does anyone know what he is trying to say? between bad english and senseless logic, i can’t catch the whole gist of the above message.
In conclusion, on examining the above post by roaring_red, after carefully working my way through the haze of fragments and lack of punctuation marks (documented in Section 3), abuse of certain vocabulary, like “grassroots” (Section 4), and general crimes against grammar and syntax (Sections 7-8), I have demonstrated that, beneath it all, the work betrays the author’s staggering ignorance of the history and the workings of fundamental sporting logic. While the author’s wildly swerving train of thought did at one point flirt with coherence, this brief encounter was more likely a chance event (see statistical analysis in Table 5) than a result of even rudimentary lucidity.
(inspired by http://xkcd.com/406/)
Could the Slingers slap fines on players who try to injure others? I think this is the only way for the Slingers to protect their players. I believe even the NBL does the same i.e Mark Worthington last year. Otherwise, I think that it would be very risky since it is an invitational game and the teams invited like Air21 could take advantage of this and commit fouls like de Ocampo’s.
Get over it Gabriel, u cant really do much coz its only an exibition game not unless its a league. Dont talk about the NBL coz its really no point as Slingers is not a part of the league anymore. And as for what roaring red is saying, I think he is trying to say that he prefer to have a local singaporean players than have Australian players playing in Singapore Slingers. This is another issue in the NBL before, a lot of people are looking forward to singaporean players since it was a Singaporean team, but what happened they saw Australian players playing for Singapore. Commercial team or not, if u name ur team Singapore, you expect it to be local not foreign or at least have 1 import.
yeap i agree with both roaring_red and KC23. it was a bit eye sore to watch a Singapore Pro Team with 1 or 2 Singaporean player. It should be the other way around. Can we imagine our Football team fielding mostly foreign players in this “passionate game” (as roaring used it).
i know singapore slingers is planning to have Asian (South East Asian i think) League. if this happens, the other countries might send their National teams for trainings and exposure in international games. Like in Euro-League they might allow foreign players but they limit it to max of 3 i think.
Since this will be a international league like the Jones Cup, will it be complete (or satisfying) to brag that we won the championship if we field a team with lots of foreign player?
maybe that’s why roaring_red told us that in the long run Slingers line up is not good in the long run.
Amen Jan29
hi daphne. that was a funny post, and i was about to give you credit before i realized that your comment was plagiarized, not ‘inspired’. changing a mere single word does not make it your own piece of work. peace
on second check, i guess you did change more than one word. my mistake haha. as per literary etiquette, still a breach of intellectual property i must say…
turning to basketball, i think de ocampo did not intend to harm sandrin, but just wanted to stand there so eric would have a harder time getting his shot off. given that de ocampo was walking rather slowly beneath the basket, eric had plenty of time to change his plans from dunking to simply laying it in. in the final analysis, it seems de ocampo could have exercised wiser judgment, while eric would have saved himself some back pain with a simple adjustment. just my two cents.
as for philippine basketball, i believe there is much to learn from australian as well as european players. despite the lack of height, filipinos do have the talent. but there is just too much emphasis on one-on-one plays and dribbling; i guess they idolize the american players too much. at the end of the day, they will be better served if they supplement their current skill set with some screening, spacing, and better outside shooting. a foreign coach would certainly bring in a new perspective.
the footballers in the english premier league aren’t all english.
’nuff said.
as for singapore basketball, the first order of the day should constitute improvement in local officiating, at least a core group of class A referees. this way, games are played fairly and consistently, and newcomers to the sport can learn the correct rules. the officiating during the game vs purefoods simply does not make the grade. there were numerous bad calls against both teams. this completely disrupts the game and can threaten the credibility of the results. for a country that prides itself on justice and order, nothing less that top-notch officiating is acceptable.