Numbers Game

    While the Philippine Olympic Committee (POC), and sports "journalists" who couldn't be bothered to do research all hailed the appointment of Richie Garcia as the new Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) Chairman, my stomach churned nervously.  Recently, the joint POC-PSC task force announced that the Philippines could send as much as over 200 athletes to this year's Asian Games.  While people see Garcia's appointment bringing about peace between the POC and the PSC and the eventual improvement of Philippine Sports, I only see more disappointment.  While that makes me sound like an old curmudgeon with, wait for it, "crab mentality,"  I'm backing it up with numbers.



     The present leadership of the POC began its reign (of terror) mid 2005, and during that time, they enjoyed a favorable partnership with the PSC, which had the admirable but entirely too-friendly William Ramirez until 2009.  With the proverbial "peace" between the two groups, the POC were able to dictate how many and which athletes got to compete.  This supposedly is "good for Philippine Sports," so, I took a look at all the regional competitions to check our efficiency.  I created two formulas, one for overall efficiency and one for gold medal efficiency.  My constants will be as follows:  Gold Medal = 3 points; Silver Medal = 2 points; Bronze Medal = 1 point


Overall Efficiency (OE) Formula

(Gold Medallists X3) + (Silver Medallists X 2) + (Bronze Medallists X 1) 

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Athletes sent

Gold Medal Efficiency (GME) Formula

Number of Gold Medals

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Number of Athletes Sent 

Here are the numbers from regional tournaments from 2005-08:


2005 Manila SEA Games - 743 athletes sent, winning 113 golds, 84 silvers, 94 bronze  
OE: 80.88%, GME: 15.20%


2007 Thailand SEA Games - 620 athletes sent, winning 41 golds, 91 silvers, 96 bronze  
OE: 64.67%  GME: 6.61%


2006 Asian Games - 233 athletes sent, winning 4 golds, 6 silvers, 9 bronze 
OE: 14.16%  GME: 1.72%


2007 Asian Indoor Games - 79 athletes sent, winning 1 gold, 2 silvers, 3 bronze  
OE: 10.13%  GME: 1.27%


2008 Olympics - 15 athletes, winning nothing
OE: 00.00%  GME: 00.00%

     As the numbers show, overall efficiency got progressively worse the longer the POC had total control of which and how many athletes were sent.  Interestingly, in 2009, then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo made an unpopular but warranted decision to "stop the bleeding" by appointing Harry Angping to the PSC.  A former congressman, Angping had enough gumption to challenge the POC's choices, preferring to save money and send only what he deemed were athletes with real chances to win.  His decisions led to a war against POC and its (ring) leader Peping Cojuangco.  POC apologists, Cojuangco and sports "journalists" who couldn't be bothered to do research, all pointed to this war as the main cause of the degradation of Philippine Sports.  Did the war really wreak havoc?  I let the numbers tell us:   


2009 SEA Games - 251 athletes (153 by PSC) - winning 38 golds, 35 silver, 51 bronze  
OE: 93.62% GME: 15.14%  


2009 Asian Indoor Games - 16 athletes, winning 1 gold, 4 silvers, 5 bronze  
OE: 87.50% GME: 6.25%


     As the numbers show, both the OEs and GMEs during the supposed debilitating PSC-POC war were significantly better than when "peace" reigned.  It gets even better when I looked deeper.  One of the highlights (or "lowlights") of the PSC-POC war was the PSC sending only 153 athletes, while the POC forcibly sent another 98 using money from private sponsors. As it turned out, 34 out of the 38 golds were won by the original 153 sent by the PSC.  With that development, the PSC team of athletes' GME is actually 22.22% while the POC team of athletes' is 4.08%.  Huh. Imagine that.


    I stink at Math.  I mean, there are those that suck at Math, but me?  I absolutely stink at it.  It, however, doesn't take a genius to do these numbers and realize what I came up with.  With the POC and the PSC at peace again, we're in for more disappointment and pitiful efficiency.