it is barely a month to the opening of season 70 and, as some of you may already know, there already are a couple of controversies that are racking the UAAP. the first and earlier one concerns former baby tam soc rivera, a member of the graduating high school class of 2007, who had expressed his desire to play for UP at the seniors level. in so doing, many believe that FEU tamaraws team manager anton montinola had asked the UAAP board to adopt what is now known as "the soc rivera rule" to get back at the player. the rule, in a nutshell, requires a player coming from a UAAP high school who intends to play for another UAAP college to "redshirt" (i.e., not join the team for actual UAAP games) for his/her freshman year.

another controversy involves incoming king tiger jojo duncil, whose age is now under dispute. as a backgrounder, the UAAP requires that players must not be 25 years or older when the season begins in july. the problem, which has been percolating quietly since last year, is that jojo may have already turned 25 years old last january, rendering him in violation of the said rule. an article written by dennis eroa that appeared in last monday's (04 june 2007) issue of the inquirer-run tabloid libre said that two official sources for age verification -- the municipal civil registrar and the national statistics office (NSO) -- have listed two different birthdays for the king tiger, one on 13 january 1983 and the other on 13 january 1982 -- the latter date reported by the NSO, which is the standard source for identity verification in this country.

the soc rivera issue has largely died down, as coach joe lipa has already factored in the probability that soc may not be on his line-up next month by making the necessary adjustments. it has not, however, died down as far as some fans, notably lasallites, are concerned. there is no love lost between anton montinola and the lasallites, especially after the acrimonious championship series of season 68, which conferred a lifetime persona non grata status on DLRT asst. team manager manny salgado in any UAAP event. now, the lasallites have found the silver bullet with which they believe they can put away their favorite vampire who they believe stole the crown from them. clearly, though, sir anton is rightly perceived as being vindictive. some proposals have been put forward to protect players, who are more often than not from less-privileged backgrounds and who see hoops as a way to a more comfortable life, from being vulnerable to the machinations of team managers and school owners, who see their schools as their little kingdoms.

on the other hand, the jojo duncil issue is still considered a non-issue -- or at least the parties affected are trying their darndest to make it appear as such. but this could blow up in their faces, and throw the entire league into a tailspin. why is that so? quite simply, jojo has been registered at UST as a student all these years using any one of those two papers -- it cannot be both. if it's the one that says he was born in 1983, then well and good: he maintains his eligibility.

but what if it's the other?

Let's treat these controversies like the showbiz buzz of the Ruffa Gutierrez-Ylmas Bechtas marriage brouhaha and the Gretchen Barretto-John Estrada smooching caught on celphone camera. They are the talk of the town even in coffee shops.

These UAAP controversies will certainly spice up the forthcoming UAAP season.

I'm sure more will follow for this season. Abangan.

I want to bump this thread before the game on Sunday so regardless of the outcome people might start talking about Jojo Duncil again.

The guy has three birth certificates. One that says he was born in 1982. Another one that is the same as the first one but this time the 2 was made to look like a 3. The third one states he was born in 1983. This is very dubious.

Some people are saying that in any case, it's no harm no foul because he would have been eligible last year. I don't agree with this reasoning because the fact still remains that he could have been using fake documents all this time. That makes him no different from Benitez. Who knows Benitez could have eventually passed the PEP test or something.

I am not bringing this up because I want UST to return the championship to Ateneo. Heck, even if that happened, I don't think Ateneo will accept it - Ateneo's track record when it comes to these things is proof of that. For Ateneo, UST won that game, end of story. It's just that I strongly feel that the UAAP board should let any school get away with anything especially since they had just suspended one and others should have already learned from that.

^ that is interesting to know.

and yes, there are a lot of issues and protests that came up.
even ateneo was a victim of that referee who was very partial for dlsu.
hope he never comes back, not even this thursday.