The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedis.net

WITH the forum created by Best Events and Sports management team during the Meet & Greet for Minister of Sports Mario Bowleg, the sporting associations and federations got to express their grievances over the state of sports in the country in the COVID- 19 environment.

BES’ husband and wife founders Tommy and Makeva Wallace-Stubbs provided the opportunity on Saturday at the Fusion Superplex in what turned out to be the largest gathering of sporting personalities to discuss the plight of sports in the country.

Varel Davis, the president of the Government Secondary Schools Sports Association, said as a physical education teacher for at least 20 years, it’s a bit discouraging to know that there is no after-school sporting activities for the past two years for the student-athletes.

“We know how important sports is to our students, especially those in the government schools,” said Davis, who is a physical education teacher at CH Reeves Junior High School. “Two years now, we have been fighting and praying that something would work out for our kids.

“They are our kids. They are ready to engage in after-school sports. Everybody knows how important sports are. Just like education, they go hand-in-hand. So we really need to get our kids back out there because if they don’t, we know that they can find ways to be idle.”

She said she’s hoping that through this forum, they can find ways and means to engage the student-athletes into wholesome sporting activities because they can’t get much done online. She noted that they are tired of trying to find ways to do everything virtually and looking forward to the day when they can return to face-to-face competition.

“Hats off to my coaches who have been able to engage in virtual activities for the kids who came to them,” she stressed. “Again, we haven’t done anything in two years. And if we don’t do anything, how can we feed our national team programme? So we need to get high school sports up and running, I’m hoping that this is the year that we will be able to do it.”

Evon Wisdom, the sports director in the Ministry of Education, offered his dedication to Patricia ‘Pattie’ Johnson, who has devoted her life to coaching so many young girls through her coaching at HO Nash Junior High School. He noted that she’s now in need of assistance as she recovers from her illness.

Wisdom advised the sporting personalities in the room at Fusion Superplex to give “respect where respect is due.”

He noted that it doesn’t matter whether one likes the person or not, when one considers what Johnson did, she, along with others like Cynthia ‘Mother’ Pratt, deserves the credit that is due.

He noted that over the years, the efforts of a lot of Bahamian coaches have produced some wealthy Bahamian athletes, who have now become multi-millionaires and are doing much better than many of those that they have left behind.

Wisdom revealed how NBA player Chavano “Buddy” Hield has secured a new basketball floor to put down in a gymnasium in his hometown of Grand Bahama, but they can’t do it because they have to first find the funding to repair the roof.

“If we don’t catch up and understand what is going on, we will be left behind,” said Wisdom, alluding to the fact that young baseball players are signing more and more professional contracts here and there is still no completion of the new baseball stadium on site.

“Baseball is out there, basketball is coming. What’s the next sport. Track and field has been doing it for years with professional athletes. What are we doing to enhance that.”

With high school sports officially on hold, Wisdom said one physical education teacher told him that she felt like two buses ran over her, one that hit her and one that reversed and hit her again because of the plight of the sports programme.

“We have to listen to what the health experts are saying,” he charged. “It is for your safety. One of the first persons in sports who died from COVID-19 was a primary school coach. We don’t know how he got it. But we take this challenge very seriously and so high school sports are on hold.”

Wisdom said his ministry is proposing that the schools begin competing in the non-contact sports like golf, tennis, swimming, track and field and chess in championship forms in the first instances and in the second phase, they can look at the other kids they can stage in a safe environment.

Mario Ford, a veteran all-around player who began coaching at the age of 14, two years after he returned home from travelling with the men’s national basketball team as a bat boy at 12, said he too is feeling the effects of COVID-19 with his Mario Ford Baseball programme he has conducted on Windsor Park since 1986.

“The state of baseball as we see it now, is not what it used to be,” he said. “We have lost almost three or four generations of players, but thanks to Freedom Park, JBLN, myself and other persons like Michael Butler, who have gone out to seek ways to keep baseball alive in this country.

“My programme was developed from scratch. I think players off the street, who have no idea about the way, are using whatever resources I have from whatever other resources I can get to help some of these kids to go on further, either to college or to the pros,” he said.

“I think we need to look at the bigger picture and that is educating these kids through sports because we have a lot of kids on the streets not doing anything. That’s where most of the talent is. We need to come together and start being selfish and give these young kids the structure.”

Ford called on all of the sporting bodies to come together and find ways where they can collectively work on developing a sustainable programme to assist the young people on the streets, who are not doing anything positive.

Rochelle Kemp, representing the New Providence Basketball Association, said they too are faced with the challenge of when they will resume competition and they are working on their plans, but they’re still optimistic that something will happen very soon.

And New Providence Softball Association president Desiree Taylor said after not playing in two years, they are finding the requirements to resume competition a little too stringent, so she’s not able to say when they will be able to resume play as well.

“There’s a baseball tournament that is being played here in June or July and they’re currently having the fields rearranged for that,” she said.

“So when softball will start, night league that is, I am not sure.

“The WBSC mandates that persons under them to have protocols established where teams will have to take a COVID--19 test prior to the start of play, officials have to take tests prior to the start of play and I don’t see that happening right now because it’s going to be costly to the sponsors and the league.”

With the league normally playing three nights a week, Taylor said it would mean that at least two teams will have to be tested twice before they can and that is where their main problems lie. She noted that the players want to play, but it’s going to be too costly at this time.

“Once we can get this pandemic under control, meaning everyone does their part, then we will be able to start by establishing the right protocol,” she said.

“But we all need to do our part to get it together so we can have softball and every other sport playing again.”

Jennifer Dotson-Isaacs, the first vice president of the Bahamas Softball Federation, said as sporting leaders, they have to realise that COVID-19 is here and it’s not going anywhere so they have to learn to live with it.

“We have to adapt and to do whatever is necessary to resume sports by working closely with the Bahamas Olympic Committee, the Ministry of Youth, Sports and Culture and the Ministry of Health in establishing the different protocols in our particular areas,” she stated.

She suggested that the sporting bodies come together with a diverse plan to raise funding rather than keep going to the government to furnish their programmes when it’s obvious that they are not in a position to do so.

“Funding is critical to all of our organisations and it is something that we have to look at closely in restarting sports so that we won’t lose a whole generation of athletes,” she summed up.

Teddy Sweeting, the secretary general of the Bahamas Baseball Association, commended Prime Minister Philip ‘Brave’ Davis for appointing Bowleg as the minister of sports and he asked for every organisation to support him as he works to move sports forward.

Sweeting, however, said that Bowleg can leave his legacy by forming a committee that will look at sport funding to assist all of the sporting bodies, especially as it relates to ensuring that the national teams are able to travel when they have to without having to worry about funding.

“Leave a legacy. When you walk away 10-15 years down the line, when individuals come along, one thing they can say is Mario Bowleg put legislation in place for sports funding,” Sweeting said. “We need it.”

Sweeting said the sporting leaders must stop all of the talking and come together and assist Bowleg by forming a committee that will provide some plans to finalise sports funding for our athletes in the country.

Adam Watehouse, the chairman of the Bahamas Rugby Football Union and a physical education teacher at Queen’s College, said he shares in the frustration of not having sports played in the schools.

But he noted that rugby is also experiencing the same pain.

“We have not had any competition in the past two years, so we are suffering from not being able to participate in any international competition,” he said. “We have sent a beach team over to Florida to participate in a tournament and they did very well, winning all of their games.”

Watehouse said the Bahamas is still poised to be a major sporting destination for international competitions as it has done in the past, but he also called for a collective effort to ensure that everything is in place to achieve these goals.

Kyle Chea, president of Nassau Rowing Club, said they had an opportunity to host a number of international athletes at Lake Kennedy and they have gone home and are encouraging their peers to come to the Bahamas to stage their training sessions. Chea said they will be looking at working closely with the GSSSA to get more of their athletes to come out and participate in their activities free of charge with the view of being able to earn athletic scholarships available through the sport.