...the World baseball qualifier

Philippines defeats Thailand in World Baseball Classic qualifiers opener

By Celest R. Flores
INQUIRER.net

Thursday, November 15th, 2012

Philippines opens up WBC qualifiers with a win. PHOTO FROM WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC TWITTER ACCOUNT

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippines got off to a good start with an 8-2 romp of Thailand in the World Baseball Classic qualifiers opener Thursday.

Ranked 34th in the world, the Filipinos overwhelmed the youthful Thais—who even had Major League Baseball (MLB) veteran Johnny Damon in their roster.

The Philippines—a first timer in the qualifiers—scored three runs in the fourth inning to take a 3-1 lead, and never looked back from there.

The Philippines faces the victor in the Chinese Taipei-New Zealand clash at the New Taipei City in Taiwan.

Thailand opened with its first run in the first inning, but did not score again until the ninth inning.

The remaining two teams at the end of the double-elimination tournament play each other to determine the winner of the qualifiers.

...the gold diggers

SEA Games: Philippine men’s baseball, rowing teams strike gold

By Celest R. Flores
Philippine Daily Inquirer

Sunday, November 20th, 2011

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippine men’s baseball team, which bucked funding woes to get to Indonesia, delivered a gold medal for the country in the 26th Southeast Asian Games.

The baseball squad bucked adversity and raced to a 2-0 win over Indonesia in the finals Sunday behind an overall effort and clutch pitching from ace Darwin de la Calzada.

The Filipino clouters almost didn’t make it to the biennial competition because of lack of funding from the Philippine Sports Commission. They were only given the green light after a businessman, Marty Eizmendi, came to the rescue of the team.

Meanwhile, the Philippine dragonboat team also caught gold in the 20-man crew for the 500 meter traditional boat race with a time of 01:53.950.

The Filipino rowers edged Myanmar (01:54.120) and Thailand (01:56.210) for the title and also settled for silver in the standard men’s 500m race.

Alfie Catalan toppled his Indonesian rivals and claimed the 4000m individual pursuit title for the gold medal in cycling.

In weightlifting, Hidilyn Diaz took home the silver in the 58kg women’s category, which brought the Philippines’ medal haul as of 7 p.m. Sunday at 25-45-63 (gold, silver, bronze).

SEA Games: Sinag Pilipinas outclass Thailand to bag basketball gold

11/20/2011

GMA News

Sinag Pilipinas outclassed the Thailand squad on the back of a big second quarter run to win 85-57. - OMG, GMA News