I’M A PROFESSIONAL operating in an amateur world. No, honestly. There’s just not a more apt description for a journalist covering sports in Barbados when one considers that more often than not, mine is one of the very few roles being paid full-time in the local sporting arena.
It’s a domain typically run by devout volunteers governing talented but generally ill-fated part-timers.
So unless you’re in cricket and horse racing (neither of which I cover extensively) then chances are you don’t see a cent from Barbadian sports.
Hence, in the loosest of senses, I am indeed a professional functioning in an amateur setting.
I’m constantly reminded of it too, having often to rely on the whims and fancies of officials who aren’t financially- or contractually-obligated to perform tasks that are quite pertinent to my news gathering.
Yet the biggest tell-tale sign of this amateur world isn’t the inability to complete said jobs, but rather the insistence on pointless justifications when they aren’t done.
Because professionals don’t bring excuses, they deliver results.
At least they’re expected to.
If you take your own job into consideration then you totally understand what I mean, unless of course you just happen to be in one of those occupations that continually allow you to explain to your boss why a certain role wasn’t carried out.
Yeah, probably not.
Heck, I can’t tell Mike King this column wasn’t written because I had no one to babysit my daughter/my laptop suddenly crashed/I caught chikungunya/it’s Christmas and there aren’t any sports going on.
Somehow, though, it’s acceptable for athletes to pin their non-performances on mechanical failures/illness/lack of preparation/absence of facilities/unfavourable conditions.
Yup, the latest abysmal showing at yet another international meet – namely the Central American and Caribbean Games – was greeted with more excuses from a Barbados contingent which never seems tired of rolling them out.
Well up to a couple weeks ago local squash president Craig Archer even got in on the act by stating this country’s athletes are at a disadvantage by coming up against full-time professionals at these games.
But as the kids say nowadays, “ain’t nobody trying to hear that”.
Before I go any further, let me first acknowledge that Archer’s sport is one of the few disciplines not caught up in this web of excuses, having won at least one medal at three successive CAC Games.
They have no pros, no doubles court, no full-time coach and no need to apologise for their performances either.
So I find it strange Archer thought it necessary to come up with pitiful justification when his charges refuse to provide any.
Sure, it would help if Barbados had a cadre of professional athletes to choose from, but that’s no different from the situation in Aruba, Panama, Dominica, Cayman Islands, British Virgin Islands and St Lucia, and they all managed to get at least one gold medal.
Maybe the conditions were less than ideal for sailing and triathlon, but guess what, the weather was bad for everyone else and not just team Barbados.
Okay, probably we can concede the country views the CAC level as a developmental vehicle to introduce young athletes to international competition. Then again, doesn’t every other country too?
And if that’s the case, then why do certain disciplines continue to take “experienced” competitors to these meets instead of more promising youngsters only to complain that they’re facing full-time pros?
Did you only now figure that out?
But last I checked Karen Meakins and Gavin Cumberbatch aren’t full-time squash players either, yet they have a mixed doubles bronze medal all without a doubles court at home to practise on.
Swimmers Lani Cabrera and Christian Selby aren’t pros and that didn’t stop them from turning in personal bests after getting in the pool at 4:30 a.m. every day.
Hockey hasn’t had a turf to play on in years but their men were but minutes away from securing bronze in Mexico too.
Haydn Lewis apparently played with a balky back yet he and Darian King barely missed out on bronze medals in both the doubles and Nations Cup competitions as well.
I’m sure rising track stars Levi Cadogan, Greggmar Swift and Kierre Beckles could find legitimate excuses too if they weren’t busy getting medals.
You see anyone can come with an excuse.
True amateurs just think they don’t have to deliver anything else.
