I LIVE in a results-oriented world.
It’s a take on life that has stuck with me since Adrian Sealy explained to me the high value of production in basketball, and by extension, life in general.
Essentially, you can look good trying to do something or sound even better explaining it, but all that means nothing without results to show.
So explaining big story ideas to my editor is worthless without writing exclusive pieces.
Clubs acquiring talented players is insignificant without winning.
And a Minister of Sport constantly talking about a national sports development policy is hollow without enacting the policy.
Or even without developing sportsmen.
Nowhere was that more evident than last week when it was discovered several of our elite and emerging athletes are yet to receive a single cent of funding in yearly grants from the National Sports Council (NSC) and the Barbados Olympic Association (BOA).
Grants for some
Now in fairness to Minister of Sport Stephen Lashley, and his right-hand man, NSC interim CEO Jerry Blenman, it has since been revealed there are some sportsmen who have received grants.
No less than pro sprint hurdler Kierre Beckles said as much.
Blenman has even gone on to disclose that the NSC has disbursed $90 000 in requested grants for the year already.
But again, revealing such a figure is really empty.
I know of elite sportsmen who haven’t received what they have been promised by either body when their results deserve oh so much more.
So what’s the sense coming out and saying that athletes have indeed been given grants when you know full well that most of them haven’t?
Telling the media that there are indeed a group of athletes you have “paid” is particularly pointless to the sportsman who didn’t get a cent to shell out for coaching, training, travel and medical bills.
Even the $90 000 figure itself is worthless if you take into consideration that there’s a total of $2 million in annual requested grants.
To be fair to Lashley again, I think he tried to acknowledge the mess by saying he requested that there be a joint commission between the NSC and BOA so as to regularise the allocation of funding.
However, that too is quite meaningless if the two bodies literally don’t meet.
It’s the fourth month of the year already and that joint commission is yet to happen to decide which athletes are eligible for funding and how much they are entitled to.
I can’t speak for the monies because I don’t know these itineraries, but I do know the sportsmen and I can tell you off the top of my head just how many should be considered elite.
How hard could it really be to identify the elite athletes, considering this is tiny Barbados and not the big ole United States after all?
But if it really is that difficult, then start with the simplest route and look at the 12 Olympians plus Chelsea Tuach first. You shouldn’t go wrong from there.
On another note, though, I listened to Lashley explain the need for a national sports development policy and I was in total agreement.
He was absolutely right in saying issues such as high import duties on sporting equipment and the professionalisation of sports won’t change without enacting legislation in Parliament via that policy.
Guess what, though?
That policy was originally drafted in a 40-page document called the National Sports Strategic Plan that has sat on a shelf for at least five years without ever coming close to being enacted.
What’s the purpose of coming up with a policy to chart the way forward if you don’t effect it?
Talk shop
It’s just one big talk shop and that’s part of the reason why Barbados will never truly have a sporting culture.
We have this laid-back attitude and unproductive way of life where we feel that talking about doing something is actually getting a job done.
That’s why we have so many meetings in Barbados and executives who walk out of them with big smiles on their faces.
Could you imagine if Akela Jones said she was going to medal at the Olympics without actually trying to qualify for them?
What if Darian King told you he was going to crack the world top 100 players without playing ATP events?
But they can’t because sports are defined by results.
Darian gets ranking points by winning matches at tournaments.
Akela cops medals by winning races and events.
They live in a results-oriented world, and it’s time everyone else starts doing the same.
