Kleon Penn’s application denied!
According to the Basketball Federation of Puerto Rico, the request for the switch that had been approved by the BVI Basketball Federation, despite some members of that BVIBF Executive claiming outrage at that original decision, was turned down by FIBA General Secretary, Patrick Baumann.
Baumann rejected the application on the grounds that Penn’s departure "would weaken the development programmes for the BVI National teams”.
However, it is not clear what information Baumann had collected to make his statement as no such programmes seem to exist, nor is the National team as such. The BVI does not appear in the ranking of FIBA and is a certainly not a powerhouse in the Caribbean, failing to qualify for Centrobasket tournaments, which serve as the pathway into higher levels of competition.
The denial becomes even stranger when the main reason Penn gave for wanting to switch was to follow his dream of appearances in major tournaments like the World Cup or the Olympics. That dream has now vanished.
Penn, who was born in Fajardo but grew up on the island of Tortola, pledged his loyalty to the BVI Basketball Federation since 2007 when he debuted in the Caribbean Basketball Tournament held in Caguas.
Several months ago, though and after much discussion with family and friends, he decided to request a change, looking for better options in international basketball. His decision was supported by the Puerto Rican Federation, who included Penn in their preliminary list of 24 players for the FIBA Americas Championship in Venezuela.
Penn even attending training with the Puerto Rico national team.
"Its part of the process," Federation president Carlos Beltran lamented. "It was an initiative and we support him. I knew that anything could happen. I knew it was more difficult to approve the transfer of a player from there to our programme, rather than one from our programme to the British Virgin Islands," Beltran said.
Penn had also looked like the perfect candidate to replace veteran Daniel Santiago on the Puerto Rico starting lineup.
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17 Responses to “Kleon Penn’s application denied!”
Now if you can read verrrry well you will see that the application was denied by FIBA not BVIBF or family and friends. Beltran himself said he knew it was a long shot to change a status from a low ranking team to a higher ranked team.... This alone failed the transfer. He did not have to look for any other reason not to approved it.
We were selling out our player for equipment (balls) not a gym or a coach for 5 years.
Hope everything is much clearer now.....so please right comments with sense now.