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For a basketball-crazed country like the Philippines, welcoming hoops royalty like Carmelo Anthony onto its shores constituted a historic moment. There was no venue more fitting to introduce the newly minted FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023 Global Ambassador than Araneta Coliseum, which hosted the country's most iconic global sporting event, the Muhammad Ali-Joe Frazier bout dubbed the “Thrilla in Manila”, nearly 50 years ago.
Melo didn't need a history lesson when he walked in.
“I felt it,” Carmelo Anthony said when asked about the history behind the venue he was fielding questions in last February 24.
“I felt like I was Ali walking in. I'm like one of the biggest Ali fans. The way that you guys love basketball over here, I love Ali. For me to come into this arena knowing and understanding the history that took place in this building with him in the ‘Thrilla in Manila' puts a lot of things in perspective for me. I just checked this off my bucket list.”
Melo in Manila 🇵🇭 #FIBAWC
IN PHOTOS: Fiba names Carmelo Anthony as its newest global ambassador in a ceremony held in Araneta
📸 Jerome Ascano using Sony A1 with 70-200mm F/2.8 pic.twitter.com/8eFjFB45tI
— SPIN.ph (@spinph) February 24, 2023
It's the same venue that hosted fellow NBA icon and Melo's close friend Kobe Bryant during several of his visits to Manila in years past. From those visits, Melo said that the Los Angeles Lakers legend “raved” to him about the locals' passion for the game of basketball and their affinity for the ambassadors who pushed and continue to push the game forward.
“Having somebody like my brother Kobe who raved about the Philippines and kept telling me, ‘you have to get there, you have to get there. They love you.' I took him up on that and to be sitting here across from his mural right in front of me, it says a lot and it means a lot.
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The ambassador mantle was one Bryant carried with pride, which Anthony has grown ever cognizant of as he takes on the role himself.
“It's special to kind of follow what Kobe has created on a global scale from basketball. For me to just follow and continue and keep that legacy going, not just for myself, not just for US, but also for him, too. He would have definitely been here with me watching these games and come over here to the Philippines and just enjoying himself,” said Carmelo Anthony on continuing what Kobe Bryant started.
Melo, who donned the Lakers' purple and gold last season just like Bryant did, shared the court with him during Team USA's legendary Redeem Team run during the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The gold medal he helped secure then was the first of three he'd eventually win en route to becoming one of the most celebrated international basketball figures in history.
Despite an international resume already overflowing with accolades, Anthony came into the Manila FIBA visit not just as a basketball figurehead, but as an open-minded emissary ready to take in all that the Philippines had to offer him in terms of widening his global perspective on the game.
“I love the conversations that I'm having with the local people. I'm also learning about the Philippines as well. I think for me, coming from as far as I came, I didn't want to come over here and think that I know everything. … I wanted to see what it is to be a true Filipino. I think being over here now, speaking the game of basketball and talking the game of basketball, and understanding that there's not a lot of fans like the Philippines nowhere in the rest of the world.”
