Happy Birthday, Chris Jackson ( Jan 22 )

Chris Jackson..JUST LIKE ANY OTHER YOUNG basketball player, he too had dreams. He dreamed of playing with the best cagers on earth in the NBA; but he did not hang on to that dream and became more realistic. After all there were a lot more better 6-3 and below cagers than him in US of A. Then he turned his dream to the CBA and tried out with some teams, but sorry, no go. He was not signed up by any team. Did he give up? No, he simply shifted the venue of his dream and look forward to playing in Australia, but alas and alack, his supposed to be team decided to sign up a bigger player than him. And that was the time when Christopher John Jackson at 25, quit and decided to work in the corporate wc becoming a Supervising Manager for Roadway Ex-i press, a freight company in California. But the basketball bug bit him after only

six months of no organized basketball. Also, he had been hearing about a professional basketball league in the Philippines, a country that was not foreign at all to him. After all, he is a half-Filipino, his mom hailing from Legaspi in Bicol who married a US Air Force man then stationed in Clark Air Base in Pampanga. In fact, if not for a delayed flight, he almost became a natural-born Filipino. We suppose by this time you know that we are talking about Sta. Lucia's blue collar rookie player, Chris Jackson. "My mom was coming to the Philippines early 1994 to visit my grandmother, so what we did was to synchronize our schedule and came here together January last year. I've heard of the PBA already and I was looking forward to playing in the league but people told me I had to play first in the PBL and I tried to but I wasn't allowed because of my American citizenship. Fortunately, in the last conference last year,

PBL allowed Fil-American like me to play, at almost the same time that I got my Filipino citizenship in September," Chris, 27, related. He hooked up with Chowking and did well, enough to land among the top five in the PBL's MVP race, "I was pleased with how I did in the PBL and having watched PBA games last year, I realized I had what it takes to play in this league, though I know I had to give up my American citizenship. Otherwise no PBA team can draft me. I was sure no team would get me as an import." Drafted fourth overall by Purefoods, Chris got pretty excited about playing with the team, "I really wanted to play with Alvin (Patrimonio) and Jerry (Codinera) whom I

believe were among the best in their respective positions and I thought I could really help the team by relieving the two. Then I was told I was going to be traded to Sta. Lucia and I looked at how I will do with this team. I've seen the team play and I've even practiced with them and I realized that the team had the potential. Jun (Limpot) and Gerry (Esplana) just needed to be supported and I knew Dennis (Espino) was going to play for them. Then they also got other young, talented rookies and I became excited about this team."