'Pedring' gives NBA legend Drexler stormy welcome

MANILA, Philippines - Clyde Drexler, one of the NBA’s 50 Greatest Players of All Time, blew into town the other night – literally.

“It’s my first time here. I’ve heard great things about the Philippines. Finally, I’m here,” he told mediamen gathered before him at the Palladium.

“And what happens? You get a typhoon,” he said, smiling and drawing laughter from the audience that came to see the retired NBA superstar in the flesh.

“It’s a grand welcome by mother nature. I think it was the worst time to come. The wind just blew the plane in,” said Drexler.

He wasn’t that serious when he said it was the worst time to visit the country because in reality he said he was having a great time.

“Now that I’m here I can’t wait to come back. I didn’t know how nice the people are, your culture, the food, the sites. Nothing but great things,” Drexler added.

The 49-year-old member of the 1992 Dream Team that won the gold in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics is here for the NBA Madness.

It will be five days of fun for Drexler, and the bouncy members of the Orlando Magic and Portland Blazers’ dance group.

It started off with yesterday’s press conference and Team Spirit School Tour followed by today’s NBA Cares (Read to Achieve Basketball Clinic), tomorrow’s School Tour, Saturday’s NBA Madness Festival and Viewing Party leading up to Sunday’s final day at the SM Mall of Asia.

Solar Sports COO Peter Chanliong and NBA Asia senior manager Carlo Singson welcomed Drexler at the press conference, and the former was presented with a signed jersey.

Drexler said he’s having a grand time here, much more if the weather had fully cooperated.

“I had friends who played here before like Michael Young, and he spoke so well of your country for many, many years,” he said.

Drexler, a 6-foot-7 Hall of Famer, fielded questions from the press – from his most memorable days in the NBA leading up to his retirement, the greatest players he knew, and how well the NBA dancers were.

He also talked about winning the gold in the Olympics.

“It was phenomenal because some of the guys there were already legendary, like Patrick Ewing, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson,” he said.

Of course, there were Charles Barkley, Scottie Pippen, Karl Malone, John Stockton, David Robinson, Chris Mullin and Christian Laettner.

And Drexler.

“To be on the same team with them when you’re used to playing against them was different. And it was different because you were playing for your country,” said Drexler, who won an NBA title with the Houston Rockets in 1995.

“One is like a job and one is for your country. But both were pleasurable,” said the excellent golfer who’d a couple of 67s and 68s in different courses across the country.

He was asked who his favorite NBA players were of all time, and he said it was Julis Erving.

“I thought of him every night when I went to bed, and I tried to copy all his moves,” he said.

Lastly he talked about his retirement, and when he felt it was time to hang them up.

“It was when I started spending more time in the training room than in the court. That means your body is breaking down. My first nine years I never knew our trainers, I didn’t get taped or did anything. But by the last six years I knew them and their whole families,” he said.

Then he knew it was time to go, and retired in 1998, 15 years after being picked 14th overall by the Portland Trail Blazers.

Now he works as the Rockets’ color commentator.

“When you can’t play anymore, you just talk about it,” he said.