Meet up-and-coming basketball star Jackson Connors. At only 5-years-old, he is drawing the attention of many for his skills, but more importantly for his unstoppable determination. Jackson was born without his right hand, but that has not slowed him down on the court one bit.
During the pregnancy, a 3-D scan revealed that Connor was missing his right hand. “We both started to cry and I looked over at the radiologist, she was crying. And it was pretty devastating for us,” said Jackson’s mother Rachel Roberge.
“At that point all of your expectations of what your child is going to do are not endangered, but you just don’t know,” said Jackson’s dad Skip Connors. “You think you’re going to have a son and you’re going to do all the things that I did with my dad when I was growing up, baseball, basketball. And you think, ‘How is that going to happen now without a hand?'”
Jackson asks his parents, “Is my hand gonna grow?” They respond, “No, that’s the way God made you and that’s what you have.” Skip reveals his son’s inspirational outlook, “He may have gotten a little sad once in awhile, but he bounces right back. He looks at what he has and what he can do versus what he doesn’t have and what he can’t do.”
Jackson calls his right hand his “special hand.” And that special hand is already crossing people over at 5-years-old and his coach says he has “off-the-charts dribbling.”
To encourage his son Skip has been showing him footage of other one-handed athletes such as Kevin Laue from Manhattan, Zach Hodskins at Florida and when Jackson was two-years-old he met MLB pitcher Jim Abbott.
Jackson has basketball in his blood, his dad played ball at UMass. That continues with Jackson who loves playing basketball and has been a Wildcats fan since he was 2-years-old.
This little bro was able to attend a Wildcats practice where he received some special advice from Kentucky coach John Calipari. “I’ve known Jackson since he was born, and I don’t even think Jackson knows that Man, I’m a little different.'” Calpari told Bleacher Report. “I think he looks at this and he doesn’t see it as something that is gonna hold him back. That’s what makes this great and unique.”
What if the world had the positive perspective of this young boy?