The landscape of Filipino esports is where it is today thanks to the efforts of people like Boss Jab.
It’s 2026 and Jab Escutin has had a busy year coordinating with various Filipino Esports organizations and groups, helping them prepare for what lies ahead. As the general manager of SIBOL, the national esports team of the Philippines, he’s constantly splitting his attention between different international events while keeping his ear to the ground for potential new prospects.
“The way that I look at my responsibilities is that I have to be always looking forward,” said Jab Escutin to The GAME. “So that I can confidently say that this is the best decision we made based on the resources we had.”
This philosophy has carried Jab quite far in his career. He has a clear vision of what the Filipino esports athlete should be. And with the help of like-minded peers, Jab was able to shape Philippine esports to what it is today.
Rooted in the Arcades
A common stereotype for people in esports is that they have a background in tech or a related field. Jab, however, came from hotel and restaurant management and had a pretty standard 9 to 5 job before diving into the world of esports. Everyday he would go to a small arcade in Glorietta after work, playing Street Fighter with other competitive players.
He learned pretty quickly that he didn’t have what it takes to be a pro but he still wanted to be involved in his local community.
“I realized that no one was really taking video footage,” said Jab Escutin. “I would tell everyone that I’d be recording every Friday and that got people excited. They wanted to see their own fights, see how they were doing. So that’s how I started and eventually I was able to invest in better equipment. That’s around the time YouTube and Twitch were getting big so everybody was interested in building the community.”
From there, Jab was able to add value and grow his community beyond the arcade. He emerged as the ‘community guy’ and from recording videos, he was soon organizing and managing tournaments.
“Lahat ng mga opportunities na dinadaan ng tao ngayon, I went through it. I was an organizer, broadcaster, I even used to do my own productions. I can even say I was probably one of the first people in the Philippines to buy a capture card. I invested in it because hindi mo mastre-stream ‘yung console games kung wala kang capture card.”
The image of the Filipino esports was still pretty nebulous back then, but even then Jab had an inkling of what was needed to make it real. The esports scene can’t exist just from talented players playing a video game really well. There has to be a level of quality and, above all, professionalism added to it — something that Jab would realize through a now-iconic venture.
Defining the Filipino Esports Athlete
In 2017, Jab Escutin and Bernard Chong co-founded Bren Esports, a name that many old school esports fans remember fondly. Jab didn’t decide to establish Bren Esports just for fun however. He saw it as an opportunity to fix the biggest problem in Filipino esports at that time.
“Everybody wanted to be an esports athlete, but I got so frustrated because nobody understood what contracts are. Owners and athletes were getting scammed left and right. It was the wild, wild west back then. Nobody was putting in the effort to change the culture or the mindset,” Jab recalled.
“My goal was to make everyone understand what a professional esports athlete should be. I would tell everyone who shared our vision that this was going to be a long and hard road because we were changing how these guys operate. We had backing and prominence, but some would say we were also very antagonistic. The players liked us because we treated them well, but other owners saw us as a threat.”
Professionalism and integrity had to be the standard in esports if it wanted to grow and be taken seriously. This was something that Jab never compromised on — no shortcuts or sidestepping, you follow your contract, you follow the process. This meant extra work for esports teams and organizations but that’s what esports needed for it to thrive.
And it’s not like Jab was hoarding the secret of how to run an esports organization to himself. He was more than ready to help other players and managers, teach them the best practices that he’s learned after years of growing his own small niche community.
“Okay lang sila magalit sa akin, pero kailangan din nila matuto and I’m willing to help. Because if everyone improves, then that just benefits the entire community,” said Jab Escutin.
A Bigger Role as SIBOL General Manager
Now, as the General Manager of SIBOL, Jab’s focus is on a much larger scale. He’s not just looking at one esports community but several others, preparing them to represent the Philippines in international competitions. He’s applied his policies to the process of building our national team and so far it’s produced results.
“Ang lagi ko sinasabi is as long as I’m here, I’d give the opportunity to everybody. I don’t want to handpick or give favors. So that’s why I proposed that there has to be a national qualifier. It has to be something that anyone can join.”
The SIBOL national qualifiers has players in their particular esport play against each other in order to see who gets the opportunity to represent the country in an upcoming international event. A new qualifier is held for every event so it’s not unlikely that the national team will be composed of different players for different events.
SIBOL has drawn criticism for this process, in part because it’s another layer of commitment and work for esports athletes. Some fans also don’t see the point of the qualifiers when you can just get the best players and teams to represent the Philippines. But Jab points out that esports can be very volatile. A team that’s good today might not be in the future because of an update or change in the game. It always goes back to his guiding philosophy of doing the best with what you have.
And honestly, nowadays he doesn’t have to worry about lack of choice.
“One of the best things I’ve heard was from one of the Saudi princes when they were giving a presscon. He said ‘in the last five years, nobody has been born where esports competitions wasn’t the norm.’ So right now, walang pinapanganak thinking ‘uy, bago ‘to‘,” Jab reflected.
“Everybody can now see on TV, on livestreams, that this is normal, this is happening. So the best thing to happen to esports is for people to see it and think it’s another sport. Hindi ka na nagugulat, hindi na siya historical, it’s an everyday thing na.”
That to Jab Escutin is the endgame for esports, where people can accept it as part of life. Esports athletes share the same prestige as regular athletes, possibly even dropping the distinction altogether. If that world were to exist, then Boss Jab can probably help make it happen. He’s already laid the groundwork for the modern Filipino esports athlete, so the path to the future is looking bright.
Banner image from SIBOL on Facebook.
Frequently Asked Questions
Jab Escutin is the general manager of SIBOL, the Philippines’ national esports team, overseeing player selection, international event preparation, and coordination across the country’s various esports organizations, communities, and prospective athletes ahead of major upcoming international competitions.
Jab Escutin and Bernard Chong co-founded Bren Esports in 2017 to professionalize Filipino esports, introducing formal player contracts and industry standards at a time when athletes and team owners were frequently exploited without any formal agreements in place.
SIBOL uses national qualifiers, open to any eligible player, to select the roster for each international esports event, since a team’s strength can shift quickly due to a game update, ensuring the Philippines always fields its most competitive available lineup.
Before esports, Jab Escutin worked in hotel and restaurant management and played Street Fighter at a Glorietta arcade, where he began filming and organizing local matches, work that eventually grew into managing tournaments and, later, national esports team leadership.
Yes. Jab Escutin insists players and teams follow formal contracts and professional standards, a philosophy he says reduced exploitation in Filipino esports and helped shape modern expectations for how esports athletes should be treated and managed by their organizations.
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