Family says hard work got Eagles lineman, North Rowan HS grad to Super Bowl

EAST SPENCER, N.C. — It almost feels like yesterday when Eagles defensive lineman Javon Hargrave first made his mark in East Spencer.

His path included North Rowan High School, where he was named Defensive Player of the Year twice, along with South Carolina State University and now as a member of the Philadelphia Eagles, a trip to the Super Bowl.

“He would just dominate, man,” said his father, Timothy Bates. “He would have a ball.”

Hargrave’s uncle George Bates joked that he predicted the moment.

“I said Pro Bowl last year, Super Bowl this year,” George Bates said with a smile. “Little did I know it came to pass.”

“Since he was a child, we always wrote down his goals before every football season,” added his uncle Kenneth Bates, who served as his first professional trainer. “We would sit there, we would check off ‘did you accomplish these goals?’”

“To see the man he is now and just to see his body, just to see how big and strong he is, that’s a lifetime of work,” he added.

Timothy Bates, considers the moment surreal, especially given the hurdles he’s witnessed his son overcome.

“It was always one thing that they would say – (Youth Football League), he’s too big and so he should beat everybody, middle school and high school, he’s from the 1A Conference,” Bates said. “South Carolina State is not the big school so he should dominate there.”

“Javon, whatever that one thing was, he was always willing to do that one more thing,” his father said.

And here he is facing one more thing again: The Super Bowl.

“Super Bowl week. God almighty,” Timothy Bates said, laughing. “It’s sinking in.”

His uncles George and Kenneth Bates added jokingly, “Oh it’s going to be a good one, because we want to go to Disney World!”

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