Mark Bavaro Featured In NFL Retrospective

Known for his grit for the Super Bowl-winning New York Giants, Mark Bavaro is being honored in a new feature released on the NFL website in the feature video section.  

Bavaro played football at  where he was a high school All-American.  

After a standout All-American career at the University of Notre Dame, Bavaro was drafted by the Giants in the fourth round in the 1985 NFL Draft.   

His hometown of Danvers holds Bavaro in the highest esteem, naming a street after him. Danvers has even held onto four manhole covers that his coach Ernie Smith acquired from the highway department for him to lift in the Danvers High weight room because the weights were too light to accomodate.

A softspoken giant of a man, who in his prime stood at 6'4", 245 pounds, Bavaro gained a reputation for his resilience, playing through countless injuries over the course of his career.

Former track athlete Pattie Debie fondly remembers her teammate: "I remember him as being very quiet, and he always wore this brown leather hat everywhere. He was just as awesome in track as he was on the football field."

"I remember during indoor track practice Mark jumping the hurdles with a football tucked in his arm," she said. "I don't ever remember the coach saying anything about it. If Mark wanted to run the hurdles with a football, they were going to let him. I think people knew they were watching someone pretty special."

For many years, Bavaro ran a youth football summer camp in his hometown with his younger brother David, who also played four years in the NFL. The Bavaro Brothers Football Camp is now being held at Austin Prep in Reading.