ESCONDIDO, Calif. — It was just after 8 a.m. on Tuesday when the black stretch limousine angled its way off Valley Parkway and through the twisting roads of a small apartment village.

This place seemed forgotten. Patches of its grass had been worn to dirt. Barbecue grills and old bicycles rusted in patios framed by strings of pumpkin lights. Paper skeletons faded on a front door.

A San Diego Chargers flag hung limply outside another.

Nobody was outside when Chargers Pro Bowl tight end Antonio Gates stepped from the limo, climbed up the stairs to Unit 18, the apartment with the blue and gold lightning bolts and the illuminated "Chargers Country" sign in its living room window.

Gates, wearing his dark blue No. 85 jersey, was there to do something special for the Cogdill family. It began when he knocked on the door.

"Hi, I'm Antonio," he told Shirley Cogdill, a mother of three. "I'm here to take Kristina to school."

For the past several years, Gates has volunteered for the NFL's "Take a Player to School" sweepstakes. He takes a randomly selected winner from the San Diego area to school in a limo, speaks to an auditorium of students, attends a class, gives the principal a big-check donation from program sponsor JCPenney and turns one young fan into the most popular kid on campus.

But this year was a little different, perhaps a little more personal for Gates, who didn't grow up with much in Detroit beyond a love for his family and for sports.

The Cogdill family doesn't have much. But they have their Chargers.

Team coasters, T-shirts, towels, mini-helmets, ballcaps, footballs, stickers and photos decorate the walls surrounding the 19-inch television in the living room where mother Shirley and her three children — Natalie, 16, Kristina, 13, and Justin, 9 — watch the Chargers play every Sunday.

"It all stays up year-round," said Shirley Cogdill, who entered her daughter's name in the contest on the NFL youth Web site, NFLrush.com. Out more than 77,000 national entries, Kristina and 33 other winners — one for each NFL market and two from out-of-market regions — were selected and paired with players.

"We were living in my sister's trailer when we got the call that Kristina had won," Shirley Cogdill said. "I couldn't believe it. We were so lucky."

Gates posed for more than two dozen pictures with the family and then autographed everything Chargers in the home. He would've signed the family dog, if they had asked. He was that happy to be there and make them smile.

Around 8:20 a.m., Kristina, a seventh-grader at Hidden Valley Middle School, put on a new Gates jersey, bundled up in a Chargers sweater and grabbed her schoolbooks. She was excited to take her first limousine ride and even a little nervous to be bringing a 6-foot-4, 260-pound NFL star in for show-and-tell.

The whole family rode in the limo with Gates, who offered them juice and water while he nibbled on baby carrots. When they arrived in front of Hidden Valley Middle School, hundreds of students lined the walkway leading to the front office.

"This is a big day for everyone," said Trent Smith, principal of the school with a 1,300-student enrollment. "We've never had a superstar athlete here."

Gates high-fived and bumped fists with students, moving through the crowd like a lead blocker in front of a shy but smiling Kristina. Teachers took pictures. Young boys and girls took shots with their cell phones.

In the school auditorium, Kristina stood on stage, beneath an arch of yellow and blue balloons, and introduced her new friend. Gates spoke to the students about the importance of being active.

"Get outside, walk the dog, walk the cat, cut the grass, run, do something," he said, promoting the NFL's Play 60 youth fitness program. "Exercise and fitness is good for your health and your heart."