Frank Gore

Franklin Delano "Frank" Gore (born May 14, 1983) is an American football running back currently playing (as of 2019) for the New York Jets of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for the University of Miami, and was drafted by the San Francisco 49ers in the third round of the 2005 NFL Draft, playing with them from 2005 to 2014. He is the 49ers all-time leader in rushing yards and rushing touchdowns.

• On Early Years:
  • "I know what I signed up for. I do not regret anything I’ve done. I never, never wish I did not play this game.”
  • "My neighborhood, Coconut Grove, we always played in the streets. It was corner against corner. We all had football teams. Different neighborhoods. My first year playing Pop Warner football, my mom had to change my birth certificate because I was too young. I was 5, I think, and you were supposed to be 6. My first time playing running back in a real game, I had eight touchdowns. I always loved football. For so long, I played against the older kids in the neighborhood. They had me really competing. I’d play corner, receiver, running back. I remember one time one of the older kids looked at me when I was playing corner, like it was a threat, and said: ‘You better not get beat.’"
  • "When I got to Coral Gables High, it felt like I was on a different level. You play Pop Warner, and you’re good, and all the top high schools try to get you. So I felt like I was pretty good. I got over 1,000 yards my sophomore year, but my coach got fired. At that time I wasn’t really working hard. I was good, but I didn’t lift weights. This new coach, Joe Montoya, basically called me out in our first team meeting. He didn’t give a s--- what I done to that point. He said, ‘I don’t care what you did before I got here.’ He told the guys things were gonna be different, and they better work hard, or they could get out right now. I felt like he called me out. I was about to leave. But then I met with him. He said, ‘Listen to what I say, and you’ll be a D-1 player.’"
  • "Good lesson. I listened to him. I got stronger and stronger, and I got faster. I was the first one at practice. I had to be first in every sprint. He had me programmed. I got better. My senior year, I rushed for 1,000 yards in my first four games. I wanted to play major-college football. Joe Montoya was really important. When I go back to Miami now, I call him. We have cookouts."

• On College Years:
  • “I had offers to go to different places. I committed to Ole Miss. I figured they just lost Deuce McAllister, and they needed a back, and I could play right away in the big conference. Eli Manning was the quarterback. We could win there. I loved [the University of] Miami, but they had a lot of backs at the time, and I wanted to play right away.
  • “That backfield at Miami … Clinton Portis, Willis McGahee, Najeh Davenport. [And Jarrett Payton, Chicago high school star and son of Walter.] One day, [Miami wide receivers coach] Curtis Johnson rolled up in front of my house. He challenged me. ‘You scared to compete? You scare of Portis? If you say you’re the best, you have to play with the best.’ That hit me. The night before signing day, I told my mom I didn’t want go to Ole Miss anymore. She didn’t want me to leave anyway. So I signed with Miami. I wanted to prove something to them. I got there and asked the coaches, ‘What do I have to do to play right away?’
  • “What did I learn at Miami? How to be a football player. There was a big lesson there. You can be talented, but having great talent isn’t enough. You have to work every day or someone will pass you up. Not only am I competing against McGahee, Portis and Najeh, but every day I gotta beat Ed Reed. I gotta beat Sean Taylor. Imagine practicing that first year against Ed Reed [a senior] and Sean Taylor [a freshman] and thinking, ‘I gotta beat those guys.’ You know how tough that was?
  • “My first time going to Miami to train, I was doing agility drills, I feel like I’m a man. I go against the LBs, I get smoked. All I can think is, Man, I must have come to the wrong place! How am I gonna win here? But I was so competitive, I would go home at night and do the drills myself to be ready for the next day. I had to get better, every day. I had to beat Ed Reed.
  • “At Miami I was up, I was down, I was written off, I had back-to-back [knee] injuries. When I was up, people wanted to be around me. When I was down, nobody’s around.’ What I went through in college made me the kind of worker, the kind of person, I am.
  • “Sean T? Man. Me and Sean were real close. How it happened was just sad, someone broke in his house. Killed him. [Taylor, then a Pro Bowl NFL safety with Washington, was shot by a burglar in November 2007 and he died from blood loss.] Tough. So tough. Great dude. We came in together. When you know him, he’ll give you the shirt off his back.
  • “That’s how I tore my first ACL, against Sean T. It was a nine-on-seven [practice drill]. I broke through the line, me and Sean one-on-one. I made a move, planted my leg, Sean collapsed with me, my leg went out. He is one of the best football players I have ever seen, anywhere. I love Sean T.”

• On Injuries:
  • “My first year, my rookie year at the 49ers, I had two labrum tears. Both shoulders. I had a chance to get the surgery before the season or play ball, and I told my coaches that I wanted to play and then get the surgeries. The reason was, when I came out [of college], everybody said I was injury-prone, and I just wanted to show them how tough I was and how much I love the game. That’s what that year was about. I got the surgeries after that first year in San Francisco. Both shoulders.
  • “After the surgeries, I respected Ronnie Brown, I respected Benson, I respected Cadillac. But I told people, ‘Once I get healthy I WILL NEVER be outrushed by any of those guys. No one in my draft class will ever outrush me again. That second year I proved that.
  • “How I did that … I don’t know. It’s not me. It’s God. God got me here. God and hard work. Respecting the game. Love, man. Love. Love the game. Love my teammates. Every time I get ready to strap up, show the world today that no one is better.”

• On Tenure with San Francisco 49ers:
  • “When [Jim] Harbaugh came to the Niners [in 2011], everything changed. His attitude basically was, We don’t give a F about anyone. Players, we loved that. Scot McCloughan basically built that team [as personnel director/GM for five years, starting in 2005], and it was a team of tough MF-ers. I respect coach Harbaugh a lot. We had a bunch of guys who loved football. Like at Miami.
  • “[In 2011], we started 2-1 and went to Philly to play the Dream Team. I didn’t even know I’d play that game. I hurt my ankle against Cincinnati [the previous week] and I couldn’t practice. I rehabbed, rehabbed, rehabbed. I went out there to see if I could go before the game. I got in the game, but it was a struggle. Down 17-3 at halftime, I think. Me and Patrick Willis looking around, trying to figure out what would happen. We’re in trouble, man. Coach Harbaugh didn’t think it was trouble. He just said, We gotta make adjustments. We will make adjustments. Strike fast. Change things up. We will win this game. So we went out there, scored right away. I was making some big runs. I made the winning run.”
  • “We go on in ’13 to beat Atlanta in the NFC Championship Game and make the Super Bowl. Best years of my life. I loved that team. Harbaugh, man, straightforward guy. If he thought you were full of s---, he’d tell you, and you’re not going to be on his team.

• On Tenure with Indianapolis Colts:
  • “I have loved it here. I miss San Francisco. I never wanted to leave. But I still think I get better as I go. Ask my boy Jack. [Tight end] Jack Doyle. I know what the defense is gonna do, always. I tell Jack. He changes his blocks for me."
  • “I just want to finish up strong here. Things haven’t gone as well as we hoped. But my plan is to play one more year. I want to play one more. I can help a locker room. I can help a team, just by the way I practice."
  • “But if this is it, if this is my last year [(2017)], I want everybody in the NFL to say, ‘He was a football player. Period.’"

• On Advice on Football, Life:
  • “Love the game. Love the game. Perfect your craft, every day. Look at all the guys who everyone says, ‘He’s the best one.’ And be better than they are."
  • “When I came in the league, I was thinking about the best guys. Not the best guys on my team—the best guys in the league. I was thinking about LT [LaDainian Tomlinson], Marshall Faulk, Portis, Larry Johnson … Thinking about how I wanted my name mentioned with them. What can I do to make that happen?"
  • “This was important to me … My first year [2005], late in the season, we beat the Rams. I had a long run in the fourth quarter to win the game. Marshall came up to me after the game. He said, ‘Keep working hard. You’ll be a special player in the league.’ Man, that was big. Marshall Faulk!"
  • “I started calling those guys. I wanted to know stuff from them. LT, Faulk, Edge [Edgerrin James]. Now it’s come around. What I am happy about now, young guys at my position—Derrick Henry, after we play the Titans, he comes up to me and says, ‘Damn, I want to train with you, man.’ Even coordinators. They say, You still got it."
  • “When I was young, I remember [former Niners fullback and coach] Tom Rathman said to me, ‘The only thing you should worry about is your peers’ respect.’ He’s right. If your peers respect you, you’re doing it right."
  • “No matter what your job is in your life, don’t listen to anyone who says you can’t do something. I can tell you: You can do it.”

• On Mortality:
  • “I don’t think about it. Like I said, I know what I signed up for. What happens, it was meant for my life. God got me, man. God got me.”

• Sports Illustrated Interview with Peter King - December 25, 2017 https://www.si.com

• On helping his mother beat drug addiction:
  • "I got up to use the bathroom," Gore said, "and I saw her using. That just stayed on my mind. I was probably a sophomore in high school. I sat down with her and said, 'Mom, why? [...] That was the day she started working at it," the Colts' veteran running back said. "And she got off those drugs. I had to have a real heart-to-heart with her."

• Reflecting on life and his NFL career:
  • "I've been through a lot. But I think it all happened for a reason. I think what I went through made me appreciate the game even more. Even life, really. I wasn't guaranteed to be here."

• On his mother's battle with kidney disease while he was in high school:
  • "During my junior year, she almost passed away," Gore said. "She was in intensive care. But she made it through. I remember we were playing against Miami Central in the playoffs. Usually I don't like going to the hospital. But I went up there and saw her with all these tubes coming out of her. I asked her, 'Mom, do you want me to play?' She shook her head like, 'Yes.' So, I went out there and I had a pretty good game."

• On his departure from the San Francisco 49ers:
  • "The only thing I was hurt by was that I thought we could have done it better," he said of his departure after 10 dedicated seasons. "Like, no bull----. Just straight up. I don't know if I even wanted to go back. But I would have felt better if we would have sat down and had a conversation. I mean, I was going to test the market no matter what. Me and the head coach (Jim Tomsula) talked and he basically told me I'd be in a certain situation. But I wanted to hear it from the GM (Trent Baalke)."
  • "I mean, you could let us compete. You didn't have to say I was automatically going to take the back seat. Put it on me. I mean, bro, I finished last season with 1,100 yards. Every time I got opportunities, I did something with it. So, I felt like, 'Fine, if you want to go with the young guy, (make him) beat me out. It wasn't like I can't play anymore. If he beats me out, I can handle that. You can't play this game forever. I knew I couldn't be there forever. But I was there 10 years and I played every down the same whether we were winning or not."
• On persevering through adversity:
  • "I've been through so much," Gore said. "I mean, after an ACL, you have to learn how to walk again, how to run again, you have to get your head strong again. That's why I appreciate this game. That's why I work so hard."
• IndyStar Interview with Stephen Holder - October 2, 2015 https://www.indystar.com

• On grief and losing his close friend, former teammate, and fellow NFL player Sean Taylor
  • “All the boys that come out of [Miami], we’re close. It’s tough. It’s like losing my brother.”
  • “I couldn’t believe it. It was scary, especially his getting shot in his house, and he was just there to get his knee checked, see what’s wrong with it.”
  • “Sean was a great football player and he loved the game. But a lot of people didn’t know that he was a great dude, too. He thought of me when my mom passed. Even when he left Miami early for the NFL and I was still in college, he’d still check on me. It’s just tough on me, losing my mom and now losing a friend who I played ball with in younger days.”
• East Bay Times Interview with Dennis Georgatos - November 29, 2007 https://www.eastbaytimes.com

• On Joining the Miami Dolphins:
  • "I’m happy to be on the Dolphins,” he said with a smile. “I don’t know how many years I’ve got left but I’m happy I’m back home."
  • "Getting an opportunity to play in front of my family, a lot of my fans since I was a kid, my high school fans, my college fans; I’m happy."
• New Miami Dolphins Running Back Frank Gore Receives Key To City Of Miami - April 12, 2018 https://miami.cbslocal.com

• Indianapolis Colts General Manager Chris Ballard on Frank Gore:
  • “I think the world should know what a gift he has been to football. I don’t know if I have ever been around a player who has impacted me more than Frank. His love and respect for football are what all personnel people strive to acquire when we draft players. There will never be another player like him. In this hard year, Frank has kept me going and kept everything in perspective. He has taught me that no matter how hard it gets, you keep working and respecting the game of football. If he is not a first-ballot Hall of Famer, we need to discontinue how we select.’’
• Sports Illustrated Interview with Peter King - December 25, 2017 https://www.si.com

• Former running backs coach Don Soldinger on his conversation with Gore after Gore began to question if football was his destiny after several debilitating injuries
  • "He was down in the dumps; his mom was sick. A lot of things were coming down on him at the same time. But God gave him an ability, and he needed to use it."
• Fellow NFL player and former teammate Phillip Dorsett:
  • "It's how he's lasted this long. He always tests me. We compete at everything. He calls out the young guys (in workouts)."

• Joe Montoya, Gore's coach at Coral Gables High School:
  • "I'm watching a kid who fulfilled his dream and I had just a little part in it," Montoya said, sobbing through the telephone. "It brings tears to my eyes to see that kid, knowing how far he's come and how much work he put in and how he cried in my office, in my arms, saying, 'Please, Coach, help me.' That's what it does for me. Every time I see him on the TV, I say, 'There he goes! There he goes!'"
• IndyStar Interview with Stephen Holder - October 2, 2015 https://www.indystar.com

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Frank Gore