Terrance Gore, a dynamic baserunner whose speed impacted postseason games for the better part of a decade, has died at age 34, the Kansas City Royals announced on Saturday.
According to USA Today, Britney Gore, his wife, posted on social media that Gore died from complications after routine surgery. He leaves behind three children.
“Very sad to wake up and hear this,” said the Dodgers‘ Dave Roberts, one of many major-league managers who deployed Gore as a pinch-runner during his career. “He was as confident a basestealer as I’ve ever been around.”
Eric Hosmer was a teammate of Gore with the Royals.
“Absolutely brutal news,” he texted. “A great teammate.”
Gore had 85 plate appearances during his big-league career, and batted .216. But in some Septembers and October, he led the majors in fear induced, because of his speed. He was often added to rosters late in the regular season – first by the Royals, and subsequently by the Chicago Cubs, Dodgers and New York Mets -to serve as a pinch-runner, usually in the late innings of close games. He played in the big leagues in parts of eight seasons, and in just 112 regular season games and 11 more in the postseason, he stole 48 bases in 58 attempts.
Buck Showalter managed against Gore when the Baltimore Orioles face the Royals in the playoffs, and had Gore on his own roster in 2022, when Gore was with the Mets.
“I called him in to talk to him about what his role would be, but he already knew,” said Showalter. “He was such a weapon. He fit in well. He didn’t take himself too seriously.”
Gore took batting practice daily, and worked in the outfield before games. But Gore and his teammates knew how he would be used – if his team was down a run in the late innings, or if the score was tied, then he would be sent into the game as a pinch-runner.
“If the score was tied and you got him into the game to run,” said Showalter, “it was like the game was over.”
Showalter mentioned that players like Gore and Deion Sanders were different in their degree of speed. Some players are fast, Showalter said, but when Gore ran, it was at another gear.
“We knew we couldn’t throw him out,” he recalled. “He was a light slider” – who sometimes popped up after reaching a base – “and then we would try to ride him off the base with the tag. But if you just worked at trying to throw him out, forget it, it wasn’t going to happen.”
When Roberts played with the Boston Red Sox in 2004, he famously played a similar role as Gore did during his career, notably stealing a base against Mariano Rivera and the New York Yankees in the playoffs before scoring a pivotal game-tying run. Roberts talked about this with Gore when the player joined the Dodgers in 2020.
“He knew exactly what I meant,” said Roberts. “He was a good teammate.”
Gore was born and raised in Georgia, and after playing for Gulf Coast State College in Panama, Fla., he was selected in the 20th round of the 2011 draft by the Royals, the 606th player picked overall. Gore was a middling hitter in the minors, with a .237 average and a .334 on-base percentage – he hit one home run in 2,585 plate appearances. But he could run.
“His acceleration was amazing,” texted Dayton Moore, the former GM of the Royals. “He was fearless on the bases. He was in control of the matchup (on the bases) – I always worried that he’d hurt himself because he slid late and hard into bases.”
Moore recalled that Gore thought about quitting when he was playing in A-ball, but Mike Sweeney and Lonnie Goldberg, then with the Royals’ organization, talked him out of it.
“He wasn’t satisfied with just being known for base-stealing,” said Moore. “He worked extremely hard at trying to be an everyday guy.”
