Terrance Gore, one of the last major leaguers to make an impact solely with the most exciting of the game’s tools – breathtaking speed – died Friday, Feb. 6, the Kansas City Royals announced.
Gore was 34 and, according to a social media post from his wife Britney, died following complications during a routine surgery. Gore is survived by his wife and three children.
A revered teammate and dynamic personality, Gore’s tremendous speed kept him in the major leagues for parts of eight seasons and produced one of the most remarkable feats to which a player could lay claim: He was a 2015 World Series champion with the Royals in his second season in the bigs, but had not yet recorded his first major league hit.
In fact, it wasn’t until his fifth major league season – 2018 with the Chicago Cubs – that he got his first hit, a single up the middle off future Hall of Famer Max Scherzer.
Yet his legs held immense value.
Gore, perhaps generously listed at 5 feet 7 and 160 pounds, was clocked at 4.29 seconds in the 40-yard dash, and the lower-revenue Royals, always seeking an edge, deployed him as a designated runner during their two-year run as American League champions that culminated in their 2015 title.
He was nearly impossible to catch: Gore was 17-for-17 in stolen bases to begin his career (though he was caught once in the postseason), finally getting nabbed by Cleveland catcher Roberto Perez in 2016.
By then, though, he was a cult hero in Kansas City, on a Royals team that in a powerball era somehow conjured up memories of its 1980s speed and defense dynasty. Led by All-Star Lorenzo Cain and buttressed by Jarrod Dyson and Gore, Kansas City found a way to topple bigger-market clubs and win its first championship in 30 years.
It was Dyson who famously coined the phrase “That’s what speed do,” yet even Dyson could not keep up with Gore, who stole a base and scored a walk-off run in his major league debut.
‘I wouldn’t say I’m cocky,’ he told the Kansas City Star in 2014, ‘but I know I’m really fast.
‘And it’s going to take a perfect throw.’
Gore grew into a more fully-formed player in his second tour with the Royals, batting .275 with 14 hits in 58 at-bats in 2019, and swiping 13 bases in 18 attempts.
He’d latch on with the Dodgers, Braves and Mets in subsequent years, and got one more shot at postseason glory, appearing in the 2021 NLDS for Atlanta. Yet he showed how big his heart was once the Braves went on to win that World Series.
As the Braves celebrated closing out the Houston Astros in Game 6 of that Fall Classic, Gore made sure to pull out his phone and shoot a video call to pitcher Charlie Morton, who broke his right fibula in Game 1 and was home recuperating from surgery.
Simply, he wanted Charlie to be part of the celebration. And somehow, wherever Gore went, a celebration – no matter how unlikely – of some sort was likely to follow.
Gore was born in Macon, Ga. and raised in Gray, a small town to Macon’s northeast, before attending Gulf Coast State College in Florida, from which the Royals selected him in the 20th round of the 2011 draft. He settled in Panama City after retirement and worked as a speed and baseball trainer at a sports facility there, as his family with Britney grew to three children.
Gore retired without a major league home run – and just one run batted in – yet managed to impact the game forever.