The Indianapolis Star put together a great feature on Frank Gore Friday morning, going into his personal history with solid detail. A lot of the stuff we already know about, but some details add more context to the former 49ers running back. I highly recommend giving it a read.
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The article goes back to his high school days, and proceeds forward through his history. At one point Gore goes into some details about his departure from San Francisco. We do not get a ton of information, but it adds a little more context to what went down this offseason.
"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."
I understand Gore wanting to compete for that starting role, but I also understand the 49ers ready to move forward. I'm not entirely sure based on this what kind of conversation happened. It reads like maybe there was a conversation after the season, and Gore wanted one earlier, but I am not entirely sure. It's not entirely clear, at least to me, what he is saying in this quotation. Any thoughts?