NFL alumni and media members react to Frank Gore becoming the NFL’s third all-time leading rusher.
The run itself was anything but astonishing.
It was one that fans of Frank Gore have seen hundreds of times – a fourth-quarter handoff up the middle that ‘the inconvenient truth’ took for six yards.
There wasn’t any fanfare following the rush; barely any indication that Gore had just surpassed Barry Sanders to become the NFL’s third all-time leading rusher.
A few moments later, the stadium’s PA system announced that Gore had run into the NFL’s history books, prompting an eruption from the New Era Field crowd and the Buffalo Bills’ sideline.
“I’m blessed, I’m happy,” Gore said. “For me, it was tough to get to here. It wasn’t an easy road to get to the NFL. I’ve been doubted my whole career. Not just the NFL, college, I tore my two ACLs.
“A lot of people said I won’t even be here two or three years. Now, Year 15, still having fun, still making plays, still helping the team win games. [I’m] blessed.”
Gore’s record-breaking run accounted for a fraction of his 65 rushing yards in Buffalo’s Week 12 win over the Denver Broncos. It accounts for an even smaller fraction of his 15,289 career rushing yards, an astonishing feat that only two other players in the history of the NFL have been able to accomplish.
Only Emmitt Smith and Walter Payton sit above Gore on the list of the NFL’s all-time leading rushers.
A 15-year veteran, Gore once served as a role model for many of the players he now shares the field with. In fact, the person who handed the ball to the 36-year-old on his record-breaking run grew up a fan of the mid-oughts San Francisco 49ers teams, rosters that Gore was an integral part of.
“I told him it was an honor to be in the backfield with him,” quarterback Josh Allen said. “A guy that just comes and works and doesn’t say anything, and puts his head down, doesn’t care about stats or numbers, he wants to help his team win football games.
“At 36 years old, how well he’s playing, how well he hits the hole, how physical he is, it’s unbelievable.”
Both former and current players, as well as media members, took to Twitter to congratulate Gore following his achievement.
Here’s some of the reaction:
Buffalo Bills/ Barry Sanders
Trey Wingo, ESPN
Thurman Thomas
Quinton Spain
Fred Jackson
Barry Sanders
NFL
Adam Schefter, ESPN
Field Yates, ESPN
Rich Eisen, NFL Network
Bleacher Report
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