Instead, the 25-year-old is lining up for his second successive grand final after helping the Storm down Cronulla to book their spot in the title decider next Sunday.
Blore suffered the potentially life-threatening injury when he was hit while making a tackle a month ago against the Sydney Roosters and, unable to speak, was rushed to hospital.
He avoided being put into an induced coma or surgery but was told by doctors he would be sidelined for the remainder of the year - devastating news after previously recovering from back-to-back ACL injuries and a broken wrist when he was at Wests Tigers.
"I remember when I did it and I was in hospital, the doctor that was with me told me my season was over and I was very sad hearing that news," Blore told AAP.
But Storm doctor Jason Chan, who had already nursed another Melbourne forward Tom Eisenhuth through the same injury in 2019, gave him a glimmer of hope.
"That was all I needed, I was sweet after that, just ripped into the rehab and I was good to go," said Blore, who joined the Storm ahead of the 2024 season.
"It was still very sore, there was still a fracture in there, but it was probably a blessing in disguise.
"That was three or four weeks I was able to recover my body and rest and work on things that I probably haven't worked on in a long time."
The former Penrith junior star's voice remains raspy and he's set to undergo speech therapy but has been given no guarantees it will make a full recovery.
"I don't know if that's going to help at all but hopefully it does as I don't want to sound like this - it sounds shocking," he said.
Despite being limited to a liquid diet for a week, Blore was back to his best in the 22-14 victory on Friday night, making 25 tackles.
With halfback Jahrome Hughes coming through his return from a fractured forearm unscathed, Melbourne are set to be at full-strength for the grand final.
They are missing Nelson Asofa-Solomona through suspension but in his absence Stefano Utoikamanu has stepped up as the team's main enforcer.
After their tight loss to Penrith last year, Blore said the team was better prepared mentally.
"I feel like now our team's in a better mindset going into this one," he said.
"We know what it takes, we know what we have to do, we know what we have to fix.
"To be able to get that opportunity again to have another chance at it, it's amazing.
"I feel like we're really going to lean into the week and just embrace it and really try to grab it with both hands and don't let go."
