MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred repeatedly denied Pete Rose’s request to be reinstated while Rose was alive.
Manfred should remain a Rose denier. Complying with his wishes now, just because Rose has died, would be an unforced error with lasting consequences for baseball’s health, along with Manfred’s own legacy.
ESPN’s Don Van Natta Jr. reported Saturday that Rose’s family filed a petition in January to have Rose “posthumously removed from baseball’s ineligible list.” They want to clear the way for him to be elected to the Hall of Fame. The family and Rose’s attorney met with Manfred in December, with the lawyer calling the discussions “productive.” Little has emerged about what has changed, exactly, regarding Rose’s argument. The posthumous case likely boils down to this:
There’s no reason to keep him banned because Rose is no longer alive and actively undermining the integrity of the sport. Wherever his soul rests, Pete Rose can’t hurt Major League Baseball anymore.
If only it were true. Rose continues to haunt baseball in death and is doomed to haunt it forever. It’s hard to calculate how much Rose has cost the game by making himself ineligible for the Hall of Fame. The museum’s own board of directors passed a rule banning ineligible players from the Hall in 1991, just before the BBWAA was set to vote on the first class of candidates that included Rose. His lack of inclusion there has been costly, beyond the presumed decrease in foot traffic at the Cooperstown museum among fans wanting a look at Rose’s mug on a plaque. With a few exceptions, MLB has never been able to capitalize properly on Rose’s fame. He cheated the game as a player and manager, and continues to cheat it, contrary to his reputation as someone who put winning first.
Rose cared more about beating his bookies, an attitude that would destroy baseball if the league let it. Rose was a cheater, maybe not like the worst of the 1919 Black Sox who took payoffs to lose the World Series on purpose, but close enough. It’s a slight ethical (or even moral) distinction at most. Damning with the faintest of praise. The powers that be cannot let this person have a Hall of Fame plaque.
Even if it’s true that Rose never placed a bet against his own team, it doesn’t matter. The biggest fallacy about Rose is that “He only bet on his team to win”—as if it were some admirable axiom. President Donald Trump regurgitated this misunderstanding with skillfully coincidental timing, announcing Friday on social media his intention to issue a “complete PARDON of Pete Rose,” adding that Rose “shouldn’t have been gambling on baseball, but only bet on HIS TEAM WINNING.” (The all-caps are to emphasize SCREAMING!)
Rose’s True Believers don’t want to hear it, but on the odd days when The Hit King didn’t bet on his own team, it had the same effect as betting on them to lose. Gambling corrupted Rose’s actions as a player and manager no matter if he placed a bet that day or not. Baseball can’t have that. The entire meaning of a game is debased if competitors are not trying their best to win. Rose didn’t always try his best, saving it for only when he gambled on the game. He ruined his own legacy. Charlie Hustle hustled himself in addition to everyone else.
Rose even admitted to the gambling accusations in John Dowd’s investigation, which led to his suspension in 1989. MLB continued to use the evidence and confession against Rose whenever he tried to get his sentence truncated. The facts haven’t changed. On that front, some fans might care to recall that Dowd also found evidence of Rose committing statutory rape in the 1970s, getting underage girls—like, 12 to 14—brought to him. Rose in a defamation suit against Dowd confirmed one of the relationships but said he was under the impression the girl was 16, which made it legal in Ohio, where the Cincinnati Reds played. This is your Hit King?
The president didn’t specify which of Rose’s crimes his impending pardon was for, but the only one he likely can influence is for Rose serving time in the 1990s for federal income tax evasion. Trump can’t just snap his fingers and put Rose in the Hall of Fame. He’s saving moves like that for his third term. Rose’s major league fate remains up to Manfred, who could hand it to an eras committee—the actual body that could put him in Cooperstown. The next eras committee for pre-1980 players comes in December 2027. There are no guarantees any committee would elect Rose, either. Imagine if teammate Johnny Bench were on that committee: Would it be good for Rose, or bad?
Mmm, probably not too good.
Before we go down that road, if we do: One piece of business is different about today’s MLB—the league’s relationship with sports betting. It has obviously changed since the Black Sox scandal broke, which prompted the codifying of the rules against league members gambling on MLB games. That would be Rule 21, which has been posted prominently in every clubhouse for about 100 years. Rose no doubt saw it, perhaps memorized it. Since Rule 21 and related statutes, MLB had been … let’s call it stridently against any association with gambling. Even the greatest of the greats got caught up in MLB’s anti-gambling fervor when then-Commissioner Bowie Kuhn in the 1980s suspended no less than Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle for working as casino ambassadors in Atlantic City. No matter that New Jersey didn’t even offer legal sports betting until 2018, or that the pair didn’t even work for MLB at the time. The greats were reinstated by the next commissioner but the message was clear: Stay away from gambling!
The environment has changed, even if Rule 21 remains in permanent ink. MLB partners with companies like DraftKings and FanDuel and we’re all one big, happy gambling family. But those toys are supposed to be for fans, not players. As far as MLB is concerned, it would be just as problematic for Johnny All-Star Center Fielder to place legal bets today as it was for Rose to do what he did. But the lines are blurred, and they’re indistinguishable among those credulous enough to willfully ignore them. Don’t be dopey: MLB’s gambling sponsorships are not a get-out-of-jail-free card for Pete Rose. It’s legal for the guy in the bleachers to bet on the game. It’s not OK for the starting pitcher to do it.
What the commissioner today has to consider, in addition to Rose being guilty as ever is what could happen if he commuted Rose’s sentence. You don’t have to be a lawyer to understand the phrase “bad precedent.” If Pete Rose gets away with cheating MLB, anybody can. Just this offseason, the league fired umpire Pat Hoberg for violating MLB’s gambling rules. MLB found no evidence that Hoberg placed bets on games, or influenced the outcome of his own games because of gambling. Anyone looking up Hoberg’s record will find that he was damn good at his job, especially on balls and strikes. If all umpires called ’em like Hoberg seemed to, hardly anyone would call for an ABS challenge.
Hoberg was fired anyway and absolutely should have been. He tried to erase evidence that he shared personal and legal sports betting accounts with a friend who used the accounts to bet on baseball games. He probably won’t be the last umpire to get caught up in gambling, which should bother the excrement out of MLB, but la-la-la, la-la-la, they can’t hear you, they’re too busy counting their easy short-term cash.
Most MLB players, the ones who influence games the most, hopefully, don’t have to resort to betting on games as a side hustle, either for the money or the rush. But the league already has suspended players for gambling, including one forever, as recently as June. MLB embracing legal gambling among fans might be like trying to juggle live grenades, but it’s still up to the players to keep out of the blast radius.
Pete Rose blew up his own opportunity. Now, Manfred gets another chance with him. Hopefully, it’s just to say “no” one more time.
