Posted on 08/12/2003 7:28:41 AM PDT by Ray Kinsella
Pete Rose and Major League Baseball have reached an agreement that would allow him to return to baseball in 2004, and includes no admission of wrongdoing by Rose, Baseball Prospectus has learned. According to several sources, Rose signed the agreement after a series of pre-season meetings between Rose, Hall of Fame member Mike Schmidt, and at different times, high-level representatives of Major League Baseball, including Bob DuPuy, Major League Baseball's Chief Operating Officer, and Allan H. "Bud" Selig, Commissioner of Major League Baseball.
The agreement includes removal of Rose from baseball's permanently ineligible list. This would allow Rose to appear on ballots for baseball's Hall of Fame, which bars such banned players from consideration. The agreement allows Rose to be employed by a team in the 2004 season, as long as that position does not involve the day to day operations. That employment restriction would be removed after a year, allowing Rose to return to managing a team as early as the 2005 season if a position is offered to him.
In December, several publications reported that Rose and Bud Selig met in Milwaukee last winter, and that lawyers for both sides were exchanging proposals to end Rose's lifetime ban from baseball. Jayson Stark of ESPN wrote in a column August 7th that Reds owner Carl Lindner intends to hire Rose as the team's manager and has agitated for Rose's reinstatement for some time.
Pete Rose has been banned from baseball since he reached an agreement with then-Commissioner Bart Giamatti that included a lifetime ban from baseball for conduct detrimental to the sport, but which did not include an admission that Rose gambled on baseball. The August 23, 1989 agreement ended the investigation by baseball, led by John Dowd. Dowd's findings are published at www.dowdreport.com. Dowd concluded that Rose had bet on games he was involved in, citing such evidence as telephone records including calls to a bookie from the Reds clubhouse, bank records of large payments, and betting notes that handwriting experts identified as Rose's, which matched records of bookie Ron Peters. Baseball Prospectus has published several articles on the continuing controversy over Rose, including a lengthy evaluation of baseball historian and Boston Red Sox analyst Bill James's criticisms of the Dowd Report. Rose has always denied that he has bet on baseball.
The agreement would secure a place on the Hall of Fame ballot for Rose as his eligibility window closes. Rose played his last season in 1986, and Hall of Fame eligibility rules require that a player appear within 20 years of the end of their playing career. There would be significant barriers to Rose appearing on the 2004 ballot, which would leave only one year of eligibility for election by voters at large. If Rose failed to be elected by a vote, he would have to be selected by the Veterans' Committee.
I understand what you're saying and I agree with most of it... except, Pete Rose is one of the best players of our time. If he is pardoned, it has nothing to do with the integrity of the game, because, as you said, there is "None".
keeping Rose out of the HOF makes the HOF a lesser place. Adding him can only make it greater.
The illusion is worth big bucks, however, so the manipulators and snake oil salesmen within Big Baseball have to resurrect some tacky, shopworn figure like Pete "Double or Nothin'" Rose to con a whole new generation of fools.
Adolph Hitler was a pretty good political leader. Does he belong in the pantheon of political greats? Doesn't a Hall of Fame membership require more than just skill at the game? Doesn't it carry with it some moral burden as well?
Perhaps the reason the game of baseball lacks any integrity is because fans are too willing to forego that integrity in favor of splashy plays and infield razzle-dazzle. Maybe expertise should be second to honor.
Let the great man be forgiven and into the HOF.
Not for me.
He'll be in the HOF within 7 years and he deserves it for his accomplishments. Rose was not only great, he was/is a great guy and was/is well liked by fans and teammates. Not like Tyson or O.J. at all. Using those two guys and Rose in the same sentence is unwise and uneducated.
This isn't a personality contest, it goes directly to their effect on the integrity of their sport.
For that reason, I personally would keep Rose and Tyson out of any type of Hall of Fame. They both damaged their sport.(Is there a boxing Hall of Fame?)
As far as OJ goes, he was found innocent of the crime in a court of law and there is no basis to remove him from the Hall of Fame. Even if he was found guilty, I still don't believe that to be a basis to remove him from the Hall of Fame since it did not impact the sport at the time that he was involved in it.
But it is wrong, and illegal. Sports betting can contribute to a decline in integrity of that particular sport. If I work for Intel and I steal a Hewlett Packard from a store, I doubt that Intel would allow me to continue to work from jail. I would simply ask Pete not to break the law. Is that so difficult?
To bet FOR his team to win, would mean that the manager would make decisions designed to ensure his team would win.....which is what everyone wants to happen in the first place.
Again, betting for your team allows a snake into the clubhouse. What if the mob threatens Pete or a player? What if the mob forces Pete to give up inside info on how a player is feeling, etc.? What if Pete brings a good pitcher back too early in order to gamble his season and/or career on one game?
The best solution here is not to allow gambling on anything at all. That is MLB's conclusion. Rose knew it, broke it flagrantly, and has refused to admit it or show any contriteness.
American League President Ban Johnson to issue an order in 1903 forbidding all gambling and betting in American League parks. Johnson's order was greatly ignored as gambling continued to infest baseball. Two years later, New York Giants manager [and 1937 Hall of Fame inductee]John McGraw was involved in a gambling incident during the A's-Giants World Series. McGraw had placed $400 on the Giants to win the Series. After New York defeated the A's in 5 games, McGraw collected on his winnings and never faced any discipline over the incident.Since 1943, four men have been expelled from baseball for gambling related offenses. They are: Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Pete Rose and George Steinbrenner.
The only one not to be reinstated is Pete Rose.
You want a situation in which he tries so hard to win that he does something that causes him to lose. A decision to take out a fatigued player rather than play a fatigued play is actually a decision that would help you win. Therefore, the manager would make that decision.
To leave in a fatigued player would cause you to lose your bet. Perhaps if he worried about a player being fatigued before he actually was, and yanked him too early, that might cost him a game IF he didn't have a good bullpen. But he would know if he had a good bullpen, and then, in order to win he would make a good decision.
The logic to win would always be the same.
I just saw a blurb that said so and so denies that MLB is reinstating Pete.
If that's true, then this is a conversation based on a false premise.
My sense, though,is that if they reinstate him AND require no admission of guilt, then they are also admitting that their case against Pete had some detectable fatal flaw.
It seems like gambling has been causing a lot of problems in the baseball world these days, especially now that Pete Rose may be reinstated. Curious to find others who have been banned from the game (and why), I did a little research.
Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle were both banned from baseball in 1983, but it wasn’t because they were directly involved in gambling. Mantle and Mays were both offered jobs at resorts and casinos. The work that the two were doing consisted mostly of promotional appearances at golf tournaments and other public events. Commissioner Bowie Kuhn warned the two that if they accepted their jobs, they would be placed on the “permanently ineligible” list. Thinking the ruling ridiculous, both players accepted their jobs. Mantle accepted a job at the Claridge Resort and Casino in Atlantic City acting as a community representative - he was rarely ever around the casino. Mays was hired on with Bally’s Resorts where he worked as a public relations executive.
Bowie stuck true to his promise and banned both Mays and Mantle from the sport of baseball - even after they already had places solidified in the Hall of Fame.
On Mar. 18, 1985, Peter Ueberroth took over as the commissioner and immediately reinstated both Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays back into the sport. Why is it that one commissioner would feel that they needed to be banned for life, and another is able to realize that baseball is where those two legends belong?
In 1919, the White Sox were heavily favored to win the World Series against the Cincinnati Reds, but instead lost the series three games to five. In 1920, the grand jury let the story unveil about an $80,000 scandal that changed the way that fans view sports and gambling.
Shoeless Joe Jackson and the “Black Sox” were banned for their gambling involvement. For those unfamiliar with the Black Sox scandal, it involved eight players from the White Sox that threw the 1919 World Series to earn gambling money. According to The Morning News, the White Sox were probably the best team ever assembled, but they were also the unhappiest. They were severely underpaid.
Shoeless Joe led the team during the World Series with a .375 batting average. Although evidence shows that he chose not to go ahead with the scandal, Joe accepted the money, which made him guilty of the gambling charges.
Pete Rose. I won’t sit here and go through the whole Rose debate with you, but consider this. Mantle and Mays were banned after they were already in the Hall of Fame. When they were banned from baseball, they were not removed from the Hall. So maybe Commissioner Bud Selig should realize that we are currently punishing Rose for his actions as a manager of a team, and he should be able to be recognized for his accomplishments as a player... before the gambling thing ever happened.
Pete Rose made a horrible decision when he decided to bet on baseball, and as a result he should never be allowed to manage a team again. This punishment must stand.
Just because Rose made a mistake as a coach, however, does not mean that the all-time hits leader should not be recognized in the Hall of Fame where he belongs. Pete Rose should be reinstated into baseball as the player that he once was, not the manager that he became.
Others banned:
The spit-ball, defined as any ball with spit, snot, Vaseline or any other substance put on the ball, has been classified by many as the hardest pitch to hit - and it can also be lethal. It was officially banned from baseball in 1920 when Carl Mays threw the pitch to Ray Chapman. The ball hit Chapman in the head, killing him.
Paul Fagan, the owner of the San Fransisco Seals of the Pacific Coast League, banned the peanut in 1950. Fagan was determined to clean up the sport of baseball, and went as far as to declare that he was going to ban husked peanuts. According to writer Gaylon White, all of San Francisco went nuts over the news.
“It was just like ripping the heart out of baseball itself,” said the Los Angeles Herald Express. Only 24 hours after Fagan had announced the peanut ban, the uproar caused him to change his mind.
“I give up,” Fagan said. “It’s the first time in my life I’ve been beaten and it had to be by a peanut.”
LOL, but I insist. He has the same profile.
First, he is notorious.
Secondly, he is unrepentant and even defiant.
Third, like Robinson's cuckolded wife lobbying of him, there are Rose's old friends stumping for the guy that slimed their vocation by his behavior.
Fourth, he doesn't care how much discension it causes, he wants it and he wants it now.
Fifth, voting, that love of the rationalists, will redeem him if only by one percent over half of those considering the question.
Sixth, it is equal treatment.
Seventh, he doesn't wnat to change his behavior or admit any sin.
Eighth, he doesn't have to say he is sorry.
Ninth, he can continue his behavior.
AND TENTH,
DRUM ROLL PLEASE
He can have all the little boys look at his bat at Cooperstown.
Great line...
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