Pete Rose admits to betting on baseball

In My Humble Opinion
41

On the other hand, so did Shoeless Joe Jackson. Jackson claimed he didn’t shank in the games, but he fully admitted his guilt in the conspiracy and rolled on his teammates. They still banned him for life.

The difference is threefold:

  1. Baseball has a different history. Baseball in the late 19th and early 20th century was very seriously threatened with destruction by gambling. The Black Sox were just the tip of the iceberg; at least 15-20 other guys were thrown out of the major leagues for life for gambling and throwing games, some of them big stars, like Heinie Zimmerman and Hal Chase. Baseball had to stamp it out, so they adopted a lifetime banishment rule. Football didn’t have that (hell, at the time the Black Sox throw the Series, there wasn’t an NFL at all.)

  2. Frankly, the NFL is too lenient. Any reputable business fires an employee who deliberately acts with a conflict of interest.

  3. In fairness, you’re right; it is true that Horning was forthcoming about what he did, whereas Rose is a scumbag, a convicted thief, and a liar, who has spent 14 years trying to destroy the reputations of men who could not fight back. Rose has done nothing to earn the sympathy of anyone.

42

Well, technically speaking, Hal Chase was never banned from baseball. According to Bill James he was just more or less PNG’d (he played a couple more years after the Series, IIRC), which is ironic considering that he “allegedly” fixed more games than anyone else in history. I remember reading in my Historical Baseball Abstract circa 1987 that he was accused by Christy Mathewson of fixing a game in 1918, Mathewson actually spoke well of Chase at his hearing, John McGraw showed up to speak on his behalf, and he walked away scot free, just in time to “allegedly” fix the 1919 Series.

Everyone knows that Chase was dirty. In fact, later in life he admitted to betting on games, but they couldn’t pin any one thing on him, so he was never given the gate.

Anyway, I think Pete should be allowed to come to the games (IIRC he’s not even allowed to set foot in a MLB stadium due to his ban, which is what the big hubbub was about when they made the exception for him to participate in the All-Time team thing), I think Pete should be allowed in the Hall as a player, but I think that he should HEVER be able to make any decisions that effect any part of the game ever again. He claims that he wants to manage again, or work in the front office. If that happens I will never watch a baseball game again.

43

I can’t see the logic in re-instating Rose.

“Well, since you finally admitted to doing exactly the very thing that we banned you for, we’ll take away the ban.”

WHAT???!!!

44

Keep an eye out for a Pete Rose interview this week, I think it’s on Thursday.

45

if i remember properly his stats as a player were removed from the hall of fame when he was banned. i visited the hof after his banning and some people mentioned a few times that rose’s name and stat should be here or there. i remember there was a blanked out area where the stat was.

i don’t know if they had changed that or not. or what they do in the areas his stats should be. i do remember there being pictures of him in cin and phila uniforms in team shots.

the rule is everywhere in baseball. it does say that you can apply for reinstatement, but i always took that to mean, there had to be evidence that you DID NOT bet on baseball (or for quite sometime on any sporting event); to be reinstated.

i hope that mr. rose is banned for life. the rule is rather clear. no gambling. if they do reinstate him, they better reinstate some of the “black sox” players that were incorrectly scooped up in the scandal.

mlb and hof are two very sep. entities. it will be up to the hof if they want to have mr. rose’s career in the hall.

46

And yet, it might work. It boggles the mind.

I agree that the NFL is too lenient.

47

No, a primary difference is the one you already pointed out: Shoeless Joe admitted to accepting money to throw the World Series. Pete Rose admitted to betting on his team to win.

Both transgressions go to the integrity of the game, but I can’t understand the rush by some columnists to say that Pete’s admission now places him in the company of Shoeless Joe. No. It now places him in the company of Paul Hornung. That’s bad enough.

I was at the Vet in 1980 when the Phillies won the Series, and I believe that Pete Rose is the player that ultimately put that team over the hump and made them champions. So I am biased.

But I do understand that Pete Rose is not bigger than the game, and I always agreed that so long as he acted as if he did nothing wrong–hell, he acted as if he did nothing–then he’d be on ice with no one to blame but himself.

Now he has admitted it. As I said, that places him in the company of athletes like Paul Hornung and Alex Karras, in substance if not in degree.

Pete says he has and had a gambling problem, a fact no side seems to dispute. Does anyone in this thread doubt that Pete Rose has/had a gambling addiction? He also points out that athletes with other addictions–drugs, alcohol–not only receive help and support from the League, their admission does not amount to a death sentence like a gambling addiction admission would. I don’t see how anyone could seriously dispute this.

That being said, I do understand the opinion that says it doesn’t matter. The integrity of the game is tantemount, and no personal issue should ever, ever comprimise the rule, not to any degree, not for any reason. I don’t agree. I don’t think Pete’s reinstatement will lead to the downfall of baseball. I don’t believe his example will lead others down the road to believe gambling is trivial. Hell, quite the contrary.

The NFL survived Hornung and Karras. Pete admitted he did it, he expressed regret that he denied it for so long. IMO, that should be enough. He should be in the HoF. Again, I will understand and respect a decision to the contrary, even if I don’t agree.

48

Just a clarification. Rose’s ban still allows him to attend games if he purchases a ticket and has no interaction with anyone associated with MLB. That’s why he could be invited in by Marge Schott ten years ago but couldn’t sit in the owners box.

49

Acknowledging that it’s a judgment call, I disagree. I think he’s acting in his own self-interest (he reportedly received a $1 million advance on the book, and to me he’s only admitting the truth that everyone knows BECAUSE he thinks it’ll get him into the Hall. This isn’t his first biography - and he lied about betting in the other one

From an article in today’s NY Times:

He writes “I’m sure I’m supposed to act all sorry or sad or guilty now that I’ve accepted I’ve done something wrong. But you see, I’m just not built that way.”

And he’s quoted everywhere as saying ""If I had admitted my guilt, it would have been the same as putting my head on the chopping block - lifetime ban. Death penalty. I spent my entire life on the baseball fields of America, and I was not going to give up my profession without first seeing some hard evidence. … Right or wrong, the punishment didn’t fit the crime - so I denied the crime.’’
To me, that reads as “You see, I was justified in lying because I didn’t want to pay the price for doing something I knew was wrong.” Very reasonable. :stuck_out_tongue: To me, Rose’s ‘admissions of guilt’ read like a child giving lip-service and admitting why he was wrong just so he can get out of his punishment.

50

No, Rose is allowed to come as a paying spectator. That was just the first MLB official event he’d been a part of so that’s what made it a big deal. (MLB had little choice, as it was a Mastercard-sponsored event.)

51

So Rose signed a lifetime ban of his own free will, then lied about the facts for 14 years, and now his admission is supposed to make it better?

His ban was not predicated on his admitting anything, ever. It was a fact that he had bet on baseball, they had him cold, and for that they banned him.

His lying only shows him to be someone extremely untrustworthy. I HATE that, don’t you? I wouldn’t trust him to anything more than show up to games, period. He’s admitted to a gambling problem, and I think it’s tempting fate to let him get close to the people who can influence games.

His admission doesn’t change anything about his past actions, it only proves that they were what Vincent said was true, which apparently was so damning that Rose signed off on the consequences without a gun to his head. Don’t go and pull out some kind of pressure he was under, he physically signed a document agreeing to a lifetime ban. In the absence of illegal coercion, his decision was made as an adult and while being of sound mind.

I hate it when people make rules and then back out of them just because it’s easier. “You’re grounded! Well, except that I don’t have the energy to follow through, so I’ll just let you out of it again, removing the consequences for your actions, and setting a bad example for those in your position.”

52

I believe it was Rob Neyer who said that, contrary to the notion that Rose should be forgiven if he admitted to gambling, he should especially NOT be allowed back in if he admits to it.

Myself, I don’t want him anywhere near the sport. There’s enough bad stuff in baseball (let alone professional sports as a whole) without baseball admitting back into its ranks someone who took this long to admit he’d done something that was proven a while ago anyway.

You hang out in the dugout that many years, you know the rules. You break the rules, you get punished. Simple as that. And there is no lifetime ban for being a druggie or soliciting prostitutes or clubbing baby seals or what-have-you. There IS for what Rose did. That means that while Orlando Cepeda is in, drug use and association notwithstanding, Rose is out. Permanently.

53

I don’t follow baseball that much, but I was surprised to see that the coverage in the print edition of the Los Angeles Times (Tuesday 6 January 2004) seemed universally negative concerning Pete Rose.

From columnist Ross Newhan:
“He’s Coming Clean, but His Motives Don’t Wash”
The gist of the article is: Pete Rose is admitting it now because this will give him a chance of being reinstated and then admitted in the Hall of Fame through voting by eligible members of the Baseball Writers Association. After 2005 he would have to be elected by the Veterans Committee (Hall of Fame players) who might not be so impressed by his baseball prowess. He played his last game in 1986 and you can be elected by the Baseball Writers’ ballot in the 20 years following your last game (see http://www.baseballhalloffame.org for the exact rules)

Bill Plaschke
“After All These Years, He’s Still Hustling”
Pete Rose doesn’t care about the Hall of Fame, he wants to be readmitted in the game so he can make big bucks as a manager of the Cincinatti Reds. In a two-year-old interview Mr. Plaschke suggested to Pete Rose that if he accepted banishment from baseball it might help his chance of remaining eligible for Cooperstown. Pete Rose answered “I can’t make that deal. I want to manage again… Do you know what kind of money managers are making today?” Note that Pete Rose did not apologize to John Dowd for calling the Dowd report “a pack of lies”.

Roger Kahn, who co-authored “Pete Rose: My Story” with Pete Rose: “Had Pete Rose bet on baseball? If I asked that once, I asked it 20 times. Rose always looked at me evenly and said in his rough speech, ‘I dint bet baseball. I got too much respect for the game.’” Mr. Kahn had in the past defended Pete Rose against the accusations of gambling and thought that the investigation was too harsh. Mr. Kahn’s article today in the LA Times has this in one of the final paragraphs: “Hall of Fame? Not only no, HELL, no! I want Rose out of Cooperstown, and I don’t even want him managing my grandson’s Little League team.”

Bill Dwyre (“Shades of Gray in This Story”) recalls the (in)famous Jim Gray interview at the 1999 World Series in Atlanta (Game 2). quoting Jim Gray: “I inteviewed him right after the ceremony and one of my questions … was along the lines of: 'Might not this be a good time, in the face of overwhelming evidence, to show some contrition and admit that you bet on baseball? He replied that was tired of saying, and people were sick of hearing him say, that he was not going to admit to doing something that he didn’t do.”

Tom Lasorda: “Gambling on your games is the worst sin you can commit. The rules are posted on every clubhouse door. If you bet on your team, you are banned for life. Pete broke a rule that cannot be challenged or arbitrated. He broke a rule and must suffer the consequences.”

Bret Saberhagen: “He should not be around a baseball field because of his actions. To gamble on the sport while participating in it, I don’t think you should be allowed back.”

I didn’t really have an opinion before today but after reading the LA Times articles I don’t think he should be allowed in the Hall of Fame or back as a manager.

54

A coupla things:

  1. Regarding the Hornung comparison: betting on your team as manager is much more serious than doing so as a player.

As a player, there isn’t really much you can do to help your team win today’s game, besides play your heart out. As a manager, though, you are in the position of being able to sacrifice a whole bunch of tomorrows in order to win today’s game. And that’s why a manager should be forbidden to put a pile of cash on his team’s fortunes in a particular game.

There may be nothing in the rules to codify that, but it doesn’t make it any less true.

  1. Pete Rose in HoF as player: No.

Why? Two reasons: first, I don’t think you can divide human beings so neatly like that. Rose is Rose ;), regardless of the differing roles he played. What he’s done is bad enough that he shouldn’t be in the Hall in any capacity.

Second, his roles overlapped during his years as player/manager, and it was during those years that he broke Cobb’s record for most hits in a career. When he was a first baseman slugging .319.

It’s possible that another manager would have kept on playing him (you never know) but it’s pretty damned unlikely. I strongly feel he made it past 4,191 by writing his name into the lineup when he wouldn’t have tolerated such piss-poor offensive production from any other 1B. He wanted Cobb’s record so badly that he was willing to put that ahead of winning. He did that as manager and player, and I don’t want him in the Hall in either capacity.