Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
December 10, 2002
Pete Rose:

There's an article on ESPN.com today that Pete Rose and Selig appear to be negotiating reinstatement of the all-time hit leader.

Only Baseball Matters had a lot about Pete Rose earlier this winter. Start here and keep reading. The inclusion of the David Levens piece here is the best part of the series.

I don't like Pete Rose. I never liked him as a player, and as I learned more about him as a person, I liked him even less. He wasn't someone who hustled; he was someone who was obnoxious about hustling. He was a singles hitter who could have walked more. Rickey Henderson without the speed or the power. One of my college roommates hated Pete Rose. We once got him a dart set and a Pete Rose poster for his birthday. When I joined a strat-o-matic league in the 1980's, I knew I had found my home when they burned Pete Rose's card before the draft.

With my prejudices in mind, I don't think Rose should be reinstated. Bill James makes a great case that the Dowd report proves nothing, and I will not argue with James' conclusion on that. However, as David Levens piece points out, the Dowd report was probably trying to save a lot of people from embarassment. I think if we all knew what Rose was really like, he wouldn't get those standing ovations, and there wouldn't be much support for his induction into the Hall of Fame.


Posted by David Pinto at 10:19 AM | Baseball