Pete Rose Disappointed In Manfred Decision

WCPO will update this report from Tuesday’s news conference.

Manfred said Monday allowing Rose back into baseball “presents an unacceptable risk of future violation by him … and thus the credibility of our sport”. “It is after all the Hall of Fame, not the Hall of Saints”. “I want baseball and Pete Rose to be friends”. I want to say I’m not an outsider looking in. “I am also not convinced that he has avoided the type of conduct and associations that originally led to his placement on the permanently ineligible list”. Manfred took over as baseball’s commissioner in January.

There is still hope for the Hall of Fame. In the meantime, he is turning his attention to the Hall of Fame.

I’d bet Rose would get a big kick out of that.

A University of Kansas researcher has discovered what is believed to be the only audio recording of basketball inventor James Naismith, during which he describes the first game he organized 124 years ago this month as a bit of a disaster.

“I spent 26 years in the major leagues and 26 years out of the major leagues”, said Rosea native of Sedamsville who scrapped his way into being one of the game’s all-time greats. He’s also been quite brazen in flaunting his Las Vegas lifestyle, maintaining a constant presence at autograph signings and paid appearances in casinos.

Rose was contrite and somewhat upbeat in offering his first comments since Manfred on Monday rejected his application for reinstatement 26 years into a lifetime ban.

That Rose now bets on baseball, which he has told Manfred, didn’t help his cause, though it’s perfectly legal.

Rose’s interview with Commissioner Rob Manfred on September 24 was a microcosm of his life. Manfred upheld the conclusions of the Dowd report and said Major League Baseball obtained additional evidence not available to Dowd: a notebook of betting records from 1986 kept by Rose associate Michael Bertolini.

“He was able to do all the things that would be major distractions for players and then when the time came for him to focus on the job at hand, which was to get one or more hits to extend his hitting streak, he was able to do it. I’ve never been involved with a player that was so single minded when it came to being the best possible player he could be than Pete Rose was”. “Some of his questions, though, I kind of panicked”. “All you can do if you make mistakes, is try to learn from your mistakes”.

“I’m not a stockbroker guy, but it’s similar”.

But only Rose admitted to betting on games that involved him, which is the highest baseball crime of all.

What unfolded that day is what unfolded the past 26 years, Rose making denials in 1989 even after agreeing to a lifetime ban and finally admitting in 2004, in a book he co-wrote, that he did bet on baseball.

Rose was joined by one of his sons and flanked by two attorneys, one of whom argued that Rose should be allowed on the Hall ballot. “It is the Hall of Fame, not the Hall of Saints”.

Rose, of course, wasn’t even supposed to set foot on minor league property, and his presence infuriated then-commissioner Bud Selig. Common sense and stats might say that Rose deserves to be in the Hall, but his failure to present “a reconfigured life” absent of gambling gave the commissioner no choice. It’s painful to watch the man who leads baseball in singles and ranks second in doubles be unable to leg out the final 90 feet of a glorious career.

He is, said Rose, not a complicated person.

Yes, commissioner, I do bet on baseball.