Pete Rose’s plea for reinstatement rejected by Rob Manfred

Rob Manfred, who succeeded longtime commissioner Bud Selig in January, has denied Rose’s application for reinstatement, informing baseball’s all-time hits king on Monday that he will remain on the outside looking in almost three decades after his ban for gambling on the sport, and issuing a three-page statement that says Rose has fallen far short of rehabilitating his life in a fashion that suggests he could associate with a major league team. However, Manfred wrote, Rose said he could not remember facts from the Dowd Report that showed he bet on baseball as a player.

“It is not at all clear to me that Rose has a grasp of the scope of his violations of Rule 21…I am also not convinced he has avoided the type of conduct and associations that originally led to his placement on the permanently ineligible list.

Even more troubling, in our interview, Rose initially denied betting on baseball now and only later in the interview did he “clarify” his response to admit such betting”.

In July, Rose was honored prior to the MLB All-Star Game in Cincinnati and received a long standing ovation as he joined Hall of Famers Johnny Bench, Joe Morgan and Barry Larkin in being voted by fans as Cincinnati’s “Franchise Four”. I can guarantee you there are guys in baseball right now who play DraftKings or FanDuel on a regular basis.

“I respect Mr. Rose’s accomplishments as a player and, as a result, I will continue to allow him to participate in ceremonial activities that present no threat to the integrity of the game, provided that the activities are approved by me in advance”.

“Pete’s fall from grace is without parallel, but he recognizes that it was also of his own making”, they said.

“As such, Pete seeks to be judged not simply by the mistakes of his past – but also by the work he has done over the last three decades in taking responsibility for his actions – constantly working to remain disciplined, compassionate and grateful”.

But in a move that could leave the door open for Rose’s election to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., Manfred wrote that it’s not his job to determine Rose’s eligibility there.

Rose applied for reinstatement under Commissioner Bud Selig in 1997 and 2002, but Selig never ruled on the request.

“He made assertions concerning his betting habits that were directly contradicted by documentary evidence (the Bertolini Notebook) secured by my office following the publication of the ESPN story on June 23, 2015”, Manfred wrote, “And, significantly, he told me that now he bets recreationally and legally on horses and sports, including Baseball”. “We got along good, I thought”.

Rose submitted two reports to Manfred, one by Dr. Timothy Fong, co-director of the UCLA Gambling Studies Program and director of the UCLA Addiction Psychiatry Fellowship. In that meeting, Rose told Manfred that he bet “extensively” on Reds games in 1987. Manfred said he gave the report little weight because it was inconsistent with what Manfred told him.

Rose, 74, collected a record 4,256 hits, breaking Ty Cobb’s record, and was a career.