[Seasmillets]

The Length of Forever May Be Shorter for Rose
Published: July 27, 2009

Next month will be the 20th anniversary of Pete Rose’s permanent ban from baseball, and on Monday there was a report in The Daily News that Commissioner Bud Selig is considering Rose’s reinstatement.

A lot has happened in baseball since Aug. 24, 1989 (the entire steroid era, for one), when A. Bartlett Giamatti, then the commissioner, decided that Rose, the career hits leader with 4,256, had bet on baseball games, including those of the team he managed. But Selig might be amenable to reinstatement now because two decades have passed and because Joe Morgan, Frank Robinson and Selig’s close friend Hank Aaron have given Rose their support, according to USA Today and The Daily News.

Of course, reinstating a 68-year-old man to the grand old game is shorthand for making him eligible for the Hall of Fame.

“I would certainly like to see him in,” Aaron said Saturday, speaking of Rose and the Hall of Fame. “He belongs in, really.”

In an aside, Aaron, the former career home run leader, said players linked to using performance enhancers should get into the Hall of Fame, too — but only if there is an asterisk on their plaque. So, all things considered, it was a great weekend for bettors and cheats.

Unless special arrangements were made, Rose would most likely have to be voted in by the 65 living members that make up the veterans committee; inclusion on the writers’ ballot ends after 15 years. But we are far ahead of ourselves.

On his blog for ESPN, Buster Olney said he felt “incredible ambivalence” upon hearing the story, and he predicted that Rose would never rise above being a dishonored former star.

The reason the sporting press was in Cooperstown for the weekend was to witness the induction into the Hall of Rickey Henderson and Jim Rice. Jeff Passan of Yahoo expected more outrageousness from the humbled Henderson, who once led the leagues in talking, but was happy to see that he would carry on Yogi Berra’s “endearing butchery of the English language.” In The Boston Globe, Bob Ryan writes that “Rice yearned to be in the club, and now he is.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/28/sports/28leading.html

[Aqgkvwzm]

So a permanent ban is really... you know, temporary.

But I guess as long as Morgan, Robinson and Aaron support Rose, it's OK.

If Selig does this, it'll simply be one more sign that breaking the rules is acceptable.

Just stop!

[Seasmillets]

If Selig does this, it'll simply be one more sign that breaking the rules is acceptable.

Baseball has rules? Who knew!

[greekbeast]

I'm really against this.

[Knongargoapex]

Aside from the betting, Pete Rose was a top notch A-hole for dislocating Ray Fosse's shoulder in an all star game. Baseball huh, kind of a joke now.

[greekbeast]

There's all this talk about Michael Vick and I know a lot of noise was made about possible dopers getting into the HoF but Rose bet on his sport including games he was playing IIRC and the amounts were not chump change.

[Aqgkvwzm]

I don't have a problem with Michael Vick being reinstated into the NFL. He did his time. It's a clean slate as far as I'm concerned, and I hope he finds a team.

It's not so much that I think Rose should have been banned permanently. But he was. That was the punishment. To go back on that and reinstate him would send the wrong message. It would be one more nail in the coffin of professional sport's reputation. The great and powerful athlete is more important than the rules or ethics.

[plalleste]

Eh, the guy is the all-time hits leader in the entire 100+ years of American baseball. The HoF doesn't have to include just boy scouts. The HoF makes no sense without Rose in it.