Does this controversial player get your HoF vote #1: Pete Rose

[Left-handed Badger]

Originally Posted by MorseMoose

Because I'm a homer, Blyleven would be my #1 pick. Rose has a reason he isn't there, whether valid or not. Blyleven has no reason he isn't there.

Blyleven definitely belongs in. The voters should feel humiliated with themselves every year he doesnt get in.

[Left-handed Badger]

Originally Posted by Hurkman

My opinion on this sways back and forth from time to time. I'm willing to listen to arguments now about why he should be in, but in my mind, I'm not convinced.

Was he a great player? Yes. Should he be in based on the merits of his playing career? Hell yes. However, As far as everything says, he bet on baseball, and that is subject to a lifetime ban if you are caught. It doesn't say you are banned if you are racist, or beat your spouse, or anything along those lines. However, if you bet on the game, and are caught, you are banned. Pete was banned for betting, and at least through the laws of baseball, is banned for life.

After he dies, could he be inducted? Maybe, but in my mind, I need to see Joe Jackson inducted before Rose gets in. I mean, Jackson was found innocent by a jury when it came to throwing the 1919 series, and if he did throw it, he did a pretty bad job at doing it. I don't know if he had contact with gamblers about it, but batting around .375 in the World Series is certainly not trying to throw it. If Jackson somehow, someway finds a way in, I'm all in favor of Pete Rose getting in. Until then, he can be the guy that got embarassed at three straight Wrestlemanias for all I care.

Yeah, I do have to agree with you on Jackson. .375 isnt exactly throwing the series. Weaver for that matter hit over .300. Still, I dont want to touch this 90-year old subject on whether he belongs in or not.

The reason why you dont bet on the game period is this. If you bet on your team and lose, and lose and lose. You are going to get deep in. You might get desparate. Then you might bet against them to save your @$$. AS a manager you can then intentionally make some bad decisions to manipulate that outcome.

If you go out to shoot your worst enemy and some innocent kid gets killed in the crossfire. You dont deserve to have a reduced sentence because you didnt mean to kill them. You went to kill. (Maybe not exactly a great reference to compare, but this is how it looks to me, more or less)

[akw4572]

As a player, absolutely. Assuming there is no hidden evidence somewhere that he gambled on the game while playing.

[KurtBevacqua]

This is a really tough one for me. Pete Rose was my favorite player as a kid and I have actually met Pete Rose and liked him instantly. He was a very funny, engaging, kind person to me as a fan. He spent a great deal more time talking with me than I wanted or expected and certainly more than he had too. My personal memory of him is greatly at odds with the remorseless, bitter man he appears to have become.

On the field there is no question he belongs. While he wasn't one of the 10 greatest players of all-time, his onfield contributions to the game I feel could be argued that he merits of consideration of being one of the 10 most deserving players for enshrinement of all-time. He was probably the hardest working player of all-time, he cared greatly for the fans, he cared more about winning than perhaps any other player, maybe cared more about the game in general than any other player. All of which makes his crime all the more dissappointing. Does someone who cares so much about the game go out and trash it by betting on it while being directly involved in it?

OK, first off I thought Pete Rose was guilty of betting on baseball before he admitted to it. The evidence was clear. They had his handwriting and fingerprints on betting slips. Doesn't get much better than that. I wish he'd have come clean from day one. Had he done that I suspect he'd have been long since reinstated. The real tragedy may be his own stubborness and hubris.

All that said, I still think he belongs in the Hall of Fame because to the best of my knowledge there is no evidence he gambled on baseball while playing. The Hall of Fame is very peculiar in that it deliberately distinguishes on how you vote for someone. Joe Torre the manager will probably be voted in while Joe Torre the player has failed to make it. You don't vote for Joe Torre, lifelong contributor to baseball. You vote on him as either a player or a manager, not both. If we were voting on Pete Rose and his lifelong contributions to baseball, then no way would I even consider voting for him. But we are voting on Pete Rose, baseball player. Now if good evidence came forth that Pete Rose the baseball player gambled on MLB then I'd change my mind. I have heard unsubstantiated rumors that he did so, but that's nothing remotely like the evidence Bart Giamotti had on Pete Rose the manager. I also believe his placque should have a few lines discussing the disgrace of his post-playing gambling and tax evasion to serve as a reminder and lesson. It should reflect his on-field excellence while at the same time casting shame on what he did later.

[dsvitak]

Bill James has quite a quote on Pete Rose, in his Hall of Fame book. He just RIPS the idea of placing Rose into the HOF. Old School.

[EMSoccerCoach]

Originally Posted by Left-handed Badger

If he goes in. Joe Jackson has to (and maybe Cicotte). I dont want them in.

I've heard this logic before and I don't understand it...Jackson and Cicotte were found to have violated the cardinal rule of baseball as players, which is also the only means by which either would be judged to enter the Hall.

It's different with Rose...there's no evidence he violated the gambling rule as a player, which is how he would be judged. There's no consideration for him making the Hall as a manager, which is where his "crimes" happened.

I think this is an apples and oranges comparison.

[The Playmaker]

I heard Dowd on a radio interview about 8 months ago. It was his opinion that had they kept looking they would have found evidence that Rose bet while he was playing and also was seemed near certain they would have found evidence he bet against the Reds. With what they had at the time and Rose agreeing to the lifetime ban, there was simply no more reason to keep digging nor enough time to prove it.

[EMSoccerCoach]

Originally Posted by The Playmaker

I heard Dowd on a radio interview about 8 months ago. It was his opinion that had they kept looking they would have found evidence that Rose bet while he was playing and also was seemed near certain they would have found evidence he bet against the Reds. With what they had at the time and Rose agreeing to the lifetime ban, there was simply no more reason to keep digging nor enough time to prove it.

Quite possibly true. But you can't judge on what Dowd THINKS he would have found, only on the evidence. And they didn't have evidence he bet as a player.

[avwjase]

I'm shocked Rose has so much support and Mac has so little. Do people really view steroids as worse than gambling? If so, wow! And btw, I voted yes to Rose.

[The Wolf]

Rose? HOF? NEVER!!! I will never watch a baseball game if that happens.

Pete Rose is justly banned from baseball because he broke this rule, which is posted in every clubhouse:

"Rule 21(d):
BETTING ON BALL GAMES. Any player, umpire, or club official or employee, who shall bet any sum whatsoever upon any baseball game in connection with which the bettor has no duty to perform shall be declared ineligible for one year.

Any player, umpire, or club or league official or employee, who shall bet any sum whatsoever upon any baseball game in connection with which the bettor has a duty to perform shall be declared permanently ineligible."

Then he lied about it. For years. You do not do not DO NOT put people like that in a Hall of Fame.

[redsoxford]

I don't really have a problem with players betting on games they're not involved in (unless they're doing it as part of a syndicate who are fixing games).

Still, I'd be a no on Pete Rose.

[Jpotapoff]

Rose is banned from baseball. A player who has been banned from baseball should not be inducted into the HOF. I don't care if the ban came after he was a player or due to things he did as a non-player. It's simple, the Commissioner banned him from baseball, Rose signed the agreement, no HOF. I don't feel any pity for him either. He knew what he was doing. He lied about it for years and tried to fight the system to convince people to remove his ban on the basis he didn't bet on baseball. Then when he finally realized that, that wasn't going to work he tried the other tact and finally admitted to betting hoping that people would feel sorry for him and reinstate him. Too late.

I think it's pretty much an open and shut case. Both in terms of whether he should be voted into the HOF and if his ban should be removed.

[Jpotapoff]

oops double post

[Art99]

"I'm shocked Rose has so much support and Mac has so little. Do people really view steroids as worse than gambling? If so, wow! And btw, I voted yes to Rose."


To me it depends on the type of gambling was involved. If there is no evidence a person was attempting to influence the results of games then, after some reasonable punishment, the player should be reinstated after a first offense.
If there are no further infractions that should suffice. While I support the commissioner upholding the integrity of the game, baseball at times has gone overboard like when Bowie Kuhn suspended Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle from involvement with the game because a casino hired them as greeters long after their playing days were over. Steroids though are a different matter. Not only can it alter stats and the results of games , it can potentially cause an honest player to lose his job which is quite unfair.