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Is Off Rose By George Stahl NEW YORK (AQB)--Maybe because I am a Phillies fan and remember what Pete Rose meant to the 1980 world championship team, but I've always felt that Rose belonged in baseball's Hall of Fame despite possibly betting on baseball. No more. I have changed my mind after watching an advance copy of Sonja Steptoe's half-hour report on Rose's case, which airs on a special Page One on CNN at 7:30 a.m. ET Sunday and on CNN/SI at 9:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m., as well as at various times during the following week. Steptoe settles for me what she calls "the great sports debate" of the past decade by proving to me that Rose not only bet on baseball but also bet on the team he managed, the Cincinnati Reds. "We obtained betting slips of Pete. They were in Pete's handwriting and have his thumbprint on them," says John Dowd, the former Justice Department prosecutor who investigated the Rose case for Major League Baseball. Steptoe reports that the slips show Rose betting between $2,000 and $5,000 a game on as many as 50 games a week, including his Reds. Rose, of course, denies the charges. "How is that a betting slip? I mean if you have a betting slip, Sonja, you have to have a team that you bet on, you have to have an amount that you bet on. If you look at this date here, Montreal was at Cincinnati that day, so they even got the home team wrong. I think if I was betting on something I would have the home team right." Steptoe says Rose is correct in that the Reds were at home on that date; however, the Reds appear on other sheets and in their proper place. Baseball's investigation shows Rose always bet the Reds to win, but Dowd says that doesn't matter because you're still "putting your financial interests ahead of your team's interests," creating a conflict of interest and enormous debt to the people with whom you're placing bets. At one point, according to baseball's probe, Rose was down $500,000 to the New York Mafia. "The idea that the mob in New York owned the manager of the Reds is outrageous," Dowd says. Rose says he built that debt because of his football bets and because "I got tied in with some wrong guys." However, former commissioner Fay Vincent had an interesting take on the idea of Rose betting on the Reds. Vincent wondered what message Rose was sending to his bettors on those days that he didn't bet on the Reds. Did that mean the manager didn't think his team could win? Gamblers live for that kind of inside of message. Vincent also thinks that public sentiment for the reinstatement of Rose is out of ignorance. "I think the public, bless the public's heart, hasn't read the evidence, doesn't know what really took place. But even more importantly, I think the public is not thinking about the institution of baseball. They're not worried about the next great ballplayer, who says 'Look, if Pete got away with it, I can get away with it.'" Interestingly, though, Steptoe's report shows former Reds Paul O'Neill, John Franco and Norm Charlton believing that Rose should be reinstated so that he can go in the Hall of Fame. Of course, Rose thinks so too. "I have cleaned up my act. I do no more illegal gambling. I am very selective of the people I associate with, and that's really what Mr. Giammatti said when he suspended me, that he wants me to reconfigure my life." That brings me to my one complaint about Steptoe's piece - it doesn't talk to baseball commissioner Bud Selig or get Major League Baseball's current opinion on the Rose debate. However, I did see an advance copy, which leaves time for in-studio discussions, where Steptoe may address this issue. Grade: A. An excellent report that becomes an A+ if Steptoe discusses Selig's view on the matter. |
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