Rules are rules...they should be respected
Ah, I was waiting for someone to say that.
First, it doesn't matter whether you bet for or against your own team. Rule 21 makes no distinction as to who you place your bets upon. There was no evidence whatsoever that Pete Rose bet against the Reds. But as Hall of Famer Hal McCoy said,
"The major problem with Rose betting on baseball, particularly the Reds, is that as manager he could control games, make decisions that could enhance his chances of winning his bets, thus jeopardizing the integrity of the game."
Plus there are also problems with legal sportbooking, like in Vegas, where the oddmakers know when Pete Rose is and is not betting on his own team. If he's not betting on his own team that particular night, is it because he thinks they won't win? The odds changed dramatically depending on whether Pete did or not not bet on the Reds. Also, the lineup card can change depending on whether or not Pete has a bet on tonight's or tomorrow's game. Does he play this guy tonight, or save him for tomorrow when he's going to place a large bet on the game? Does he continue to play a guy who is hurt, instead of resting him, because he needs him in there to win a bet?
Clearly, betting on baseball, either for or against your own team, is repugnant and affects the integrity of the game.
Still, betting on baseball and being kicked out of the game does not preclude you from being voted into the Hall of Fame. Or at least it didn't use to.
When a player retires from the game, after 5 years to the day he becomes eligible for the Hall of Fame. Pete Rose officially retired from the game on November 11, 1986. Which means that on November 11, 1991 he would be eligible to be voted in to the Hall of Fame.
He Managed the Reds for 4 full seasons, from 1985-1988, with the first two years being as a player-manager. But he never bet on games until he retired from playing baseball, as the evidence showed.
On August 24, 1989, two years before he would become eligible for the Hall of Fame, Rose voluntarily accepted a permanent place on baseball’s ineligible list (the Ineligible to Perform list). Rose accepted that there was a factual reason for the ban, and in return, Major League Baseball agreed to make
no formal finding with regard to the gambling allegations. According to baseball's rules, Rose could apply for reinstatement in one year. He accepted the ban to then-Commissioner Bart Giamatti, who immediately held a press conference and threw Pete Rose under the bus, stating that he believed Pete Rose bet on baseball. So much for no formal finding. <snort>
Eight days later, on September 1, 1989, Bart Giamatti died of a heart attack at the age of 51. A heavy smoker all his life, Giamatti's closest friend for many years, Bud Selig, wondered aloud if the stress from the Pete Rose situation didn't have a lot to do with his death, stating it was probably Pete Rose, more so than the smoking, that killed him.
After the new Commissioner, Fay Vincent, slammed the owners for collusion, singling out especially Brewers owner Bud Selig and White Sox owner Jerry Reisendorf for the rigging of free agent signings and other actions (where they were caught red-handed and had to pay the players $280 million damages), Bud Selig as the chairman of the owner's Executive Council of Major League Baseball, orchestrated the removal of Giamatti as Commissioner, and then assumed the position himself with the full endorsement of the owners.
In 1990, Selig became a member of the Hall of Fame's Board of Directors. Both he and Commissioner Fay Vincent had made it quite clear that they didn't want to see Pete Rose in the Hall of Fame. When Selig became an influential member of the Board, along with the Commissioner who is also automatically on the Board, it didn't take much arm-twisting of the other members of the Board (most of whom are former players and executives of MLB) to change things the way they wanted them to be. And one of the main things they wanted was to have Pete Rose not be in the Hall of Fame, who's time for eligibility to be voted in by the BBWAA (Baseball Writers Association of America) was rapidly approaching. The writers have been unpredictable in the past, and Selig and a few others didn't want to take the chance that the writers would vote him in.
So, the Hall of Fame, under pressure from the Commissioner of Baseball and Bud Selig, instituted a brand new, never before existed, rule for Hall of Fame eligibility. The Rule was created on February 8, 1991, just months before Rose was to become eligible. It's a rule widely known as the "Pete Rose Rule". The Rule states:
3. Eligible Candidates -- Candidates to be eligible must meet the following requirements:
E. Any player on Baseball's ineligible list shall not be an eligible candidate.
That's the rule that make Pete Rose ineligible to be in the Hall of Fame. It's the very definition of an
ex post facto law, where the rules change and then you are subject to them before they even existed. It's like getting a ticket today, for running a stop sign 6 months ago, despite the stop sign not being installed until last week.
If the rule had been in existence when he was playing or managing or when he accepted the ban, the chances of Pete Rose
volunteering to be placed on the list is zero. He broke the rules after he quite playing, because the risk of being banned from ever playing the game wasn't an issue. It's also very likely that if he knew he was risking not even being allowed to be considered for the Hall of Fame, since he was a lock to be enshrined there, that he would have never gambled at all on baseball in the first place.
So, yes, rules are rules, and they should be respected, but the Hall of Fame changed the rules on Pete Rose. And it sucks. The Hall of Fame used to be a magical place, and it largely still is. But I can't get past the fact that it's now a place controlled by people who hypocritically are damaging integrity of the game in favor of their own politics and petty vindictiveness. Selig reinstated his friend George Steinbrenner from the permanently suspended list shortly after he became Commissioner. He also suspended Reds owner Marge Schott for, officially, racially insensitive and prejudicial remarks, but it was also on the heels of her publicly calling him a "petty little man" in criticizing Selig for his refusal to even consider her friend Pete Rose's requests for reinstatement to the game.
I think Pete Rose will eventually be elected to the Hall of Fame. But he won't live to see it, and neither will Bud Selig. Ironically, if you go to the Hall of Fame Museum, which houses the Hall itself, you can't turn a corner without seeing Pete Rose. He's everywhere. His numbers demand it.
