Journal 3

Michael Arnott

Exploratory Journal #3

            My third source was a economic explanation of Pete Rose’s gambling from April 8, 1987 through May 12, 1987 by economist Douglas Coate.  In it, he breaks down Rose’s gambling through three categories: the Reds (his own team), other teams within his division (National League teams), and teams in the other division that the Reds did not play (American League teams).  Coate also mentions that Rose bet on other pro sports as well as college sports and horse racing.  At the end of this time period, Rose had lost $4200 on his own team, $36,000 on other NL teams, and $7000 on AL teams as well as $20,000-$25,000 in transaction fees with a total of $450,000 in total transactions.

            As Rogers said, Pete Rose never bet against his own team.  He just bet for other teams, some that he competed against, and some that he did not.  I think he was so engulfed in the sport of gambling that it did not matter whether he won or lost.  He just enjoyed the potential of making money off of other’s results.  Kennedy lays out the argument that gambling can lead to influences in the manager’s decisions but in this report, Rose put a minimum of $2000 on his team as well as multiple other teams around the League, making the Reds just another piece of the pie, so to speak.  He could not affect the other games around the league so why would he do anything different for his team, whose main mission is to win.

I believe that Rose’s managerial decisions were not effected by the prospect of gambling since he had more money riding on other teams collectively.  I believe that the Reds were another team in the pool he decided to bet on where he let the results play out and collected his winnings accordingly.  Gambling was a pure sport for him and while his team was winning (as they had a 412-373 record while Rose was managing), he wanted to reap the benefits.  He ultimately did not and actually lost money on his team but Rose lost much more money betting on other teams which made the Reds just another team to bet on.  The other games would have random results (though educated guesses could be made on who would win) and I think it is fair to assume that his team was included in this, too, if not to a lesser extent with the fact that he bet on the Reds to win every game, an improbability in baseball.  Regardless, gambling is a game of chance and his chances were good because of his good baseball team which is all the reason enough to bet on them.

After reading the numbers and looking at the charts that lay out Rose’s gambling habits, I seem to find myself asking if Rose had an addiction to gambling.  It would be different if he only bet on his team because that would put more pressure on him to want to win games and win money but since it was spread out over the League so much, the pressure is eased since it is just money in a larger pool with less of a chance for major loss.  But Rose bet almost everyday on different teams, and in this report it only shows the baseball teams he bet on.  It mentions he bet on other pro and college sports as well as horseracing, which seems to me like he had a problem.  If he did have a problem with gambling, that is a mental disease with a dependency on gambling which raises my question: should MLB punish Rose for a mental disease or try to help him get past his problem while still giving him the recognition he deserves?