Journal 4

Michael Arnott

Exploratory Journal #4

            My fourth source is an article from the Philadelphia Daily News written by John Morrow named, “Pete Rose Tells About Gambling and PED Users.”  It is a description of Pete Rose talking to a crowd of people at Christ's Church of the Valley in Pennsylvania.  In it he talks about his life through baseball, his mistakes, his future regarding the Hall of Fame, and current views on PED (Performance Enhancing Drugs) users.  He explains why he bet on his team and apologizes for his actions.

            In this article, Rose says something that partially goes with what Kennedy has to say about whether or not Rose’s punishment fits the crime when there are steroid users in the sport today.  Rose points out that “other people get second chances: alcoholics, drug addicts, spousal beaters.  Not gamblers.”  If a situation arises in these categories in sports, a fine and/or suspension are given out as punishment for the first offense.  Rose was met with a lifetime ban from baseball for his first offense for a crime that seems less dangerous than the previously stated three categories.  Kennedy also wrote about how Bud Selig, the current commissioner of the MLB is not budging in his stance to keep Rose banned.  Rose states his poor luck since “Bart Giamatti (the commissioner at the time) suspended me and four days later he died.”  Giamatti’s two successors have held the ban firm though Rose believes Giamatti would have lifted the ban after a year.  Also going along with Kennedy’s argument about gambling vs. PED’s, Rose brings up that Mark McGwire, an admitted steroid user, is still working in the MLB for the Cardinals and Dodgers as a hitting coach, the exact aspect he cheated in.

            I have begun to think about Rose’s eligibility for the Hall of Fame and what needs to happen before that can happen.  He has a ban from all MLB-sanctioned events (with a couple exceptions), which keeps him from his passion.  The man was involved with baseball as a player and manager for twenty-six years before having it stripped from underneath him.  That is a whole life dedicated to baseball only to be told that he will not be accepted in the game he loves.  Offenders of other crimes such as drug problems, alcohol problems, and spousal beatings serve their punishment and are reinstated into the game so why should gambling be any different if not lesser punishment?  Rose understands the mistakes he’s made and he has done his penance for twenty-five years--a longer suspension than anyone has ever faced for a DUI, assault, or steroid use.  The first step to his Hall eligibility begins with his overall involvement in baseball.  Instead of punishing him for his mistakes, why not use his mistakes to teach others?  He could talk about his problems with gambling and how it set him into deep debt aside from lifetime banishment from baseball to help other that might have the same problem.  He could even help coach and develop younger players using his twenty-six years of professional baseball experience to build fundamentally better players who play the game through effort and hustle, the way Pete played the game.

            Going forward, I want to look at previous cases of alcohol/drug abuse and spousal abuse in baseball and the punishments inflicted upon the offenders, specifically in the Hall of Fame.  If they get a second chance, why does Pete not for a equal or lesser crime?  If Rose is considered to have a gambling addiction, how does that match up to an addiction to drugs or alcohol since they are both classified as addictions?  Did Pete Rose have an addiction to gambling or rather an addiction to baseball, or did they feed each other?