In what has to be the least surprising move of the off season, Major League Baseball has announced that Commissioner Rob Manfred has denied Pete Rose’s request to be reinstated.
“It is not at all clear to me that Mr. Rose has a grasp of the scope of his violations,” Manfred said. “(He) has not prevented credible evidence of a reconfigured life.”
According to reports, Rose is also still actively betting on baseball…despite saying otherwise.
Yikes. That’s not good.
Here’s Manfred’s official statement (h/t Hardball Talk).
Of course, the bigger picture in all this is that not only will baseball’s hit king remain on the ineligible list…but he still remains barred from admittance to baseball’s Hall of Fame. Something that the Hall’s president Jeff Idelson is fine with.
“I’m of the age where he is important to me in my childhood as a great player,” Idelson told The Hall of Very Good Podcast. “On a celebratory side as it relates to the Hall of Fame…I can tell you that every time I walk through the door of a clubhouse, the first time that I read was ‘you won’t gamble on baseball’. Unfortunately, for those of us who grew up loving Pete Rose, he committed baseball’s cardinal sin, lied about it for twenty years, then he wrote a book saying he lied about lying about it.
Coincidentally, Rose isn’t the first former player to see his request for reinstatement denied. Earlier this year, Manfred opted to uphold the lifetime ban on “Shoeless” Joe Jackson.
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