Pete Rose

1941-

American baseball player

Baseball's all-time leader in hits, singles, at-bats, and games played, Pete Rose has often been compared to the legendary Ty Cobb , whose decades-old hitting record Rose broke on September 11, 1985. Curiously, the comparisons

between Rose and Cobb don't end with their outstanding hitting abilities. Late in their respective careers, both men were accused of betting on their own teams. Cobb escaped relatively unscathed, when Kenesaw Mountain Landis, who was baseball's first commissioner, helped to cover up the allegations against him. In 1936, Cobb was one of the first players to be voted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Sadly, Rose may never be so honored. Because of the gambling allegations, Major League Baseball Commissioner Bart Giamatti in early 1989 suspended Rose from baseball for life. Vehemently denying the charges, Rose battled against Giamatti's ban for several months before finally agreeing in August 1989 to accept the lifetime suspension.

Born in Cincinnati

He was born Peter Edward Rose in Cincinnati, Ohio, on April 14, 1941. One of four children of Harry and LaVerne Rose, he grew up in nearby Anderson Ferry, Ohio. His father, who had once played semi-professional football, pushed Rose into sports at an early age. According to one story, Harry Rose one day went downtown to shop for a pair of shoes for his daughter but returned instead with a pair of boxing gloves for Pete. Rose spent much of his childhood playing baseball with neighborhood friends and later joined the local Little League team. At Western Hills High School in Cincinnati, he played both football and baseball but excelled particularly in the latter sport. Shortly after his graduation from high school, Rose was signed to a contract by the Cincinnati Reds. Under his contract with Reds, he was first assigned to play for the Geneva Red Legs, a Reds farm team in upstate New York.

As his game improved, Rose was promoted through the ranks of the minor league teams in the Reds farm system, putting in time with teams in Tampa, Florida, and Macon, Georgia. By the start of the 1963 season, the Reds decided that Rose was ready for the big time. During spring training that year, Rose earned the nickname "Charlie Hustle" that would stick with him throughout his career. In an exhibition game against the New York Yankees, Rose won a base on balls. Rose ran out the walk, eliciting laughter from the Yankees. Yankee pitcher Whitey Ford dubbed the rookie "Charlie Hustle."

Makes Major League Debut

On April 8, 1963, Rose made his major league debut playing second base for the Reds. He played nearly every game his rookie season. With a batting average of.273 and forty-one runs batted in, Rose was named National League (NL) Rookie of the Year. In his second season with the Reds, Rose's batting average slipped slightly to .269 and his RBIs totaled only thirty-four, but he barreled back in 1965 with a batting average of .312 and an impressive eighty-one RBIs. For the next eight seasons, through 1973, Rose posted batting averages of.300 or higher every year and in 1969 hit a career-high eighty-two RBIs. In 1967, after four years at second base, Rose was switched to outfield to make room for Joe Morgan at second base. At the end of the 1969 season, Rose and Roberto Clemente were tied for the NL batting title going into the final game of the year. In his last at-bat of the season, Rose bunted for a base hit to beat out Clemente and win the title.

For the first seven years of the 1970s, the Reds were the most successful team in the National League, and Rose clearly played a major role in powering the team's climb to the top of the league. In the 1970 All-Star Game, Rose's trademark hustle pushed the NL to victory. In the process, Rose roughed up Ray Fosse, catcher for the Cleveland Indians, in one of the most memorable plays in All-Star history. With the game tied 4-4 in the 12th inning, Rose came charging home with the winning run of the game, barreling over Fosse and separating the catcher's shoulder. After the end of the regular season, Rose fueled the Reds' drive to the NL championship in a sweep over the Pittsburgh Pirates. In the first game of the series, Rose drove in a run to break a scoreless tie in the 10th inning. He then singled during the eighth-inning rally that produced the winning run in the third game.

Leads Reds to NL Championship

In 1972 Rose, now playing left field, led the NL in hits (198) and at-bats (645), finishing the regular season with a batting average of .307. In the post-season, he batted .450 in the NL championship series against the Pirates but slipped to only .214 in the World Series, which the Reds lost to the Oakland Athletics in seven games. For Rose personally, 1973 was the best season ever. With a batting average of .338, he won his third and final batting title, was named the NL's most valuable player, and collected a career-high total of 230 hits. The Reds, however, did not fare quite as well, losing the NL championship series to the New York Mets, despite Rose's best efforts. Those best efforts included his eighth-inning homer that tied the first game of the series and a 12th-inning homer that won Game Four. Ironically, the Mets may well have been energized in their quest for the league championship by a fight Rose had in the third game with Mets shortstop Bud Harrelson.

Chronology

Related Biography: Baseball Player Ray Fosse

Pete Rose figured prominently in one of the more memorable moments of catcher Ray Fosse's baseball career. In the 12th inning of the 1970 All-Star Game, the score was tied 4-4. As Rose charged toward home base with the run that would win the game for the National League, Fosse blocked his way. Never one to be put off, Rose barreled right over Fosse, fracturing the catcher's right shoulder. Fosse, whose nickname was "Mule," played out the rest of the season despite the broken shoulder.

Born in Marion, Illinois, on April 4, 1947, Fosse was the number-one pick of the Cleveland Indians in the first-ever June 1965 free agent draft. After a couple of years in the Indians' farm system, Fosse made his major league debut for the Indians late in the 1967 season. He was injured a number of times during his years in professional baseball, missing all or parts of several seasons. He was traded in March 1973 to the Oakland Athletics, for whom he played through 1975. Back with the Indians in 1976 and the first part of 1977, Fosse played out the end of the 1977 season in Seattle, missed all of 1978 because of injury, and spent his final year with the Milwaukee Brewers in 1979. With a career batting average of .256, the injury-prone Fosse left baseball in 1979 and became an Oakland executive and broadcaster.

Rose's batting average slipped below .300 in 1974 to.284, but he still managed to lead the league in runs scored with 110. He bounced back in 1975, batting .317 and knocking in a total of seventy-four runs for the season. To make room for rookie outfielder Ken Griffey, Rose moved to third base. He also led the Reds to the first of two back-to-back World Series victories. In the first, against the Boston Red Sox, Rose, batting .370, piled up a total of ten hits, earning him the title of MVP for the 1975 World Series. The following year, Rose turned in a brilliant performance during the regular season with a batting average of .323 and sixty-three RBIs. In the post-season, the Reds swept the Yankees in the World Series, although Rose's personal stats were far less impressive with a series batting average of only .188.

Turns in Batting Average of .311

In 1977 Rose turned in a batting average of .311 and knocked home sixty-four runs. In 1978, he mounted the last serious threat to Joe DiMaggio 's 56-game hitting streak, pushing his personal total to forty-four consecutive games, the most for a NL player in the 20th century. Early in the season, on May 5, Rose became the youngest player ever to reach 3,000 hits. At season's end, he turned free agent, setting off a frenzied bidding war for his services. In the end, he signed with the Philadelphia Phillies and was assigned to play first base, his fifth position since his 1963 debut with the majors. In his first season with the Phillies, Rose turned in a batting average of .331 and knocked home fifty-nine runs. The following year his batting average slipped to .282 during the regular season, but he played well enough to help Philadelphia win its first-ever World Championship. In the ninth inning of the sixth game of the World Series, the Phillies were leading 41, but the Kansas City Royals had loaded the bases. Royal Frank White's pop-up foul bounced out of catcher Bob Boone's glove but was caught by Rose to prevent a possible tragedy. The Phillies took the series, four games to two.

During the 1981 season, shortened by a players' strike, Rose had his last .300 season and led the NL in hits. Already forty years of age, it was clear that Charlie Hustle's career was winding down, but attention remained focused on Rose as he edged ever closer to Ty Cobb's career hitting record of 4,192 hits. The night after the players' strike ended in August, Rose passed Stan Musial as the NL's all-time leading hitter. At the end of the 1981 season, Rose's total stood just shy of 3,700 hits, less than 500 from the magic mark. In 1982, his batting average slipped to .271, but he managed to add another 172 hits, bringing his total to within 323 hits of Cobb's record. During 1983, the final year of his contract with the Phillies, Rose batted only .245, but he helped the Phillies make a return visit to the World Series, which Philadelphia lost to the Baltimore Orioles in five games. By season's end, Rose's career hit total had moved up to 3,990, only 202 hits away from the magic mark.

Career Statistics

Signed by Montreal Expos

In 1984 the Montreal Expos, looking for a marquee name to energize the team's home ticket sales, signed Rose, who celebrated his 43rd birthday a day early by

posting the 4,000th hit of his career. However, by July the Expos had benched Rose because of his failure to hit consistently. On August 16, Charlie Hustle was traded back to the Reds, this time as player-manager. Rose repaid the Reds for their vote of confidence by batting .365 for the remainder of the season. As the 1985 season began, Rose's all-time hitting record stood at 4,097, less than 100 hits away from Cobb's 4,192. Excitement mounted as Rose marched inexorably toward a new hitting record. The hitter's hometown of Cincinnati in 1985 named a street near the city's Riverfront Stadium in Rose's honor. Late in the season, on September 11, Rose, batting lefthanded, hit a single to the left off San Diego Padres pitcher Eric Show, landing himself in the record books with his 4,193rd hit. Rose managed to collect nearly a quarter of his career hits after the age of thirty-eight.

As player and manager, Rose helped guide the Reds to a second-place finish in the NL West in both 1985 and 1986, his last year as an active player. In his final appearance as a major league player on August 17, 1986, Rose, batting as a pinch hitter, struck out against pitcher Goose Gossage of the Padres. To make room for pitcher Pat Pacillo, Rose was officially dropped from the Reds' 40-man roster on November 11, 1986. He returned as manager in 1987 and 1988 but was suspended for thirty days by Baseball Commissioner Bart Giamatti in May 1988 after a headline-grabbing shoving incident. Rose's shoving match with umpire Dave Pallone caused a nearriot in Cincinnati. But the worst was yet to come.

Faces Charges of Betting on Baseball

The gambling scandal that was to forever mar Rose's baseball career began to take shape in 1984, when the Cincinnati hitter started to spend an increasing amount of time with a group of men he'd met at a gym in Cincinnati. This group introduced Rose to some bookmakers, and over time he allegedly developed a gambling habit that ultimately reached $15,000 a day and included bets on baseball, including games played by his own team. After reports of Rose's alleged gambling activities reached the offices of Major League Baseball, an investigation into the charges was launched early in 1989. Finally, after the probe was concluded, Commissioner Giamatti on August 24, 1989, permanently banned Rose from major league baseball. A five-page document signed by both Giamatti and Rose included no formal findings, but Giamatti said he considered Rose's acceptance of the ban to be a no-contest plea to the charges.

Whether Major League Baseball ever relents and eases its sanctions against Rose is anybody's guess. Early in 2003, Commisioner of Baseball Bud Selig was considering reinstating Rose, if the former player admitted to gambling on his own team, something Rose had always refused to admit to. Reportedly, Rose was willing to "come clean" if it meant possible reinstatement. In the meantime, the ban and the reasons for its imposition have tainted one of the most brilliant careers in baseball history and in the process given the "Charlie Hustle" nickname an alternate and less than wholesome alternate meaning.

Awards and Accomplishments

However, nothing in the gambling allegations against Rose can alter the monumental performance of Charlie Hustle on the ball field. Nearly two decades after he set the new hitting record, Rose's career 4,256 hits stands as a mark for other ambitious batters to shoot for. And even when Rose's record falls, as eventually it almost certainly will, he will be remembered as one of baseball's greats, whether or not he is ever enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

CONTACT INFORMATION

Address: Pete Rose, c/o Pete Rose Ball Park Café, 1601N. Congress Ave., Boynton Beach, FL 33426. Email: whg [email protected]. Online: http://www.peterose.com.

SELECTED WRITINGS BY ROSE:

The Official Pete Rose Scrapbook: The Life, Times, and Record-Smashing of Charlie Hustle, Prentice Hall, 1975.

(With Bob Hertzel) Pete Rose's Winning Baseball, Mc-Graw-Hill, Contemporary Books, 1976.

Pete Rose: My Life in Baseball, Doubleday, 1979.

(With Hal Bodley) Countdown to Cobb: My Diary of the Record-Breaking 1985 Season, Sporting News, 1985.

Pete Rose: My Story, MacMillan, 1989.

Agreement and Resolution In the Matter of: Peter Edward Rose "2"

Therefore, the Commissioner, recognizing the benefits to Baseball from a resolution of this matter, orders and directs that Peter Edward Rose be subject to the following disciplinary sanctions, and Peter Edward Rose, recognizing the sole and exclusive authority of the Commissioner and that it is in his interest to resolve this matter without further proceedings, agrees to accept the following disciplinary sanctions imposed by the Commissioner:

• Peter Edward Rose is hereby declared permanently ineligible in accordance with Major League Role 21 and placed on the Ineligible List.
• Nothing in this Agreement shall deprive Peter Edward Rose of the rights under Major League Rule 15 to apply for reinstatement. Peter Edward Rose agrees not to challenge, appeal, or otherwise contest the decision of, or the procedure employed by, the Commissioner or any future Commissioner in the evaluation of any applications for reinstatement.
• Nothing in this agreement shall be deemed either an admission or a denial by Peter Edward Rose of the allegation that he bet on any Major League Baseball game.

Source: Office of the Commissioner of Baseball, "Agreement and Resolution," August 23, 1989.

(With Roger Kahn) Ballplayer! The Headfirst Life of Peter Edward Rose, Warner Books, 1990.

FURTHER INFORMATION

Books

"Pete Rose." American Decades CD-ROM. Detroit: Gale Group, 1998.

"Pete Rose." Encyclopedia of World Biography Supplement, Vol. 21. Detroit: Gale Group, 1998.

"Pete Rose." St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture, 5 vols. Detroit: St. James Press, 2000.

Other

"Agreement and Resolution." DowdReport.com. http://www.dowdreport.com/agreement.pdf (November 16, 2002).

"Biography." Pete Rose's Official Web Site. http://www.peterose.com/bio.htm (November 1, 2002).

"Chronology of Rose Case." Cincinnati.com. http://reds.enquirer.com/2001/08/08/red_chronology_of_rose.html (November 16, 2002).

"Pete Rose." Baseball-Reference.com. http://www.baseball-reference.com/r/rosepe01.shtml (November 1, 2002).

"Ray Fosse." BaseballLibrary.com. http://www.pubdim.net/baseballlibrary/ballplayers/F/Fosse_Ray.stm (November 18, 2002).

Sketch by Don Amerman