Pete Rose’s reinstatement was announced Tuesday, but we’ve known it was coming since Feb. 28, when President Donald Trump announced he was “going to sign a complete PARDON of Pete Rose, who shouldn’t have been gambling on baseball, but only bet on HIS TEAM WINNING.”
And if that wasn’t enough, Trump doubled down in April after meeting with MLB commissioner Rob Manfred, opining on Truth Social that: “Baseball, which is dying all over the place, should get off its fat, lazy ass and elect Pete Rose, even though far too late, into the Baseball Hall of Fame.”
All that remained to be seen was how Manfred would swing it and, well, swing away he did: essentially clearing the bases when he reinstated Rose, baseball’s disgraced all-time hit king, off the game’s permanently ineligible list along with 16 other individuals, including Shoeless Joe Jackson and other members of the infamous 1919 Chicago ‘Black Sox’.
Manfred apparently even called up Trump, who was in Saudi Arabia shopping for planes, to let him know.
Now, Manfred’s decision doesn’t necessarily mean that Rose, Jackson or any of the other individuals are guaranteed to be voted into the Hall of Fame — and this may in fact be the genius aspect of this move.
The reinstated group will not be included in the Baseball Writers’ Association of America vote that gets everybody all twisted up every January. Rather, they will be eligible for consideration by the Hall’s Historical Overview Committee, which will draw up a list of eight names for consideration for the Classic Baseball Era committee, which is scheduled to next meet in December 2027. Twelve of 16 votes are needed for admission and trust me — this group can sometimes be a cantankerous, swirly (to borrow a word from my friend Kevin Barker) bunch.
As a BBWAA voter, I used to view the whole committee thing as a little too opaque for my liking, a little too “let’s have a cigar and bourbon and talk about what a jackass this guy was as a teammate.” You know, something like the Hockey Hall of Fame! But I’ve come to realize that the committee system is in fact a necessary safeguard. Oh, they piss me off every now and then — putting Bud Selig in before Marvin Miller, failing to put Cito Gaston or Felipe Alou in. But in terms of players? Really, the only eye-roller of note was Harold Baines getting in through a committee that included his former owner and manager and, well, you need to re-evaluate your life if you think anything is cheapened by the presence of Harold Baines.
The committee will be well aware that Rose, who died on Sept. 30, 2024, had been on the ineligible list for betting on baseball games while he was manager of the Cincinnati Reds. They will be well aware that he is the career leader in hits (4,256), was a three-time World Series winner, three-time batting champion and Most Valuable Player. They will also be well aware that Rose also spent time in prison for tax evasion and reached an out-of-court settlement with a woman who claimed the pair had a sexual relationship while she was a minor. Pete Rose really did Charlie Hustle his way through baseball and life.
How did Manfred explain his decision? Umm … how to put this delicately? It’s, ah … well, it’s because Rose and the others are dead.
“In my view, once an individual has passed away, the purposes of Rule 21 (which prohibits gambling on baseball games) have been served,” Manfred wrote in rendering his decision. “Obviously, a person no longer with us cannot represent a threat to the integrity of the game. Moreover, it is hard to conceive of a penalty that has more deterrent effect than one that lasts a lifetime with no reprieve.”
Now, I know what you’re thinking, because you’re all a cynical lot. Does this mean that Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Alex Rodriguez or anybody else implicated in the game’s steroid scandal — it always gets back to ‘roids, doesn’t it? — has no chance of getting into Cooperstown until they … you know …
No! The two things are different. Bonds and Clemens were on the Hall-of-Fame ballot for the maximum 10 years. Their problem isn’t that the commissioner’s office barred their admission; it’s that they’ve failed to earn enough votes from members of the BBWAA. The same holds true for A-Rod, who has been on the ballot for the past three years.
Now, frequent visitors to this corner (or frequent listeners) will know that I voted for Bonds and Clemens in each year of eligibility and will continue to do so for Rodriguez. Their numbers are beyond reproach and, well, I have my suspicions about a great deal of their contemporaries, including some who are in the Hall. Plus, I’m just not comfortable passing moral judgment on athletes who want to cheat Father Time or speed up recovery from injuries or hit the ball harder or farther. I kind of see it as value added, you know?
At any rate, the game usually gets this stuff right. The Hall usually gets it right. Maybe this is leading us all toward some kind of blanket amnesty or some other committee process or something that allows baseball to continue to make peace with itself and its eras and scandals and bad guys.
Or maybe, like everything else, it’s just going to take a phone call from Mar-a-Lago. It’s 2025, after all. This is how we roll.
Jeff Blair hosts Blair & Barker weekdays from 2-4 p.m. ET on Sportsnet 590 The Fan and Sportsnet. He also hosts Blue Jays Talk following most weekday games.
