I'm a lifelong baseball fan, and probably will be, for better or worse.
So when I heard this week that the great Pete Rose, the MLB hit king had passed away, I was a little bit sad.
Pete was before my time. He retired the year before I began to really watch baseball in 1987, but as a fan of the game I had a certain amount of reverence for him. In fact, I was once at a Reds game years ago and Pete happened to be sitting in the stands, which was kind of cool.
As the memorials of Pete have come through the web this past week, one strain that keeps coming up over and over is that he played the game "the right way."
He respected the game in how he played it, how he conducted himself on and off the field. The 11 minute standing ovation he received when he broke Ty Cobb's hit record in '86 was well-deserved.
The passion he showed even inspired his opponents. You can't help but admire, albeit laughingly, someone who sprints to first base after a walk.
Contrast that with the millionaire manchildren of today, whose puerile conduct during the games makes it almost unwatchable.
So as a young person, maybe 13 years old, I was shocked when Pete was banned for life from baseball because it was discovered he had placed bets on MLB games.
We're not talking about a casual wager over beer at a family gathering. He was in deep with some pretty serious high rollers who were betting big bucks on the games. To share "inside info" to these cats was serious indeed.
If baseball was a religion, Pete's actions were anathema. They merited severe consequences, and a lifetime ban is about as severe as you can get.
People who know more about the situation than I do say that had Pete admitted his wrongdoings when people started asking questions about his illicit activities, it might have led to a different outcome. Severe consequences for sure, but some contrition on his part would surely have helped his case.
If politics has taught us one thing, it's that Americans are pretty forgiving people when it comes to indiscretions by people in the public eye.
But Pete did the opposite of what would have allowed him to save any face from the situation. He denied it. For years. Even after he was confronted with indisputable evidence.
Perhaps it was the ego telling him that his past contributions to the game had been an investment of sorts that would compensate for his present failures. There is some truth to that, but he had racked up a moral debt to baseball that could not be repaid.
Pete finally came around to reality. No appeal was going to save him. Mr. Giamatti really meant it when he used the words "Lifetime Ban"; and no commissioner following would dare overturn that precedent.
So baseball's Hit King passed from this world banned from baseball.
People are saying he should be granted membership in the baseball Hall of Fame posthumously. Why not? It was a lifetime ban, right? Now that his earthly life has ended, technically the ban is over, so why not?
I suppose there are arguments on both sides of that, but on more important matters, from what I can see Mr. Rose passed from this life fully contrite. He admitted long ago that his actions were wrong, that he had done irreparable damage to his reputation, as well as the game of baseball. He asked many times of various baseball commissioners to be reinstated, but was denied.
Whether that is just or not is not for me to say.
At this point whether or not Pete Rose is ever inducted into the Hall of Fame is irrelevant. The important thing is that he finally accepted full responsibility for his actions, and the consequences that followed.
That is Vojdaan.
And now that baseball is profiting quite handsomely from legal betting, it seems there's got to be a way to get his plaque into the Hall of Fame so that generations of fans can appreciate the incredible things he did while playing.
That's just my two cents, post-inflation, on the matter.
Speaking of doing things "the right way" I've launched a new podcast titled Ba Vojdaan. Vojdaan is a Persian word that means "conscientious" and it could use some love in its fledgling days.
Click here to give it a listen:
https://vojdaan.com