Manfred Whiffs With Rose Ruling

Looking for advice on a touchy ethical matter, many of us would not turn to a 34-time convicted felon proud of his history of preying on women and whose continuous lying borders on incalculable.

Well, Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred sees things differently. In early June he acknowledged that talks with Donald Trump in April were instrumental in his decision to remove Pete Rose, Joe Jackson and 15 other dead malefactors from MLB’s “permanently ineligible” list:

“The President was one of a number of voices that was supportive of the idea that this was the right decision. Obviously, I have respect for the office and the advice that he gave. I paid attention to [it]. But I had a lot of other people that were weighing in on the topic as well.”

I was one of those other people. Between Manfred’s meeting with Trump and his whitewashing of Rose, I sent a message to MLB, pointing out the obvious that Rose betting on the Reds he managed could lead to in-game decisions regarding his bullpen that had an impact on subsequent games. [Before we knew about his betting, we knew that Rose had been criticized for the handling of his pitching staff.] The integrity of the game was compromised.

My exact wording is locked in MLB’s Case #03945845, but the gist of it was that: Rose had no integrity, Trump has no integrity and Manfred was coming to the plate.

Manfred fanned.

At the time of his expunging of Rose’s record, Manfred expressed his unreasoning in a letter to Jeffrey M. Lenkov, an attorney who asked for Rose’s reinstatement earlier this year: "Obviously, a person no longer with us cannot represent a threat to the integrity of the game.”

Gosh, the dead can no longer act? Certainly not the professorial depth of former Commissioner Bart Giamatti, who banned Rose on Aug. 23, 1989.

But what about the integrity of the games where Rose’s overriding goal was winning a bet today, tomorrow’s game be damned? And what about information passed on by his gambling contacts on the days he was pressing down? That damage cannot be undone.

And while Manfred’s assertion that the dead cannot impact games today, in early June MLB reinstated four players suspended last year for betting on baseball while in the minors – pitchers Andrew Saafrank, Michael Kelly and Jay Groome and infielder José Rodriguez. Saalfrank and Kelly were important bullpen contributors for the Diamondbacks and Athletics, respectively, before their suspensions.

All of the Black Sox who threw the 1919 World Series have also had their permanent ineligibility revoked. Yep, Chick Gandil, the ringleader; Swede Risberg, the “hard guy” who kept the others in line, and pitchers Eddie Cicotte and Lefty Williams, whose lackluster efforts were keys to the fix.

Cicotte has a stellar pitching record, comparable to several celebrated hurlers – if you ignore the stain he put on the game. In fact, his Wins Against Replacement at 59 [he won 21 games in the last season of his ban-shortened career] tops Whitey Ford’s 57.

As might be expected, Rose’s fans greeted Manfred’s capitulation to gambling with delight.

Bob Castellini, owner of the Cincinnati Reds, where Rose was a key member [and the namer] of The Big Red Machine, was “thankful for the decision.”

He added: “Pete is one of the greatest players in baseball history, and Reds Country will continue to celebrate him as we always have.” The team held a celebration the next night.

What a stirring endorsement from the organization whose games were jeopardized by Rose’s gambling. Ah, to be a starry-eyed fan again.

The Phillies, too, celebrated the ruling. Rose won two pennants and a World Series during his five seasons in Philadelphia. His old Philly teammate Mike Schmidt called it “a great day for baseball.”

Clueless fans, those stuck in permanent adolescence, gamblers and other cheaters hope this will lead Rose and maybe Jackson to inclusion in the Baseball Hall of Fame.

This possibility reinforces my previously announced intentions to ignore the Hall of Fame and the subsequent construction of my own compilation of Gary’s Baseball Greats. So, whether they reach Cooperstown is irrelevant to me.

For those who care, Rose and Jackson – and Happy Felsch and Fred McMullin – will be eligible for HoF consideration in 2027 under the aegis of the Classical Baseball Era Committee. It takes approval of 12 of the 16 fickle committee members to get a player into the Hall.

Along with Manfred’s astute reasoning that the dead can no longer impact the game, he claimed that lifetime bans, expiring at death, “create a deterrent effect that reduces the likelihood of future violations by others" – a completely unsubstantiated statement that ignores future benefits family members might enjoy.

A skeptic – never a cynic, mind you – might see Manfred’s action as more evidence of how Major League Baseball has embraced the gambling that it historically fought.

I was listening to a Cardinals doubleheader the day I heard about Manfred not manning up. In March, the Cardinals announced its partnership with bet365 as a mobile sports betting partner.

The official MLB announcement reported: “The new sponsorship agreement includes advertising rights on the Cardinals radio broadcasts, Cardinals Insider TV show, cardinals.com, and signage at the ballpark that will be visible on television broadcasts, along with the use of the team logo and sponsorship of the team’s starting lineups at Busch Stadium.”

MLB’s OFFICIAL STATEMENT concludes:

“Fans are encouraged to download bet365’s mobile sportsbook app in anticipation of sports betting going live in Missouri later this year. Fans located in surrounding states where legalized sports betting is live including Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky and Tennessee can download the bet365 app to place wagers on a wide range of live in-game and pre-game sports from across numerous leagues including MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL and MLS.”

The Cardinals are not betting on betting alone. MLB as a whole has sportsbook partners DraftKings and Fan Duel. As of April 3, SportsHandle listed the following gambling relationships: Bally Bet, Yankees and Rockies; Betfred, Rockies, Red Sox, Tigers, Nationals, Astros, Reds, Pirates; Betway, White Sox, Mets; Circa Sports, Red Sox, Cubs, Rockies; SuperBook Sports, Orioles; Underdog Sports, Reds; Wagr, Reds, Rockies.

[Seems like one has ample choices for betting on the Rockies to lose.]

There are also deals between various sports venues and gamblers, such as Nationals Park in Washington and BetMGM, Wrigley Field and DraftKings, Yankee Stadium and FanDuel, Chase Field [Phoenix] and Caesars Sportsbook, Citi Field [Mets] and Caesar’s Sportsbook, Fenway Park and BetMGM Sportsbook and Progressive Field [Cleveland] and Fanatics Sportsbook.

After a few game recaps and a feature or two about coastal ballclubs, the daily Yahoo! baseball home page provides a tout sheet of upcoming ballgames: odds, expert picks, starting pitchers, trends, and stats.

Manfred’s willingness to gloss over the transgressions of Rose, Jackson and the others becomes merely the latest MLB slide down the slippery slope of promoting sports betting. Hey, fans, you “are encouraged” to wager money you may or may not have. MLB and the teams will get their cut of the pie from the deals it negotiates with the gamblers.

Marcus Giamatti, Bart’s son, did not share the enthusiasm for Rose’s reinstatement. He told USA Today Sports that, “It’s a serious dark day for baseball.

“For my dad, it was all about defending the integrity of baseball. Now, without integrity, I believe the game of baseball, as we know it, will cease to exist. How, without integrity, will the fans ever entrust the purity of the game?

"The basic principle that the game is built on, fair play, and that integrity is going to be compromised. And the fans are losers. I don't know how a fan could go and watch a game knowing that what they're seeing may not be real and fair anymore. That's a really scary thought."

But within a society where money is all that matters – and the easier its accumulation the better – Giamatti’s principles are dwarfed by the principle and interest generated by sports betting.