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Charlie Hustler, Part II Now that the Pete Rose commotion has finally died down and everyone has gone back to attacking Howard Dean, a profound question lingers: Exactly how much can one stand these corporate front office types babbling on about what’s good for the game? Are $20 million-a-year salaries good for the game? Are $75 ticket prices? Is a four dollar pretzel? Are ballparks named SBC, Safeco, and Minute Maid? Few remember that until Ken Lay retired to Boca Raton, the Astros played on Enron Field. If that park had wheels, Jeff Skilling would have stolen it. I’m about as much a fan of Pete Rose the person as I was of his late-1970s bowl haircut, and I realize letting Pete Rose manage again would be like letting Charles Cullen nurse again. But the George Will in me seeks to make sense of the great American pastime in much the same way Pete Rose never quite made sense of the trifecta. Pro team owners, in their finite wisdom, have chosen gambling as the one vice from among dozens with which to demonstrate a tiny vestige of Puritanism. Fact is, in the 1980s, when Rose’s big trouble started, there were enough players facing criminal charges or being questioned on suspicion of wrongdoing to start a whole separate rotisserie league. But forget all the cocaine snorting, underage groupie boffing, and hotel bar-brawling that was rampant throughout Major Leaugue Baseball at the time Rose’s “agreement” was made. Pete Rose committed the unpardonable sin: He bet on his own team--to win, no less. Excuse me, but isn't every player effectively betting on his own team to win when he signs a contract that provides a half-million-dollar bonus for making it to the playoffs? And how about those hefty World Series shares? Not at all, argue the Forbes 500 Puritans. There's a difference. See if you can follow this logic. Pete Rose bet on the Reds to win specific games. This might have led him to save a top relief pitcher for a game he bet on versus a game he didn't bet on. Apparently, Pete Rose's problem was not being able to prove he bet on every game. Now run this by me one more time: Betting on your own team to win does affect the potential outcome of the game, but being doped up on crystal meth while you're on the mound does not. Could someone from the commissioner’s office please put down the bong for a minute and answer a few simple questions. What exactly does a doped up pitcher do when he sees two catchers--aim for the middle? Does he go with the breaking ball or cut fastball when the count is five and three? How does he get his slider over knowing there are 38,000 spies in the stands sending scouting reports back to the mother ship? Some fans will remember that relief pitcher Steve Howe was suspended for cocaine use seven times and let back into baseball seven times, often with the rapidity of a streetwalker the day the Republican National Convention leaves town. When Howe was finally released by the Yankees, it wasn't because he failed a urinalysis test. It was because he lost five miles an hour off his fastball. Similarly, Pete Rose was way, way past his prime as a player and managing a losing ball club when he got caught gambling. Around the same time George Steinbrenner received a slap on the gold cufflinks and a short sabbatical for paying felon extortionist Howie Spira $40,000 to destroy Dave Winfield’s good name, the owners and their self-righteous commissioner seized the Rose case to demonstrate to the world just how squeaky clean they kept their sport. Which worked well for a few days, right up until they got nailed to the tune of $280 million for colluding against free agents. By contrast, Michael Jordan was winning championships in threes and singlehandedly bringing basketball newfound riches when his gambling problems--possibly millions lost in golf matches and at blackjack tables smack in the middle of the playoffs--came to light. His sentence? A fifteen-minute one-on-one interview with Ahmad Rashad. Click here to rant back. |