Los Angeles (United States) (AFP) – Pete Rose, Major League Baseball’s all-time hit king who left the sport in disgrace after being banned for betting on games, died Monday aged 83, his former team confirmed. Nicknamed “Charlie Hustle” for his hard-charging effort and dogged determination, the long-time hometown hero for the Cincinnati Reds passed away in Las Vegas, the Reds said in a statement.
Rose set MLB career records with 4,256 hits, 15,890 appearances at the plate, 3,562 games played and 3,215 singles. His most celebrated feat came on September 11, 1985, when he singled to left field off San Diego pitcher Eric Snow in Cincinnati for his 4,192nd career hit, breaking the prior all-time MLB hit mark held by Ty Cobb, who played from 1905 to 1928. Over his 24-season career, Rose captured three World Series titles, in 1975 and 1976 with the Reds and in 1980 with the Philadelphia Phillies.
Rose was a 17-time All-Star over his career at a record five different positions — left and right fielder, plus first, second and third baseman. He won the season batting titles in 1968, 1969, and 1973, when he also claimed the National League Most Valuable Player award. Ten years earlier, Rose had been named the NL Rookie of the Year. After a brief stint with the Montreal Expos in 1984, Rose was traded back to the Reds and made player-manager, a dual role he kept through the 1986 campaign before retiring as a player and guiding the club for three final seasons until 1989, when details of his gambling on MLB games emerged.
Rose denied the allegations. But only three days after Bart Giamatti took over as MLB commissioner in April 1989, the new boss named attorney John Dowd to investigate the matter. The following month, Dowd documented betting activity by Rose in 1985 and 1986 and produced a day-by-day gambling account for 1987 that included Rose betting on 52 Reds games in which he served as the team’s manager. On August 24, 1989, Rose was placed on MLB’s permanently ineligible list and Giamatti announced his ban. Eight days later, Giamatti died of a heart attack.
In 1991, the Baseball Hall of Fame voted to exclude consideration of players on the permanent ban list, and Rose’s status as a historic player who disgraced the game has made his inability to join the shrine of legends among baseball’s greatest controversies. Rose would later fight to seek reinstatement several times without success. In 2004, Rose admitted he bet on Reds games, saying he always bet on his team to win, never on them to lose. But in 2010, on the 25th anniversary of his record-breaking hit, Rose apologized to many of his former teammates for “disrespecting baseball.”
Rose, who spent five months in prison in 1990 and early 1991 for tax evasion, became a familiar figure at events as an autograph seller, even appearing at pro wrestling events from 1998 to 2000. In 2016, Rose’s jersey number, 14, was retired by the Reds.
Rose was born on April 14, 1941, in Cincinnati and was given a look by the Reds when he left high school thanks to an uncle who worked as a scout for the club. Rose got his chance to make the Reds roster as an injury replacement and made his MLB debut on April 8, 1963. He went 0-for-11 before finally getting a hit five days later. Rose went on to bat .243 for the season to earn the NL Rookie of the Year award.
In the 1970s, Rose was a key member of the “Big Red Machine” dynasty squad that won two World Series titles, four National League crowns, and six NL West division titles. After a 44-game hit streak in 1978, matching the National League record set in 1897, Rose departed in 1979 for the Philadelphia Phillies, whose four-year deal for $3.2 million was then a US team sports record. It paid off when Rose helped the Phillies take their first World Series crown in 1980.
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