Quote:
|
Gaylord Perry threw spitballs. I believe that is altering the game and hurting baseball's integrity.
|
Yes, I agree. However, don't you think it's a fundamentally different question?
Quote:
|
All of that is worse than gambling, I say put Rose in there, put a italics beside his name but put him in.
|
Oh come on. There're plenty of gamblers in the HOF. It's not that he bet the horses, or played blackjack. He bet on his own games!
First, we'll assume Pete Rose never bet against the Reds.
The baseball season is 162 games long. It is the manager's job to utilize the players given to him in such a way that he gets the most wins out of them. By placing bets on certain games, he is now doing things in his own best interest, and not the team's. What if he bets on a game, and then leaves his ace starter in for 140 pitches. Even though he may win that game, his starter can't seem to throw strikes for the next month. Maybe his starters are beat up, but he trots them out there, despite their complaints, because he's got 2000 riding on this game. And maybe he doesn't play the kids, even though they're the future of the club, because they can't do anything yet, and he needs a win.
There are many situations where trying to win now hurts the team in the long run.
It ALSO opens up the possibility that Pete Rose gets into a little debt, and the bookies ask Rose to toss one.
The fact that there's even the question and the possibility that Pete Rose threw games is horrifying. This is what the rulemakers believed when they made the rule, I think. And I completely agree with it.
This is how it's different from corking a bat, or using steroids (or greenies, or spitballs): by gambling, Pete Rose brought in the possibility that he wasn't attempting to win. He may have had to do that; we don't know.
No one's trying to lose by throwing a spitter.