I love the Phillies and admired Pete Rose. MLB, keep him out of the Hall of Fame. | Opinion
I don't feel bad that Pete Rose isn't in the Hall of Fame. I admired his gritty determination with the Phillies, but his choices with the Reds mean he deserves being left out – forever.

PHILADELPHIA — Sports fans in my hometown of Philadelphia have a reputation, sometimes earned, often exaggerated.
Professional athletes know Philly fans will show them all kinds of loyalty for brawny, in-your-face effort but we will also boo the bejesus out of them and then turn our backs if they show us they can't be trusted.
I was born and raised a fan of the Philadelphia Phillies, and I remain one today. I admired Pete Rose for his gritty determination, especially in the 1980 World Series.
But Rose knew that betting on baseball, wagering on teams he was managing, was stupid and reckless. He did it anyway. And tried to lie his way out of trouble when he was caught. What followed from there was a fluctuating flirtation with responsibility, often overrun by a contradictory sense of self-righteous arrogance.
Major League Baseball has now decided to rescind Rose's lifetime ban, seven and a half months after his death. This makes him eligible for the sport's Hall of Fame.
That is a mistake. Rose was an exceptional player who earned a place in that hall but squandered it for all of us to see.
I grew up with an appreciation for how Pete Rose played baseball
I don't enjoy writing that.
When the Phillies won the 1980 series, I was 13 years old. I watched the games on a small black-and-white television in my bedroom, living in a new apartment we had just moved to as my parents' marriage disintegrated. I was a year younger and often smaller than all my freshman-year high school classmates because I had started elementary school when I was five.
If ever a kid needed something to divert his attention from the world around him, it was me in October 1980 as the Phillies beat the Kansas City Royals in six games.
Rose had started playing for the Phillies the previous season and it felt like he completed a picture. His style, his "Charlie Hustle" pounding around the infield, his head-first slides, it all felt so Philly.
There is a play from that series, in Game Six, that spools on an internal reel in the minds of Phillies fans. Frank White, the Royals infielder who had been the Most Valuable Player in the American League Championship Series, hit a pop-up that drifted foul over near the Phillies' dugout. Phillies catcher Bob Boone looked like he would make the tough catch for an out.
But then the ball bounced out of Boone's glove. Rose, who had drifted with the foul over from first base, caught the rebound and got the out, thrilling the crowd.
I can close my eyes and see it still. In my memory, this astounding play is framed in a tiny black-and-white screen.
Rose broke the rules, then lied and lied and lied
Rose went on to manage the Cincinnati Reds, where he played before the Phillies. It's where he got caught betting on games, earning his ban in 1989. He denied the betting for years, but signed a deal with MLB to accept his ban.
Rose was always a big personality on a big stage. Maybe this was his way of keeping alive the thrill of sliding into home head-first. Or maybe he was just an arrogant jerk who thought nobody would ever hold him accountable.
Either way, the thrill was gone and accountability is what Rose got. He finally admitted to the betting in a 2004 book. It was on-brand for Rose to make his official confession a scheme to sell books.
Plenty has changed in baseball and the larger sporting world since Rose was forced out. Gambling is now everywhere, advertised during games, and there is a constant stream of "bet big, win big" temptation that didn't exist out in the open when Rose was betting on his games.
An aside here: I've done a lot of reporting over the years on the casino and gambling business. In that time, I never met a person in that industry I would trust with three nickels.
Rose put himself out of the Hall of Fame. He deserved what he got.
Not that I've never gambled. I went to Las Vegas with a bunch of buddies, all Phillies fans, about 20 years ago, where we bet on the NCAA men's basketball tournament and played some table games.
I kept my betting light and walked away with more money than I started with. I understood I had beaten long odds.
During that trip, we took a walk down Las Vegas Boulevard, known as The Strip. And that's where we found Rose, sitting sullenly in an odd little kiosk on the sidewalk. He was selling autographs, part of a business he built in disgrace, auctioning off memorabilia and even some of the MLB paperwork that tossed him from the game.
Rose had a look on his face like he had just taken a big swig of sour milk. How long it had been there, I could not say. But it did not look new.
I remember feeling sorry for him, thinking about a magnificent career wasted on reckless stupidity, and remembering, in that moment, that Game Six foul ball rebound catch.
But I also remember thinking this: Rose was right where he put himself, and there was nobody to blame but Rose.
Follow Paste BN columnist Chris Brennan on X, formerly known as Twitter: @ByCrisBrennan. Sign up for his weekly newsletter, Translating Politics, here.