Keith Olbermann from Cooperstown on Pete Rose In Hall of Fame (You Tube)

[Jack Rabbit]

Please click http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPkZrHV-vMk">here.

[Condem]

1. Excellent, Jack.

You open the door for Pete....you open it for all the scalawags. Tru's right. Shoeless Joe. Get ready.

[madinmaryland]

3. Selig is only opening the door to the Roiders. Let Rose in, then

Rose-Barroid-2012!

[Jack Rabbit]

6. As KO said . . .

Becuase of the roiders, Rose's sins look a lot more venial. Taking steroids can endanger one's health and there were cases of children ruining theirs because they took PEDs.

Whether or not the roiders are to be honored as great players in the future is an issue will have to be discussed on its own merits. It's a separate matter.

As for Pete Rose, for my money he should be in the HoF. He played the game as it ought to be played. No one ever accused Rose of giving less that everything he had for the most minute advantage for his team. It isn't the use of steroids that really make him look good, it's the sight of millionaires running out a ground ball 45 feet and giving up. Where is the Pete Rose intensity in these players?

Rose has served a 20-year suspension, served a prison sentence and admitted his wrong doing. He paid his pound of flesh long ago.

[madinmaryland]

7. I didn't say it nearly as well as you did, but I think Pete Rose belongs

in the HoF. He always annoyed the hell out of me (being a Pirates fan), but what he did as a player has shown me that he earned his way into the HoF. He never took any PED to advance his career.

[trumad]

9. Then you need to put Shoeless Joe Jackson in as well...

[Jack Rabbit]

10. Why?

There are those making the case for Jackson. The late Ted Williams was among them. Their case for Jackson has nothing to do with Rose. But let's put that aside and assume the Jackson is guilty as charged and should stay out of the HoF. Let's assume that Jackson and others took money to fix the 1919 World Series.

Pete Rose is guilty of nothing that grave. He bet on games, including some involving the Reds while he was their field manager. He is not accused of fixing any games, let alone the World Series.

We can have a discussion about the merits of allowing Rose in the HoF without bringing up the Black Sox scandal.

[trumad]

11. WOW!

Do you really think that what Rose did was not serious? Amazing.

The dude bet on his own team while Managing it. You do realize that a Manager handles the pitching decisions---the lineup, etc?

What---you don't think that can influence a game?

Oh but the argument is---there's no proof he did--- well--- there's no proof he didn't.

So--- don't you think that a ban for life from baseball for those who bet on their own team---especially a Manager--will send a message to others who are contemplating doing it?

[joeybee12]

12. It kills me to agree with you, but I'm gonna do it anyway...

...I think we're dealing with Cincy fans here who look the other way when it's one of their own.

[trumad]

13. I mean come on---

A Manager betting on his own team stinks to high heaven.

[Jack Rabbit]

14. I think what he did was serious

I also think the message has been sent.

I also think that small time gambling is not as serious a matter as fixing the World Series. To put them on a par, as you do, is like taking away one's driver's license for drunk and disorderly conduct because all he had to do was get behind the wheel of his car and mow down a pedestrian and it becomes felony drunk driving.

Of course it is a serious matter. Is it a serious enough matter to give Rose a lifetime ban with no possibility of repeal? No.

Also, what kind of threat does make to most players threaten to keep them out of the HoF? An idle one. A .240 hitter who averages 15 to 20 home runs with 60 RBIs a year and who fields his position just adequately isn't going to Cooperstown. What sort of penalty does he pay for gambling? If you want to be fair to Rose, then he should face a lifetime ban, which in this case means his baseball career has been abruptly terminated and nothing else. But, like Paul Hornung and Alex Karras in the NFL, he may simply be suspended for a year, or just fined, as were many other NFL players who were also caught gambling in 1962.

[madinmaryland]

2. Maybe he can spend an extra day or two there. Watching Howard Dean

substitute for Keith is quite a pleasure.

:hi:

[Condem]

4. Dean did quite well, mad.

Very interesting.

[madinmaryland]

5. Oops. Sorry. I was talking about Howard Dean allowed in the Sports Forum?

:shrug:

Not trying to bring GD:PPffth-2004 into teh Sports Forum.

[joeybee12]

8. Say you're sorry, Pete, then we'll talk...n/t

[JonLP24]

15. Gambling is an addiction

People who suffer from experience the same kind of rush that people experience from using cocaine. Then requires larger and more frequent rages to experience the same kind of rush. Treatment would've been the appropriate route instead of this kind of ban.