Rob Manfred: No meeting scheduled with Pete Rose

MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said Tuesday no meeting is scheduled with Pete Rose to discuss his possible reinstatement to baseball.

MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said Tuesday that no meeting is scheduled with Pete Rose to discuss his possible reinstatement to baseball.

Manfred, speaking to members of the Baseball Writers Association of America before Tuesday night’s All-Star Game in Cincinnati, said he was surprised by how much information the original investigation into Rose gathered. The commissioner said he wanted to have “a grasp of all the material” before determining the timetable for a meeting, the format of which would be up to Rose.

Rose, 74, has been banned from baseball since 1989 after a report led by former federal prosecutor John Dowd determined Rose bet on baseball games while managing the Cincinnati Reds. Rose confirmed the bets in 2004, but maintained as recently as April that he never bet on baseball as a player.

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A 17-time All-Star, Rose played from 1963 to 1986 with the Reds, Philadelphia Phillies and Montreal Expos while amassing 4,256 hits, the most in MLB history.

In June, pages from a long-hidden notebook published by ESPN’s Outside the Linescontradicted Rose’s long-standing claim that he only gambled as a manager. The notebook, which was seized from the home of former Rose associate Michael Bertolini in 1989 by the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, had remained sealed by a court order. The pages show that Rose bet on at least one MLB team on 30 different days, and on 21 of those days it was evident that he bet on baseball and on the Reds, including on games in which he played.

Dowd had been unable to obtain Bertolini’s notebook during his 1989 investigation, but Rose ultimately agreed to his permanent ban on Aug. 24, 1989.

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Manfred allowed Rose—who will join Fox’s pregame show Tuesday night—to participate in this week’s All-Star events in Cincinnati. In a conference call with reporters last week, Rose discussed his opinion of his chances for reinstatement.

“I don’t know if I have a better chance or not,” Rose said. “When you say better chance, just having him review my status, I’m happy with. I’m looking forward to sitting down one-on-one with Mr. Manfred and discussing the situation. I really am. I don’t know when that may happen. I believe it will happen sometime after the All-Star break. I can’t give you a date… All I can tell you is, I’m not the same guy today as I was 25, 30 years ago. I realize 25, 30 years ago I made mistakes, and I’m not the same guy today. I’m just a solid baseball fan who loves the game, cares about the game and tries to help the game on a daily basis. We’ll go from there.”

- Mike Fiammetta