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Hall of Fame baseball writer Hal McCoy has retired from the Dayton Daily News after covering the Cincinnati Reds for 37 years. Hal's blog, though, will continue to be a must-read for Reds fans. He'll share his thoughts on the team this season and will file updates from Great American Ball Park. You also can catch Hal in print every Sunday in his popular Ask Hal columnHome > Blogs > The Real McCoy | Cincinnati Reds baseball news > Archives > 2009 > February > 11
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Rose gives his take on A-Rod
Pete Rose, his hair retreating and his waistline expanding, still knows how to hold a crowd in the palm of a fist that stroked 4,256 major-league hits.
And without being asked.
Rose, knowing his audience, launched into his feelings about the Alex Rodriguez situation Wednesday night at a VIP gathering at the Crowne Plaza Hotel.
Rose, the man banished from baseball for betting on the game, speaks this morning at the Community Leadership Breakfast to benefit the Miami Valley Council of the Boy Scouts of America at the Mandalay Banquet Center.
In the middle of Rose’s off-the-cuff remarks, his cell phone rang and Rose playfully said, “Wait, that might be baseball commissioner Bud Selig. Let me check it.”
It wasn’t and he said, “Damn, I missed (re-instatement) again.”
Of A-Rod, Rose said, “I would have got 5,000 hits if I took steroids.”
Then talking seriously, he added, “Being my good and close friend, I was disappointed about A-Rod’s admission that he took steroids.
“I really thoughgt A-Rod and Junior (Ken Griffey Jr.) were the two of the greatest players out there today who were clean - that’s what I was led to believe.”
And Rose, who went on national TV to admit he bet on baseball after denying it for 15 years, was disappointed in some of the things A-Rod said during his confession on ESPN.
“I don’t quit understand how his name surfaced out of the 104 names (players who tested positively in 2003) and I don’t think that was fair,” Rose added.
“I guess we all want and need to know who they other 103 - and I guarantee you my name won’t be on that list.
Rose said some of A-Rod’s answers to questions put to him by ESPN’s Peter Gammons perplexed him.
“There was 700 tested and only 104 were found positive,” said Rose. “A-Rod said that was the culture back then and I don’t believe that.
“I understand him saying he had pressure on him after signing a $252 million contract (with Texas) to do well.
“Pressure? A lot of us are understanding in these times that pressure is signing a $250 contract, not $250 million.
“Hey, when you sign a $252 million contract, there are not a certain amount of home runs or a certain amount of games you have to win a certain amount of games,” Rose said.
“If he had pressure on him, I’d love to have that kind of pressure on me,” he said. “In the three years in question (2001-03), he averaged 52 home runs. The other 10 years he averaged 39.
Rose said he would vote for A-Rod for the Hall of Fame and likes his chances better than guys like Mark McGwire, Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens because A-Rod has nine years remaining on his contract and has to wait five years after he retires to be on the ballot, “And in those 14 years guys writing now won’t be around.”
Of A-Rod’s contract, Rose laughed and said, “When I signed, I could cash my check at the nearest drug store.”
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