There are four playoff games today:
- Tigers vs. Astros 2:30 PM
- Orioles vs. Royals 4:00 PM
- Mets vs. Brewers 5:30 PM
- Atlanta vs. Padres 8:30 PM
The Jays ‘parted ways’ with a couple more coach types:
- Gil Kim, who was field coordinator.
- Jeff Ware, who was an assistant pitching coach.
- David Howell, another assistant pitching coach.
I have no opinions on these, but I’m not particularly eager to take joy in anyone losing a job, especially in baseball, because these jobs are few and most of these people have wanted to do this all their lives.
Pete Rose passed away at 83 years of age.
I was never a big fan. He was a particular sort of creep, and I could never get past that.
He owns the MLB record for hits and was a very good player early in his career. He was part of the Big Red Machine (he won two World Series rings with them), the Phillies (getting another World Series ring and a crappy season with the Expos. Then, he returned to Cincinnati to be a player-manager and just manager for six seasons (winning Manager of the Year in 1985). His worst trait (well, actually second worst trait, but we’ll get to that later), was his insistence on writing his name into the lineup long after he was no longer
Rose had 4256 hits (all-time leader), 3562 games (all-time leader) and a .303/.375/.409 line (a 118 OPS+), finishing with a 79.3 bWAR. He was Charlie Hustle. He went hard all the time. He sprinted to first on walks. Of course, some of it was for show, some because he was hyped up all the time (it was a big time for amphetamines), and some because he wasn’t the most gifted athlete, so he made up for it by playing hard.
Sometimes, it was too much; he ran through catcher Ray Fosse in an All-Star game (just a stupid thing to do), fracturing and separating Fosse’s shoulder (changing the course of Fosse’s career).
He was an Expo in 1984, and I wasn’t thrilled; he hadn’t been a useful player in a number of years, and the Expos played him in the outfield way too much (Bill James said he covered the same amount of ground as any other flower). He hit .259/.334/.295 for the Expos and was a liability with the glove. He was traded back to the Reds in August, where he’d become player-manager, which helped him to the record for hits, as most managers wouldn’t have continued to write his name into the lineup. In his last seven seasons, he had a -1.2 bWAR, off a .274/.354/.333 line.
As manager, he started betting on baseball (well, maybe he had been all along). The number one baseball rule for all personnel is ‘don’t bet on baseball’. And, of course, Rose also bet on his team. Betting on your own team is a problem because if you bet on your team on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday, it is a sign to gamblers that you don’t think you will win on Wednesday, and they know to bet on the other team (in the days of illegal gambling). The reason for the rule against baseball players, is that players might signal to bookies that a win is unlikely to happen on a certain day. And, of course, if you are losing and deep in debt to a bookie, he might get you to throw a game to work off the debt.
Then…..well, the more major crime that Rose committed was statutory rape. He had sex with an underage girl, which should be something that keeps you out of the Hall of Fame.
He had an unofficial connection with the Jays for a bit. Living at least some of the time in Vegas, he went to many 51s’ games. Alex Anthopoulos sometimes would talk about how Rose would tell him that one player or another was a good prospect.
I almost encountered Rose once. We were in Vegas and wandering a mall; there was sports memorabilia. Rose was signing autographs but was away for lunch at the moment. They had an Expo jersey he would have signed for me (for far less money than I expected), and I thought about it for a while. The owner of the shop said that he would sign anything you wanted. He would sign, “I bet on baseball” or, apparently, anything you asked.
I considered it but decided that if I wanted something signed, it should be by a player I truly liked. A bit later, I did get a signed ball from Gary Carter.