Upon Further Review: A ‘major league’ injustice
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Rose was accused of betting on baseball, found guilty and then kicked out of the great American game for life. Remember this as you read: Baseball signed off by saying there was “no finding” that he bet on baseball.
What many of us don’t know is, Major League Baseball’s front office secretly conducted another gambling investigation, one centered on umpires. But although the misdeeds were the same as those Rose was accused of, the punishment for the umpires was next to nothing.
The investigation, which was never before made public until a few weeks ago, resulted in a shadow report written by Rose investigator John Dowd. In the report, Rose was not the only person accused of gambling.
Two of baseball’s most respected umpires were given a slap on the wrist for doing the same thing that got Rose kicked out of the game. Frank Pulli of the National League and Rich Garcia of the American League were given two years’ probation for associating and doing business with gamblers and bookmakers.
The discipline, beyond the two years’ probation, seems to have been limited to a get-new-friends advisory from then commissioner Fay Vincent. Vincent wrote a letter to the umpires and told them to “quit gambling and associating with “gamblers, bookmakers, narcotics traffickers or other undesirables.”
The investigation uncovered the fact this was not the only time these two were caught gambling. According to Vincent, they didn’t make it public because it didn’t seem to serve any purpose.
Once the people entrusted with the conduct of the game between the lines are shown to be corrupt, the game itself is corrupt. If the officials are suspected to have been bought and paid for, the games no longer are contests of athletic skills.
Let’s see, Pulli and Garcia continued to work as umpires and are still working today as supervisors of umpires. And Rose was kicked out of baseball and can never be in the Hall of Fame — where he deserves to be.
These guys are umpires, they could determine the outcome of a baseball game more than anybody.
Baseball said there was neither evidence nor suggestion that Pulli and Garcia bet on baseball. Let’s see, wasn’t that what they said about Rose?
Rose is suspended for life while Pulli and Garcia keep working. Seems like there’s a double standard there.
It sounds like Rose was made the scape goat in order to hide the real dirt in baseball. There’s a big problem when Major League Baseball decides gambling by its umpires is OK. All you have to do is say you’re sorry and bow down to the commissioner and promise never to do such a bad thing again. Rose wouldn’t bow down, however, and still to this day says he didn’t do anything wrong.
What should baseball now do about Pulli and Garcia — and how many more umpires gamble everyday?
Let’s get this out in the open, give them some help if they have a gambling problem and put Pete Rose in the Hall of Fame where he belongs.
Baseball still has a chip on its shoulders after all the embarrassment the Rose scandal caused. Some people have tried to put all the blame on Rose and this has kept him out of baseball and out of the Hall of Fame.
Should we keep all these dark secrets of baseball in the closet and continue to let a few take the heat or should we forgive and forget?
I say let’s forgive and forget and let the embarrassment of being singled out be punishment enough.