Enough Is Enough Selig: Reinstate Pete Rose Already!

It's been 20 years since Pete Rose was banned from Major League Baseball for allegedly gambling and betting on baseball and other sports.

It's also been five years since Rose finally admitted to gambling and betting on baseball.

Commissioner Bud Selig, enough is enough. Rose has served his time and has gone through enough with this lifetime ban.

Selig needs to remove the lifetime ban from Rose because he deserves to be in the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Now, I know there are still those out there that think what Rose did was reprehensible and should stay banned forever. Those people really need to get a grip on life and really get over the incident.

It's not like Pete Rose shot and killed people. He didn't throw a World Series like the 1919 White Sox/Black Sox did. He gambled.

Surely enough, he gambled on his own sport. And he gambled while he was managing the Cincinnati Reds from 1984-1989.

But his gambling addiction became well known after he was a player, not during.

In 1989, then-acting commissioner Bart Giamatti placed Rose under permanent ineligibility with a possible review in a year. So what happened in 1990? What happened to that review for Rose.

Instead in 1991, the Hall of Fame committee decided to exclude anyone who had a permanent ineligibility placed on them, which meant Rose's chances for the Hall were all but doomed.

However, Selig has had Rose's case under review and has made it seem like he was willing to remove the ban from Rose. This "review" by Selig has been going on since 1997. It is now 2009 and we are just reading reports that Selig is still reviewing Rose's case.

What is there to review? In January 2004, Rose finally came clean, 15 years after public denials, Rose finally admitted what he did was wrong, has apologized probably seven million times.

Lets face it, the man made a mistake, dug himself too deep of a hole to get out of and just kept denying it for many years. Haven't we all made mistakes in our lives. This was Rose's; gambling. Many others in this country have the same addiction and need help for it, back then, Rose had the addiction.

But Selig, Rose is a Hall of Famer. He's the all-time hits leader with 4,256. He broke the old record of 4,191 of Ty Cobb back in 1985. He still holds the second longest hitting streak with 44 hits in 1978. He's a three time World Series winner; 1975 and 1976 with the Reds and 1980 with the Phillies. He was the 1963 Rookie of the Year, 1973 NL MVP and 1975 World Series MVP and a 17-time all-star.

This guy we're keeping out of the Hall of Fame because he made a mistake in his past?

Now granted, it was a big one, and he should have came clean in 1989, but that was then, this is now. A lot of writers and analysts feel the same way I do. Rose deserves to be in and he deserves to be back with baseball.

If they didn't, they would have never allowed him to be a part of the 1999 ceremonies for the All Century Team in Atlanta. Also, the Cincinnati Reds are not allowed to formally retire Rose's number 14, yet, nobody since 1989 has worn the number. It's practically on reserve until baseball ever decides to remove this silly ban. Even World Wrestling Entertainment inducted Rose into their celebrity-wing of their Hall of Fame in 2004 for Rose's participation in WWE events, like Wrestlemania 14, 15, and 16.

Rose is still one of the game's all-time best hitters and there will never be another "Charlie Hustle." Rose has come clean, he admitted to what he did. Now, it's time for Selig and the Hall of Fame committee to put Rose in the one place that has eluded him his whole non-participating baseball life, the Hall of Fame.

Pete Rose is a Hall of Famer. It's time for Major League Baseball, Bud Selig and the Hall of Fame committee to realize this too and remove the ban.