MLB legend Pete Rose dead at age of 83

MLB legend Pete Rose has died at the age of 83, according to a report.

Rose, considered one of the greatest – and most controversial – baseball players in MLB history, reportedly died Monday at his home in Las Vegas.

Rose’s agent, Ryan Fiterman, confirmed the news via TMZsaying, ‘the family requests privacy at this time.’

Rose spent most of his baseball career with the Cincinnati Reds, but also enjoyed stints with the Philadelphia Phillies and Montreal Expos.

The MLB hit king earned 17 All-Star Game nods, won three World Series and the 1973 NL MVP.

He returned to Cincinnati, where he ended his career as a player-manager for the Reds and retired from playing for good in 1986.

Rose’s career on the diamond was not without controversy, however. In 1989, he was banned from baseball by then-MLB commissioner Bart Giamatti after the league decided he would bet on the sport.

He admitted to betting on the Cincinnati Reds when he played and managed the team from 1985 to 1987.

In recent years, allegations have also surfaced that Rose had an inappropriate sexual relationship with a minor in the 1970s.

In 2017, the Phillies canceled his induction into the team’s Wall of Fame after a Cincinnati woman said in federal court that she had a sexual relationship with the married Rose that began during his first stint with the Reds in 1973, when she was 14 or 15. .

Rose was never charged with statutory rape and the statute of limitations has expired. Although he has reportedly admitted to the relationship, he has maintained that he believed she was 16 at the time of the affair, making her old enough in the state of Ohio to consent to sexual activity.

In recent years, Rose has performed at Reds games in Cincinnati, where he remains considered one of the best players in team history and one of the city’s favorite homegrown athletes.

Despite his ban, which prevents him from being inducted into the Hall of Fame and from working in the MLB, Rose begged the MLB several times to be given a chance.

Rose has enjoyed stints with the Philadelphia Phillies (right) and Montreal Expos (left)

The MLB hitting king earned 17 All-Star Game nods and won three World Series. Pictured in 1980

As recently as 2022, Rose sent a letter to MLB commissioner Rob Manfred to try to get into the Hall of Fame.

He wrote to Manfred begging for forgiveness and a chance at his ‘dream’ in November 2022.

‘I ask for your forgiveness. Despite my many mistakes, I am so proud of what I have accomplished as a baseball player,” Rose wrote in the 2022 letter.

“I am the Hit King and my dream is to be eligible for the Hall of Fame. Like all of us, I believe in responsibility.

“I’m 81 years old and I know I’ve been held accountable and I hold myself accountable. I am writing now to ask for another chance.’

The letter came after accused steroid cheats Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and Rafael Palmeiro were listed on the Hall of Fame committee ballot.

He also applied for reinstatement in 2020 and asked Manfred to grant him entry into the Hall of Fame.

Rose was a member of the Philadelphia Phillies 1980 championship team (above), but has been officially banned from baseball after admittedly betting on the Cincinnati Reds

Rose and former commissioner Giamatti agreed to the lifetime ban in August 1989 after an investigation by attorney John Dowd revealed that he had placed numerous bets on the Reds, violating one of baseball’s oldest rules.

Although he is not accused of gambling against the Reds, Rose’s gambling posed a number of problems for the MLB, which felt the sanctity of the game was being threatened.

For example, Rose could have held back the team’s best relief pitchers when he had no money on the line, while he could have pushed them to the field when he gambled on the Reds.

Manfred argued in a 2015 denial of Rose’s reinstatement request that he had “provided no credible evidence of a re-arranged life, either through an honest acceptance by him of his misdeeds so clearly established in the Dowd Report, nor through a rigorous, self-righteous attitude’. conscious and sustained program to avoid all circumstances that led to his permanent exclusion.’

Rose’s death is one of several that will rock Major League Baseball in 2024, including the passing of Giants legends Willie Mays and Orlando Cepeda.

More to follow.