Now World ViewJohn Condit was the last person to interview Pete Rose, doing so 10 days before his death for a documentary to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Rose breaking Ty Cobb’s hit record.
In that interview, the Major League Baseball (MLB) all-time hit king predicted that if he were to ever make the Hall of Fame, it would not be until after he died. Condit told Fox News Digital recently that he “began to shake” when he heard of Rose’s death, considering what Rose had told him just days prior.
Well, Rose's grim prediction is starting to look like it will come to fruition.
MLB announced on Tuesday that those on baseball's ineligible list will be reinstated after their deaths – thus, Rose is now baseball eligible, along with “Shoeless” Joe Jackson and 15 others.
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In turn, Rose is now eligible to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.
Condit, a former sportscaster in nearby Dayton who grew up a Reds fan (Johnny Bench was his favorite), said that if Rose were to never be reinstated, the Cincinnati Reds' celebration of Rose at Great American Ball Park on Wednesday night (scheduled before Rose's reinstatement) would have possibly been the final true celebration of Rose.
That is why Condit recently kick-started a petition to get President Donald Trump to pardon Rose, a move the president said he would do “in the coming weeks” back in March, before the Reds honor Rose on Wednesday night.
"I love the fact that President Trump is considering using his pulpit to make this right, at least in the eyes of millions of baseball fans who say ‘he did a lot of bad things off the field, he lied, but darn it, statistically he should be in the Hall of Fame.’ And that can’t happen unless baseball says ‘we’re going to reinstate him,'" Condit said in an interview with Fox News Digital before MLB's recent decision.
Baseball ended up saying that.
Condit does not need to rely on the president anymore, and it is now increasingly likely that Rose will be celebrated in upstate New York.
"I'm extremely happy. My fear was if this did not happen, that the greatest moment for Pete Rose after his passing would be Wednesday night at Cincinnati. Instead, we've got a celebration in Cincinnati that we didn't have three hours ago," Condit told Fox News Digital shortly after Rose's reinstatement. "Now, we got a real shot, a real shot for him to get into the Hall of Fame, which is what Pete Rose fans want. So I'm ecstatic."
The Hall of Fame decided in 1991, two years after Rose's ban, that it would not have voting processes for players on baseball's ineligible list. As long as Rose was barred from the sport, the Hall did not budge.
So, Trump and Manfred met last month, and it is largely assumed they spoke about Rose. Condit said he is "grateful" to both Trump and Manfred for Rose's significantly boosted odds (no pun intended) of getting into Cooperstown.
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"I believe [Trump] played a significant role in this for two reasons. One, he loves baseball, he loves Pete Rose. Two, who wants to say no to a president?" Condit said. "Who wants to get on the wrong side of a president when there's so much up? I give Commissioner Manfred a lot of credit. He could have toed the line and said, 'I'm going to stay with the tradition of keeping this punishment in place, and it is a punishment.' Or 'I'm going to turn a page and offer forgiveness to Pete, Joe Jackson and others.' People are going to love this."
Condit's history with Rose dates back to the 1980s. He was actually interviewing Rose in 1989 when one of Rose's agents interrupted to inform Rose that MLB had begun an investigation into him for gambling. He was also in the press room when then-MLB Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti announced Rose's lifetime ban from the game.
"In 1989, before he got banned, I was at an event that Boomer Esiason ran for cystic fibrosis in the Cincinnati area. When Pete was done interviewing with me, I gave him a letter I wrote out and said, ‘When you get on the plane, please read this.’ And it said ‘if you did it, admit it. We’re a very forgiving society, nobody’s perfect, but if you did it, come clean now, and you will be forgiven by society. It’ll be OK,’" Condit said in an interview with Fox News Digital before MLB announced its new ruling.
"When I interviewed him [last year], I asked him about that – he didn’t remember it, but I asked if he could do it differently. He said, 'No. I thought I could get away with it."
That is why Condit understands both sides of the argument. Rose gambled on the game, lied about it for years and never seemed truly remorseful. Condit even said he wouldn't blame anybody for voting against Rose.
"No saint. In fact, did a lot wrong," Condit recently described Rose.
However, "I believe in second chances and third chances and maybe seven chances. And I think statistically it's a great time to say, you know what? He paid his price. It's time for him to go to the Hall of Fame."
Condit said he hopes the Rose family can eventually forgive Baseball and the Hall of Fame – even for Condit himself, there is still some anger.
"But all that ends well can be well, and this could end very, very well."
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