Pete Rose Wants His Second Chance
By Marc Farzetta
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – The banned Hit King of baseball joined Michael Barkann and Ike Reese Tuesday afternoon on 94 WIP, where he spoke about a variety of topics including; his now 24-year-old ban from baseball, why Phillies fans shouldn't be worried about their team and owners spending money in all the wrong places.
LISTEN: Mike and Ike interview Pete Rose
He would like a 2nd chance to get back in baseball:
"What it all comes down to in my situation is giving somebody a second chance. You get second chances if you do drugs. Nowadays you do drugs and you get a 50 game-suspension. I'm suspended going on 25 years, 24 years right now, so all you look for is a second chance. You won't need a third and if you get that second chance you jump on it."
If the Phillies are just a few pieces away from being a team to fear in the NL East:
"The nucleus you got over there in Philadelphia, just do your homework, put the pieces of the puzzle together. You can add two or three guys whether it's somebody in the bullpen, whether it's another power hitter and you can be very very competitive. Philadelphia is right around .500, they're right there. They can put a little bit of a streak together with that good pitching they got and they could be right there knocking on the door."
How much blame should Ruben Amaro Jr. take for this team's performance:
"Ruben did the right thing by putting together a good pitching staff. Then Utley goes down then Ryan Howard gets hurt. What is that $35 million worth of players? When that hits you, it's tough to replace because you only have so much money to spend and when you spend it on the right side of the infield and they both suffer injuries and miss a lot of games, it just puts a lot of pressure on Charlie and everybody in the organization."
Ryan Howard being on pace for just 18 home runs this season:
"That's just unacceptable. Is he healthy? I would think Ryan Howard would hit 18 home runs if his eyes were closed."
Ryan Howard's approach at the plate:
"His job is not to go up there and work the coun. Hey in the eyes of a lot of people he earned his $20 million, that's just the way baseball's played today, but you got to have a guy that can make some contact sometimes when you got a first and third and one out or when you got a second and third and no outs. You have to produce then too because if you're just going to relay on the home run, even if a guy has a great year he's going to hit 45 [home runs] so what's he going to do with the other 550 at bats?"
Owners pay too much for the home run but not for overall production:
"There's a guy hitting 3rd for the White Sox, Adam Dunn he's hitting .160, but he's got 15 or 16 HRs. Baseball owners allowed this to happen somewhere along the line. What I mean is, they said 'go ahead and hit 35-40 HR, we don't care if you hit .260, we don't care if you hit .250. Just drive in 100 runs where if these guys were good hitters, that would hit 40 hrs, they would drive in 160 runs.I'm mean we're getting to a situation now where a guys could drive in 100 runs and have a bad year."
Rose feels owners should pay more for players like the Reds' Brandon Phillips:
"Phillips is leading the league in hitting with guys on base an I think he's second in RBIs with 52 and he's only got 10 home runs, so if this guy was hitting at the pace of some of the other guys in the NL, 17-18-19 home runs he'd have 65 RBI's. So there's a guy there where if he was a home run hitter and knocking in run like he's knocking in, he knock in 140 [Runs] instead of 110, 105.
A recent autograph session was canceled at Coca Cola Park, home of the Iron Pigs:
"The Iron Pigs would have been fun. I did an event there with Mike Schmidt a couple years ago…at the ball park, in the dugout actually, was black tie in the dugout and because of the cancelation, it wasn't me, I mean it wasn't me that canceled, I don't want to get into it, it wasn't me that canceled and it's just another way baseball treats you, if you know what I mean. "
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