Rose gambling on himself

He wants to keep betting on horses

Associated Press

Saturday, January 10, 2004

Pete Rose doesn't want to give up gambling. He's also drawing the line on apologies.

Fourteen years after his gambling disorder was diagnosed, baseball's banished career hits leader is seeking reinstatement while continuing to wager. Rose is insisting in his latest autobiography and interviews this week that there's no reason to quit.

An expert doubts that Rose has cured himself.

"It certainly can happen," said Keith Whyte, executive director of the National Council on Problem Gambling. "It's probably a little more prevalent than the Immaculate Conception, but not a lot."

Major League Baseball is paying close attention as Rose makes the rounds of interviews and appearances to promote his book, "My Prison Without Bars." In it, Rose acknowledges publicly that he bet on Cincinnati Reds games when he was their manager in the late 1980s.

The book doesn't mention the diagnosis that he has a significant gambling disorder, and it attacks those who brought his misdeeds to light, resulting in his lifetime ban.

Asked Friday on "Good Morning America" whether he owes an apology to baseball investigator John Dowd and former commissioner Fay Vincent, Rose said emphatically that he did not. Dowd uncovered evidence that Rose had bet on baseball.

"I don't think it was fair, the way he came to his conclusions," Rose said. "The end result -- he was right. But I just didn't like the way he went about it."

Vincent didn't have a problem with that, saying: "He doesn't owe me an apology. He doesn't owe me anything."

Rose promised that he won't bet with bookmakers again, but drew a distinction between illegal gambling and going to the racetrack. In an interview with The Associated Press, he was asked whether he would be willing to stay away from tracks and casinos if baseball made it a condition for reinstatement.

"I would do anything they say, but they have to understand -- I'm not telling them what to do -- but they also have to understand one of my means of entertainment is periodically going to the races," Rose said.

Finding support: Rose soaked up kind words Friday from hundreds of fans who lined up at a New York bookstore for signed copies of his autobiography.

Some fans waited for nearly two hours to be first in line for the event that Borders Books estimated drew about 500 people and sold more than 1,000 copies of the book.

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