Baseball standout Pete Rose, who has been banished from Major League Baseball since 1989 for betting on the game, believes someday he'll be reinstated and make it into the Hall of Fame. But he tells CBS SUNDAY MORNING WITH CHARLES OSGOOD's Lee Cowan that it might not happen in his lifetime.
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"I don't know if I'm going to live to see it," Rose tells Cowan in an interview to be broadcast Oct. 19, 2014 (9:00 AM, ET) on the
CBS Television Network. "Someone, at some period of time, will feel it in their heart to give me a second chance. I might be six feet under, but that's what you have to live with."
These days, his connection to the game is mostly getting paid to sign autographs, smile and share stories with fans. The former Cincinnati Reds star and Major League Baseball's all-time hit leader also waits - and hopes - for a second chance in the sport that made him famous.
Why, Cowan asks, did a man who loved baseball risk it all by gambling on the sport?
"That's a good question," Rose tells Cowan. "I can't answer it. I wish I had an answer. I usually got an answer for everything. I just simply... the best way to say it is, I screwed up."
Former Major League Baseball Commissioner Fay Vincent calls the current situation surrounding Rose sad. Vincent is no fan of Rose's. He took over the MLB after Bart Giamatti, who was the commissioner in 1989, exiled Rose for life. Rose has been fighting to get back in ever since. Unless there's a change in position at the MLB, however, Rose will never get into the Hall of Fame.
"I think it's pathetic, I mean, I think the whole Pete Rose situation is sad," Vincent tells Cowan. "I almost feel sorry for him. I mean, I'm close."
Still, Vincent believes that had Rose taken a different approach to his suspension and the aftermath, he could have already been reinstated. Americans believe in redemption, Vincent says - "Baseball does not." Despite Rose's insistence he has, Vincent maintains Rose never really apologized or offered to help the sport after he was banned.
"I think there's every indication that if he had really understood, and people had coached him and he had gotten the word, he'd be back in baseball today," Vincent tells Cowan.
Rose also talks with Cowan about growing up in Cincinnati, skipping school to watch the Reds play, and what it was like the first time he stepped to the plate in his home town as a Major League Baseball player.
"I could have went up there without a bat," Rose says, "Because I was too nervous to swing. And he walked me on four pitches!"
CBS SUNDAY MORNING is broadcast Sundays (9:00-10:30 AM, ET) on the
CBS Television Network. Rand Morrison is the executive producer. Follow
CBS Sunday Morning on Twitter and Facebook.
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