River Rat - Final

“At some point, you stop rooting for the players and start rooting for the memories.” – Unknown

The baseball season is a week old, and I haven’t said a word about Pete Rose.

I wrote something when Bob Uecker passed. That felt like something I needed to do right away, a tribute that came naturally, almost without effort. Uecker was joy. He was the game’s sense of humor. He was the guy in the booth who made you feel like baseball was a living room, and he was your uncle telling stories. But Pete? Pete was different. Writing about him took time. It required space. It required sitting in something heavier. I wrote a quick R.I.P. piece when it happened, I was conflicted…

He passed back in September and I’ve carried it with me since. Quietly. I didn’t know how to say goodbye, and honestly, I wasn’t sure I even wanted to. Because the first thing I felt when I heard the news wasn’t sadness. It was anger.

I was angry because I had just started to come around. After a lifetime of watching, reading, arguing, and wrestling with Pete Rose’s story, I had begun to believe he deserved to be in th…