From 7 AM through 9 PM Central Standard Time, Cincinnati was handed the chance to visit Great American Ballpark and pay their respects to Pete Rose. Dreary with the rain though it was, several thousand people did just that.
They came to say goodbye to a hometown baseball legend who died September 30 at 83. A hometown legend whose wounding flaws and the sickness that got him banned from baseball and from election to the Hall of Fame many among them still seem to struggle with comprehending.
"As West Siders," said Molly Good, who teaches at Western Hills High School, which Rose attended, to Cincinnati Enquirer writer Erin Crouch, "we're like a big family, and he's one of our family." (They should have named an alley after me, the way I acted in school, Rose said, memorably, when Cincinnati dedicated Pete Rose Way)
That wasn't quite the way a West Sider who contributes to the Enquirer, Jack Greiner, put it the day after Rose's death. "[M]y sadness is mixed with a heavy dollop of ambivalence," he began.
I've already seen the platitudes from pandering politicians. The theme seems to be that Pete was the living embodiment of Cincinnati's west side — tough, gritty and hard-working. I can't argue with that. My ambivalence stems from the fact that in every other facet of his life, Pete in no way embodied the values I consider synonymous with the West Side.
Westsiders are rule followers. With very few questions asked. Pete was not. And while that had its charms, the fact is that he lived his life as though the rules didn't apply to him. Whether it was gambling on baseball, IRS regulations, or wedding vows, Pete apparently felt unburdened.
The visitation included passing by a container containing Rose's ashes, which his family seems not to have finalised concerning their burial or scattering. Atop the container sat a copy of the fabled photograph of Rose pointing skyward as he stood on first base, tipping his batting helmet, the night he broke Ty Cobb's career hits record in 1985 Cincinnati.
Those attending were clad in one or another red garment, under assorted red or red-and-white umbrellas. Many stopped by the statue of Rose captured in one of his fabled head-first slides into base outside the ballpark. Within a very short time, the figure of Rose hitting the ground hands first was surrounded by assorted Reds paraphernalia tied to Rose explicitly or other objects expressing feelings about him.
Most of the mourners were older Cincinnatians who grew up watching Rose with the 1963-1978 Reds, including the height of the legendary Big Red Machine teams. Reds officials told the press that at least 1500 people turned out for the visitation over its first seven hours; the visitation was scheduled for fourteen hours as a nod to Rose's old uniform number. Wreaths of roses appeared at various spots, including at least one displaying his number 14.
The rainy weather may well have kept more from attending the first half, but those first seven hours may have had more attending than the Reds had counted just yet. As I sat down to write, I had no idea what the final turnout would prove to be. The mourners didn't just pass by Rose's ashes, they paid respects personally to Rose's two daughters, Fawn and Kara, who'd cooperated with the Reds and with the team's hall of fame to bring the event to pass.
"We wanted to do something like this," said Reds Hall of Fame executive director Rick Walls. "You could see from the turnout, it means a lot to the people here. It's a moving experience."
"He was a guy you thought was going to live forever," said one longtime Reds fan, Bob Augspurger, to Associated Press writer Jeff Wallner. "When I heard the news, obviously it was sad. Baseball lost its greatest ambassador."
"Westsiders tell the truth. Pete lied for 13 years about betting on baseball," Greiner had written. "He did it so naturally that he seemed to believe the lie. Westsiders are accountable. Pete's ultimate confession was done in a book from which he reaped profits. He continued to deflect, citing to others who in his mind behaved worse than him."
Let it be said, then, that Queen City people came out to pay their respects to a native son whose greatness on a baseball field was as impossible to forget as the clay feet on which he walked off the field proved impossible to replace. A man whose professional achievement and the penultimate honor it should have received could be and was blocked and soiled by only one man.
Somehow, Sunday's rain seemed a little more appropriate.
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