Pete Rose: An American Dilemma

One of the most controversial and defiant baseball personalities of all time receives a piercing scrutiny by Kennedy, assistant managing editor at Sports Illustrated, who tracks the firebrand from his Cincinnati childhood to his heralded rookie season of 1963 with the hometown Reds. Rose, according to Kennedy, emerges as a walking contradiction, a hard worker on the field with a singular goal of excellence, a consistent .300 hitter with dramatic headlong slides and acrobatic catches, but also a bad-boy with the press who occasionally got into trouble after hours. As a part of the “Big Red Machine,” Rose put up impressive statistics and holds the record of MLB all-time hits leader—alongside three World Series rings, two Gold Gloves, and three batting titles, during a playing career that ran from 1963 to 1986. However, Kennedy doesn’t shy away from the banished ex-player’s gambling addiction and the infamous Dowd report that eventually got him thrown out of the game, in the middle of the 1989 season when he was serving as the Cincinnati manager. Included are Rose’s poor career choices, his roving eye for the ladies despite marital obligations, and the beleaguered, unsuccessful quest to reach the baseball Hall of Fame. Piecing together the raging firestorm of disappointment, fraud, prison time, and hustling in Rose’s checkered life, Kennedy’s ambitious account is an anecdote-rich read. (Mar.)