Up For Grabs: Charlie Hustle

Pete Rose is the next on the list to be given the boot out of my binders. Coupled with the fact that he was shunned from baseball and doesn't appear on many current cards, I also seemed to not be very good at pulling his cards at any point in my life. Thus, there are not very many Rose cards on the table here. Once again, see the end of this post for the full list.

1986 was the first year I started collecting, so the Pete Rose Years subset in the 1986 Topps set was the first example of a player having special attention paid to him. I was fascinated by the images of all of the (Topps) cards from Pete's career. I also went out and bought myself a 1986 Topps sticker book and marveled at the back cover, which contained images of all of these cards. How did someone so famous change positions multiple times in the middle of his career? Why was he a player AND a manager?

How do I feel about Pete Rose now? Well, as the all-time hits king, I've always thought he belongs in the Hall of Fame. He's super sleazy, but character issues plague other players who are in that exclusive group and no one really gives a rip about it. Pete as a player was actually extremely overrated. The man made 17 (!) All-Star teams yet owns a career OPS of just .784. He wasn't a power hitter. He wasn't a speedster. He was a hit machine, at least in terms of volume, making him sort of a gritty version of Ichiro (minus most of the stolen bases.) Still, I feel like if you're the best at something, you probably belong in the Hall.

I've never really understood the compulsion people have to gamble. It's not my thing. Losing money is not my thing. I often have buyer's remorse after I buy measly little packs of baseball cards even before I open the and know what's in them.

The list:

1986 Topps (MGR) #741
1986 Topps (The Pete Rose Years 1975-1978) #5
1984 Topps (League Leaders w/ Rusty Staub + Tony Perez) #702
1987 Leaf #129
1989 Topps #505 [2 available]
1986 Sportflics (Tri-Stars w/ Tony Perez + Rusty Staub) #138
1988 Topps #475
1987 Topps #200 [3 1 available]
1987 Topps (MGR) #393
1987 Topps (Reds Leaders) #281 [4 available]

[updated 11/5/12]