Thirty Years is More Than Long Enough

It's time for Commissioner Rob Manfred to remove Pete Rose from Major League Baseball's ineligible list.

The Commissioner who declared him ineligible in 1989, A. Bartlett Giamatti, referred to Rose's actions as a "stain" on baseball. They weren't a stain on baseball. They were a stain on Rose.

The stain on baseball is his continued exclusion from consideration for the Hall of Fame after all this time.

That he belongs there simply beyond doubt. A non-monstrous baseball establishment would put him there while he's still alive, so that he can know it and so that his fans can hear from him about it.