For decades, the question has lingered in the world of baseball: Did Pete Rose Bet On His Own Games? Pete Rose, a name synonymous with hustle and hitting, has maintained a consistent narrative for 26 years. While he admitted in 2004 to betting on baseball, ending nearly 15 years of denials, he insisted these bets were placed only during his time as a manager, never as a player. However, newly obtained documents are challenging this long-held story, suggesting a deeper and more problematic truth about Rose’s gambling habits.
These documents, unearthed by Outside the Lines, indicate that Pete Rose extensively bet on baseball, and significantly, on the Cincinnati Reds, during his playing days in 1986. This was the same year he was chasing the final hits of his record-breaking career. This revelation goes beyond the evidence presented in the infamous 1989 Dowd report, the investigation that led to Rose’s lifetime ban from baseball. Crucially, these new documents provide the first written proof that Pete Rose bet on his own games while still actively on the field.
John Dowd, the former federal prosecutor who spearheaded MLB’s investigation into Rose in 1989, stated unequivocally upon reviewing these documents, “This does it. This closes the door.”
The documents in question are copies of pages extracted from a notebook seized from the residence of Michael Bertolini, a former associate of Rose. This seizure occurred during a raid by the U.S. Postal Inspection Service in October 1989, nearly two months after Rose was permanently declared ineligible by Major League Baseball. The authenticity of these documents has been verified by two individuals involved in the raid, which was part of a mail fraud investigation unrelated to baseball gambling. For 26 years, this notebook has remained sealed under court order and is currently stored in the National Archives’ New York office, with officials consistently denying public release requests.
Through his lawyer, Raymond Genco, Rose issued a statement acknowledging the situation but refraining from direct comment. “Since we submitted the application earlier this year, we committed to MLB that we would not comment on specific matters relating to reinstatement. I need to maintain that,” the statement read. “To be sure, I’m eager to sit down with [MLB commissioner Rob] Manfred to address my entire history — the good and the bad — and my long personal journey since baseball. That meeting likely will come sometime after the All-Star break. Therefore at this point, it’s not appropriate to comment on any specifics.” Bertolini’s lawyer, Nicholas De Feis, stated that his client “is not interested in speaking to anyone about these issues.”
Dowd, after reviewing the documents at Outside the Lines’ request, explained that his investigators had previously attempted to obtain Bertolini’s records, believing they held the crucial evidence linking Rose to mob-connected bookmakers in New York. While Dowd’s team had sworn testimony from bookie Ron Peters stating Rose bet on the Reds from 1984 through 1986, they lacked concrete written documentation. They also possessed testimony and a recorded phone conversation between Bertolini and another Rose associate, Paul Janszen, confirming Bertolini placed bets for Rose. However, these pieces of evidence fell short of the irrefutable documentation needed to solidify their case, particularly in the eyes of fans yearning for Rose’s reinstatement into Major League Baseball.
“We knew that [Bertolini] recorded the bets, and that he bet himself, but we never had his records. We tried to get them. He refused to give them to us,” Dowd recounted. “This is the final piece of the puzzle on a New York betting operation with organized crime. And, of course, [Rose] betting while he was a player.”
The Bertolini Notebook: A Snapshot of Rose’s Betting in 1986
The documents obtained by Outside the Lines, specifically betting records from March through July 1986, offer a compelling glimpse into Pete Rose’s gambling activities. While they show no evidence suggesting Rose bet against the Cincinnati Reds, his own team, they paint a vivid picture of the extent of his betting life during that period as a player-manager. Key findings from the notebook include:
- During the period documented, March to July 1986, Rose placed bets on at least one MLB team on 30 separate days. The precise number of baseball bets is difficult to ascertain due to legibility issues in some entries.
- On 21 of the days where baseball bets are clearly recorded, Rose gambled on the Reds. This includes bets placed on games in which he himself participated as a player.
- The majority of bets, across various sports, hovered around $2,000. The largest recorded single bet was $5,500 on the Boston Celtics, which resulted in a loss for Rose.
- Rose engaged in heavy betting on college and professional basketball. On one day in March, he lost $15,400 on basketball alone. This occurred during his worst week in the four-month span, where his total losses amounted to $25,500.
Dowd expressed that having access to the Bertolini notebook in 1989 would have strengthened his investigation. However, he emphasized that it wasn’t necessary to justify Rose’s banishment. MLB Rule 21 is clear: “Any player, umpire, or club or league official or employee, who shall bet any sum whatsoever upon any baseball game in connection with which the bettor has a duty to perform shall be declared permanently ineligible.” The rule makes no distinction between betting for or against one’s own team.
Despite the clarity of Rule 21, Rose’s advocates have argued for his reinstatement, partly based on his repeated claims that he never bet while playing or against his own team. They suggest that any transgressions committed as a manager should not overshadow his accomplishments as a player.
Dowd refutes this argument, stating, “The rule says, if you bet, it doesn’t say for or against. It’s another device by Pete to try to excuse what he did. But when he bet, he was gone. He placed his financial interest ahead of the Reds, period.”
Unearthing the Past: The 1989 Postal Raid
The timing of this document discovery is particularly sensitive for Rose. He had applied for reinstatement to Commissioner Manfred in March of the same year. John Dowd had recently met with MLB CIO and executive vice president of administration John McHale Jr., who was leading Manfred’s review of Rose’s reinstatement request, to thoroughly explain his original investigation. MLB officials declined to comment on the newly surfaced notebook.
Adding to the complexity, Rose reiterated his denial of betting on baseball as a player in April, on Michael Kay’s ESPN New York 98.7 FM radio show. “Never bet as a player: That’s a fact,” he asserted.
Outside the Lines successfully located two of the postal inspectors who conducted the 1989 raid on Michael Bertolini’s home and requested they review the documents. Both agents, former supervisor Craig Barney and former inspector Mary Flynn, confirmed the records were indeed copies from the notebook they seized.
Barney recounted that the initial case appeared minor. The postal inspector’s office in Brooklyn, New York, had received a complaint regarding a man in Staten Island failing to return autographed goods to paying customers. This man was Michael Bertolini, operating a business named Hit King Marketing Inc. from his home.
“It was a mere ‘failure to render [services]’ complaint,” Barney, now retired, explained. “We didn’t know anything about Bertolini or his connection [to Rose].” The complaint potentially constituted mail fraud, but agents lacked probable cause for a house search.
Barney dispatched an agent to survey Bertolini’s address. The agent reported a “for sale” sign. Barney and Flynn, posing as prospective homebuyers, contacted a real estate agent and arranged a tour of Bertolini’s house. “It was such a mess. There was stuff everywhere,” Barney described. Baseball bats, balls, books, and papers were strewn throughout the house. They observed items suggesting Bertolini was forging signatures of legendary baseball players like Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Duke Snider, Mike Schmidt, and Pete Rose on memorabilia. “It reeked of fraud,” Barney stated.
During the walkthrough, the inspectors identified an item mentioned in the complaint as unreturned. This provided the probable cause needed to secure a search warrant. On October 13th, armed with the warrant, they raided Bertolini’s home, uncovering evidence leading to multiple convictions. However, a spiral notebook found in a basement box of papers particularly stood out to Barney. The numerous notations of “PETE” within its pages immediately indicated Pete Rose’s involvement.
“There were numbers and dates and — it was a book for sports betting,” Barney recalled, “I was taken aback.”
Flynn, whose initial reaction was “Holy mackerel,” stated they questioned Bertolini about the notebook. “He wasn’t forthcoming with much information,” she said, “but he did acknowledge to me it was records of bets he made for Pete Rose.”
Bertolini offered his perspective on the raid during his sentencing hearing in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn six years later (he served 14 months for tax fraud and a concurrent assault sentence): “I got a call at the place where I was working at the time from my brother, and he says, ‘You should come home.’ He said, ‘There’s a bunch of government people here, and they’re here for you.’ At the time, I think it was Mary Flynn of the postal inspector’s office who got on the phone and said, ‘We’re here,’ and she told me why and so forth. They took any records I had whatsoever, and they took different personal belongings and memorabilia from my home.”
Decades Under Seal: The Notebook’s Journey to Light
Although the 1989 raid on Bertolini’s residence garnered immediate media attention, the existence of a betting book remained undisclosed for five years. After Bertolini pleaded guilty and received a federal prison sentence, various news organizations including Sports Illustrated, The New York Times, and ESPN, filed Freedom of Information requests with the U.S. Attorney’s Office seeking access to the notebook. These requests were consistently denied on the grounds that the notebook was a grand jury exhibit containing information about “third parties who were not of investigative interest.”
Last year, Outside the Lines again unsuccessfully sought access to the notebook but learned it had been transferred to the National Archives under a civil action titled “United States v. One Executive Tools Spiral Notebook.” Two boxes of other items seized during the raid, including autographed baseballs and cards, were also transferred.
In April, Outside the Lines was permitted to examine the Bertolini memorabilia stored at the National Archives’ New York office. However, the betting book itself remained off-limits, kept separate from the other items. A U.S. Attorney’s Office internal memorandum from 2000, requesting the notebook’s transfer, stated Bertolini’s closed file possessed “sufficient historical or other value to warrant its continued preservation by the United States Government.” The memorandum listed a copy of the notebook among its attachments, but the copy provided by the National Archives lacked attachments and contained redactions.
“I wish I had been able to use it [the book] all those years he was denying he bet on baseball,” former postal inspector Flynn commented. “He’s a liar.”
For Dowd, a particularly significant aspect of this newly revealed evidence is its reinforcement of the claim that Rose was betting with mob-connected bookies through Bertolini. Dowd’s investigation had already established Rose’s significant debt at the time of his banishment.
“Bertolini nails down the connection to organized crime on Long Island and New York. And that is a very powerful problem,” Dowd emphasized. “[Ohio bookie] Ron Peters is a golf pro, so he’s got other occupations. But the boys in New York are about breaking arms and knees.”
“The implications for baseball are terrible. [The mob] had a mortgage on Pete while he was a player and manager,” Dowd concluded, highlighting the gravity of the situation. The Bertolini notebook provides compelling evidence that Pete Rose did bet on his own games, casting a long shadow over his legacy and any future prospects for reinstatement.
Freelance researcher Liam Quinn contributed to this report.
