Pete Rose death: Coroner reveals new details on passing of MLB legend, former Phillie
Rose was old school, a conscious throwback to baseball's early days.
PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) -- Officials revealed more details Tuesday on the death of Pete Rose, the MLB's all-time hits leader who was banned from baseball.
According to the Clark County Coroner, Rose, 83, died in his Las Vegas home on Monday. His cause of death was determined to be hypertensive and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. Rose was also battling a significant condition of diabetes mellitus, officials said.
READ MORE: Pete Rose, the embattled MLB legend and former Phillies player, dies at 83
Atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, or ASCVD, is a heart condition that involves the thickening of arteries that carry oxygen and nutrients to the heart and the rest of the body, according to the Mayo Clinic. Hypertension is a condition that causes high blood pressure and is a risk factor for heart disease.
For fans who came of age in the 1960s and 1970s, no player was more exciting than the Cincinnati Reds' No. 14, "Charlie Hustle."
At the dawn of artificial surfaces, divisional play and free agency, Rose was old school, a conscious throwback to baseball's early days. Millions could never forget him crouched and scowling at the plate, running full speed to first even after drawing a walk or sprinting for the next base and diving headfirst into the bag.
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In Philadelphia, Rose made four All-Star appearances and helped the Phillies to one of their two world championships during his five seasons from 1979-83.
The longtime Cincinnati Red was baseball's career hits leader (4,256), breaking his hero Ty Cobb's 4,191 and signifying his excellence no matter the notoriety that followed. It was a total so extraordinary that you could average 200 hits for 20 years and still come up short.
Looking back on Pete Rose's career in the MLB | Photo Gallery
But despite his historic achievements and Hall of Fame dreams, Rose was banned in 1989 after a Major League Baseball investigation determined he had bet on baseball, including on his own team.
On March 20, 1989, baseball commissioner Peter Ueberroth, (who would soon be succeeded by A. Bartlett Giamatti) announced that his office was conducting a "full inquiry into serious allegations" about Rose. Reports emerged that he had been relying on a network of bookies, friends and others in the gambling world to place bets on baseball games, including some with the Reds.
Rose denied any wrongdoing, but the investigation found that the "accumulated testimony of witnesses, together with the documentary evidence and telephone records reveal extensive betting activity by Pete Rose in connection with professional baseball and, in particular, Cincinnati Reds games, during the 1985, 1986, and 1987 baseball seasons."
Rose's story eventually changed with him admitting in a 2004 autobiography that he bet on baseball, including Reds games, though said he never bet against his team.
"I don't think betting is morally wrong. I don't even think betting on baseball is morally wrong," Rose wrote in "Play Hungry," a memoir released in 2019. "There are legal ways, and there are illegal ways, and betting on baseball the way I did was against the rules of baseball."
Despite owning up to the betting, Rose was never admitted into the Hall in his lifetime, although he did receive 41 votes in 1992 (when 323 votes were needed), around the time the Hall formally ruled that those banned from the game could never be elected.
Shortly after the ban went into effect, Rose was convicted of tax evasion and spent a number of months in prison. Also, in 2017, an unidentified woman alleged in a court document that Rose had a sexual relationship with her for several years in the 1970s, beginning before she turned 16. Rose acknowledged he had a sexual relationship with the woman but said he believed that it started when she was 16 -- which is the legal age of consent in Ohio.
Rose's career is well-represented in Cooperstown. Items at the Baseball Hall of Fame include his helmet from his MVP 1973 season; the bat he used in 1978 when his hitting streak reached 44 games; and the cleats he wore, in 1985, on the day he became the game's hits leader.
ESPN and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
