Second chances are second nature in sports

America forgave Richard Nixon, George Steinbrenner pardoned Billy Martin, and Marge Simpson let Homer back in the house at least a thousand times.

Second chances are second nature in sports. We're suckers for that kind of thing. So there's nothing unprecedented, unjust or even unexpected in baseball boss Bud Selig dangling a carrot under Pete Rose's nose. So long as the commissioner doesn't go overboard.

Rose doesn't deserve another shot at managing, a possibility he raised as recently as last summer. Whether he comes clean about his gambling problem is almost beside the point. Every bad call would invite the kind of scrutiny Rose could never outrun.

But he does belong in the Hall of Fame. It should be enough that Rose is baseball's career hits leader and that he collected them all during one of the game's golden ages, but there's plenty more.

Just recall the fuss made in recent years when Cal Ripken, Tony Gwynn, Wade Boggs, Robin Yount and George Brett crashed the 3,000-hit barrier near the end of sensational careers. Now consider that each would have needed another eight to 10 sensational seasons just to gain admission to Rose's neighborhood.

Of course, none of them bet on baseball. And while Rose continues to insist he didn't, either, while managing the Cincinnati Reds, that's been the sticking point ever since Selig's predecessor, the late Bart Giamatti, announced the lifetime ban 13 years ago. Nothing Rose has done since has been reason to lower the bar.

He went on TV the same night he was kicked out of the game and started selling autographed baseballs for $39 each. Rose is still selling everything he can get his hands on.

In that sense, the only thing that's changed is the number and influence of the people willing to trade on Rose's notoriety. It used to be that his strongest advocates were former teammates, a player like Joe Morgan, asking for nothing more than a review. Now it's people like Cincinnati Mayor Charlie Luken. He wants Rose not just to be reinstated, but reinstated in time to make April's opening of the Great American Ball Park, the Reds' new home. How noble is that?

"Whatever the crime, time has been served," Luken wrote in one of two letters he sent Selig last month. "Whatever agreements were signed years ago are irrelevant today."

The sad truth is that fans have short memories. Major league baseball has lined its own pockets and allowed Rose to set foot on a diamond twice during sanctioned events. Both times, he's received the loudest ovations. As Luken's letter suggested, if you've actually done the time, most fans won't remember the crime.

But the responsibilities of those in charge of baseball should extend further than that. Rose's remarks from the day the ban went into effect have been an uninterrupted series of half-truths calculated to blur the facts.

Rose admitted to a gambling problem when he wanted sympathy and denied it when victimhood made it easier to move product. He used to set up a booth down the block from the Hall of Fame around the week of induction ceremonies and stage annual pity parties, slipping out of his sackcloth and ashes only long enough to ring up his customers' purchases.

Then, Rose called the evidence against him "incomplete" and his accusers "biased," and took great pleasure in pointing out that, "if I were a dope addict, my name would already be on a plaque down the street there."

What Rose conveniently left out was his run-ins with federal authorities punched holes in his credibility every bit as sharply as those singles he used to lash between infielders. Fans, though, always focused on the hits Rose made and not the ones he took.

Judging by the past, when the fan polls being conducted over the next few days are finished, something close to 75 percent of the voters will want Rose reinstated. If Selig allows him back on the ballot, the same margin from baseball writers would get Rose elected to the Hall.

There's nothing wrong with rehabilitation. Baltimore linebacker Ray Lewis was once charged in a murder case and nowadays he delivers talks at NFL rookie orientation meetings about avoiding the wrong crowd.

A baseball executive speaking on the condition he not be identified told The Associated Press that Rose and Selig have been exchanging draft proposals about how much longer the ban will extend and how much Rose will be allowed to participate in the game if he is allowed back in. Final terms have yet to be negotiated, but here's one suggestion:

Let Rose talk to baseball's rookies about the evils of gambling, and get some time knocked off for good behavior.

Jim Litke is a sports columnist for The Associated Press.