Pete Rose is, somewhat stunningly, off Major League Baseball’s permanently ineligible list.
But that doesn’t mean he’s automatically in the Hall of Fame.
Casual baseball fans often equated Rose’s ban from baseball – which lasted past his September 2024 death until commissioner Rob Manfred reinstated him Tuesday following pressure from President Donald Trump – with a banishment from Cooperstown’s shrine. But reinstatement doesn’t ensure enshrinement.
Certainly, Hall of Fame officials deferred to MLB with regards to Rose’s eligibility, a procedural choice that kept their hands out of the Rose quagmire for decades. Yet with Rose now eligible, when might fans unbothered by Rose’s many indiscretions see the slap-hitting scourge have his day in Cooperstown?
When will Pete Rose come up for Hall of Fame election?
Per Hall regulations, Rose’s candidacy won’t come up for a couple of years. As a player whose greatest contributions to the game came before 1980, he’ll be under consideration by the 12-person Classic Baseball Committee, a group that also considers candidates from the Negro Leagues and pre-Negro League stars. The group will next vote in December 2027 for induction in July 2028.
While Rose broke Ty Cobb’s all-time hits record in 1985, he played 17 of his 24 seasons before 1980, amassing 3,372 of his 4,256 hits in that span. That puts him in the same bucket as players like Dave Parker, who debuted 10 years after Rose in 1973 and played until 1991, and was elected by the Classic Baseball Committee for enshrinement in July.
How will Rose get on the ballot?
The 2027 ballot for the Classic Baseball Era Committee will be determined by the Historical Overview Committee, a group of 10 baseball historians appointed by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. That group includes eight current or former baseball writers, a university professor and a statistician.
Last year, the committee included Parker, fellow electee Dick Allen, Tommy John, Ken Boyer, John Donaldson, Steve Garvey, Vic Harris and Luis Tiant on the Classic Baseball ballot.
Who will vote on Rose’s candidacy?
Should the committee include Rose in the group of eight Classic Era finalists, his candidacy will be voted on by a 16-member electorate. In 2024, that group was comprised of Hall of Famers Paul Molitor, Joe Torre, Lee Smith, Tony Perez, Eddie Murray and Ozzie Smith, along with Angels owner Arte Moreno, four other baseball executives and five baseball writers and historians.
The committee was chaired by Hall of Fame chairman of the board Jane Forbes Clark.
Clark and the Hall managed to keep a distance from the emotional Rose issue, deferring over the decades to whomever sat in the commissioner’s chair. In a statement Tuesday, Clark said the Hall is prepared to consider Rose’s case.
‘The National Baseball Hall of Fame has always maintained that anyone removed from Baseball’s permanently ineligible list will become eligible for Hall of Fame consideration,’ she said. ‘Major League Baseball’s decision to remove deceased individuals from the permanently ineligible list will allow for the Hall of Fame candidacy of such individuals to now be considered. The Historical Overview Committee will develop the ballot of eight names for the Classic Baseball Era Committee – which evaluates candidates who made their greatest impact on the game prior to 1980 – to vote on when it meets next in December 2027.’
Would Rose’s election be a slam dunk?
Not necessarily.
Just like with Hall of Fame voting done by hundreds of BBWAA members, Rose would need to garner support on 75% of ballots, or 12 of 16 committee members.
In what will surely become an ongoing measuring stick of perceived moral turpitude, all-time home run king Barry Bonds failed to reach that plateau in his first year under Contemporary Era Committee review in 2022.
Bonds received less than four votes, the Hall announced, meeting the same fate as Roger Clemens and Rafael Palmeiro, two other players closely tied to performance-enhancing drug use.
While Rose is the game’s all-time hits king, Bonds is the objectively superior player, amassing 162.8 career WAR to Rose’s 79.6. Bonds still holds a significant advantage if his years before well-documented ties to PEDs began: From 1986 through 1998, he produced 99.9 WAR.
That means future committees will face the same ethical quandary BBWAA voters did in the decade Bonds, Clemens and others were on the Hall ballot: Is gambling on games you managed – and, likely, played in – a disqualifying violation?
For decades, MLB commissioners upholding Rose’s permanent ban made that a non-issue. In coming years, it will be in the hands of 16 electors.