Pete Rose helped the Phillies win their first World Series but leaves a complicated legacy after his death

Pete Rose, baseball’s all-time hits leader who helped lift the Phillies to their first World Series title in 1980 before being banned from baseball nine years later for gambling on the sport, was found dead Monday at his home in Las Vegas. He was 83. No cause of death was initially given, pending an autopsy.

Mr. Rose totaled a record 4,256 hits over 24 major-league seasons, made 17 All-Star teams, and won three batting titles. But was ineligible to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame after a Major League Baseball investigation found that Mr. Rose bet on games in 1986 while he was managing his hometown Cincinnati Reds. He played the bulk of his career for the Reds from 1963-78, and played every position except pitcher and catcher.

Mr. Rose denied for years that he bet on baseball before admitting in his book in 2004 that he wagered on games while managing. He added the inscription “I’m sorry I bet on baseball” to autographs he signed in Las Vegas, wrote an apology letter in 2022 to MLB, and campaigned as recently as last month for his place in the Hall of Fame.

MLB allowed teams in 2016 to honor Mr. Rose, but he remains ineligible for induction. The Reds retired his No. 14 in 2016 before the Phillies scrapped plans to add him to their Wall of Fame in 2017 after a woman said she had a sexual relationship with Mr. Rose in the 1970s when she was 14 or 15. Mr. Rose said he thought the woman was 16, which would have been legal at the time in Cincinnati. He could not be tried in Ohio because the statute of limitations had passed.

» READ MORE: From 2022: Pete Rose on critics of his appearance with the 1980 Phillies team: ‘It was 55 years ago, babe.’

The Phillies signed Mr. Rose before the 1979 season, believing he was the missing piece the team needed after a few near-misses at reaching the World Series for the first time since 1950. The Phillies missed the postseason in his first season but won it all in 1980. His hardened style of play was perfect for Philadelphia as fans loved “Charlie Hustle.” He even rode the Broad Street line with them to Veterans Stadium.

“My dad loved Philly,” Mr. Rose’s son, Pete, said earlier this month. “My dad’s a blue-collar guy. He loves that atmosphere. I think that’s why they got behind him so much. He’s not from Philly, but if you watch him play, you could probably say he is from Philly because of how Philly guys play and they work hard and they’re no-nonsense types of people.”

Mr. Rose hit .282 in 1980, steamrolled Houston catcher Bruce Bochy in the league championship series, and secured the penultimate out of the World Series by dramatically securing a foul pop-up that bounced from catcher Bob Boone’s mitt.

“Never will his hit record be broken, never will there be a player who can set the tone of a series simply by diving into a base, never will there be a player who will play in more winning games, never will there be a player who can affect the careers of those around him in such a positive way,” Mike Schmidt wrote in 2013. “There will never be another Pete Rose.”

» READ MORE: The 1964 Phillies still wonder what could have been 60 years after a collapse cost them the pennant

The Phillies lost to Rose’s Reds in 1976 before being bounced from the postseason by the Dodgers in 1977 and 1978. The Phillies had stars but they needed a spark. Enter Rose via free agency.

“I remember one game Schmitty was in the clubhouse and he looked like he was a little jittery,” Larry Bowa said in 2016. “Pete says, ‘What are you so jittery about?’ Schmitty says, ‘I never faced this guy before.’ Pete says, ‘You never faced him before? What do you think he’s like over there thinking he’s got to face Mike Schmidt?’ Schmitty perked up and was like, ‘Yeah, that’s right.’ "

Mr. Rose was a second-year player in the dugout at Connie Mack Stadium when Chico Ruiz stole home to start the Phillies’ unthinkable collapse in 1964. Mr. Rose, who won his first World Series in 1975, once said Ruiz’s baserunning was the “dumbest play I’d ever seen — except it worked.” Sixteen years later, Mr. Rose was on the field at the Vet when the Phillies finally won, making up for the heartbreak felt years earlier.

“I don’t think we win in 1980 without Pete Rose,” Dickie Noles, a reliever on that Phillies team, said in 2016. “He never missed a pitch. He knew everything that was going on in the field and in the 1980 playoffs he made us feel like we were never going to lose.”

The Phillies won the pennant again with Mr. Rose in 1983 but his star was beginning to fade. Mr. Rose was benched for a World Series game as the Phillies bowed out in five to Baltimore and he left in the offseason for the Montreal Expos. He was traded in August 1984 back to Cincinnati, where he doubled as player-manager. He retired from playing after the 1986 season and solely managed for three seasons before being banned.