Merlin’s Pete Rose Story

Cincinnati, 1975.

My mom and I are eating at Pete Rose's restaurant. Pete Rose is seated in a booth about 20 feet away from my mom and me.

I am 9 years old, and I am fucking losing it.

My mom says it's okay for me to ask for an autograph—but only after Mr. Rose is done eating and his plate has been cleared away.^[1]

So, my legs are wet noodles as I approach one of the greatest baseball players of all time and wait tentatively for a sign that it's okay for me to even be there.

Pete Rose wears the nuanced expression of a man who's struggling to remember whether he recently ate an owl. Viz., you can kinda get the feeling he probably got good at sports for a reason.

So, I proceed, gently pushing a menu and a ballpoint pen towards his insanely large forearms.

He's still thinking about the owl, but he starts drawing his gorgeous, giant, loopy signature.

I suddenly remember we have a friend who is a scout for the Reds.^[2] A wonderful guy with a swell family which included a wonderful little daughter who'd been born with a partially formed arm.

I blurt out "Uhhhhh…do you know Sal Artiaga?! He's a scout for the Reds!"

And, Charlie Hustle sets aside his owl recovery operation for a moment to process whether he knows Sal Artiaga.

"Is he the one with the daughter that ain't got no arm?" asked Pete Rose.

"Yes, that's him. Thank you so much, Mr. Rose. It was really nice getting to meet you."

And, then, I noodle-walked back to our table thinking, Pete Rose is a pretty peculiar guy.

But. He was one of the greatest baseball players of all time.

Which is absolutely still something.

1. I include this as an admittedly huge flex simply to remind you that I was raised by decent people in the midwest. ↩︎
2. Sal Artiaga was kind of a big deal. ↩︎