Mitch in the Morning (KJR-AM) interviewed former Pete Rose-associate Tommy Gioiosa yesterday and made some interesting allegations against the Hit King.
- He bet from the clubhouse so much that Marge Schott once threatened to remove the clubhouse telephone to get him to stop.
- When he bet on the Reds it was always to win, but when he didn't bet on them the bookies knew enough to go bet against the Reds.
- He started out doing pretty well, but got greedy and bet on too many games at once to be profitable. (Gioiosa said he thought Rose could've made a lot of money if he'd stayed with his original betting patterns.)
- Rose would sometimes take a more "win-now" approach to a game if he had a bet placed on the Reds, like staying with or pulling a pitcher differently, than in games he hadn't bet on.
- Gioiosa fraternized with some cocaine dealers at the Gold's Gym where he worked out and Rose saw that they were making lots of money. He said that Rose used them to make some money while basically saying (paraphrasing) "don't tell me anything about what you're doing to make me this profit, because I don't want to know." Said Rose was just a middle man who never saw the drugs nor ever used them.
- Rose, at the end of his career and desparately wanting to break Ty Cobb's hit record, used a corked bat. He said he asked Pete what would happen if the bat broke and Pete responded, laughing, "there will be fucking cork all over the field."
- Says he last spoke with Rose at a card show in '87 right before he was indicted on drug and gambling charges related to his role as Rose's money handler and bet-runner. He told Rose he wouldn't cooperate with the investigation and Rose told him and said he wasn't cooperating either and that he was going to put baseball "on trial." Gioiosa says a week later he was indicted and that same day Rose made his deal with baseball (contradicting his earlier assertion that he wouldn't) and got banned while avoiding criminal charges while Gioiosa never cooperated, was found guilty and spent time in jail.
- He also said he had a falling out with Pete about a Pick 6 winning ticket where Pete didn't want to split the money with him and another associate and that he handled Pete's girlfriends (he called it "shuffling") and Pete's wife knew about it and didn't like him for that reason and that another guy came along who had a girlfriend and the girlfriend and Pete's wife kind of teamed up to ace Gioiosa out of the picture.
I'd heard the corked bat thing (I think) but not the drug allegations. The guy sounds like a prince of a guy (Mitch said he "needed to take a shower" at the end of the interview) and is a convicted felon, but he seemed to know just enough details and was so matter-of-fact in his recollection of events that it was hard for me to doubt the guy's truthfulness.
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According to our TV announcer, Dennis Martinez threw 9 innings of a perfect game only to lose in the 10th against the Padres. I don't remember this happening in 89... anyone remember this?