Note: Thank you to NetGalley, Pantheon, and Keith O’Brien for the advanced reader copy of the book. This review will also be posted on NetGalley. What follows is my unbiased review of the book.

I’m old enough that I can say I saw Pete Rose play. As a Mets fan, I had to have some anger over his fight with Bud Harrelson during the 1973 playoffs. I also saw his fall from grace. In recent years, I thought he still belonged in the Baseball Hall of Fame, as they had never proved that he did anything to alter the course of a game while he was in debt to the gamblers he owed money to. However, after reading Charlie Hustle by Keith O’Brien, I’m rethinking that opinion.

Charlie Hustle will likely become the definitive biography of Rose. It’s presented without the bias that Rose’s own books have. In it, O’Brien paints the portrait of a man whose entire life was consumed by baseball. He lived and breathed it, working out throughout his life more than was ever asked, and always trying to better himself. Unfortunately, he was also consumed by gambling, which would be his downfall.

O’Brien starts at the beginning of Rose’s life as he grows up in the rough-and-tumble blue-collar area of Cincinnati. His father was devoted to Pete to the exclusion of his other children. Rose was trained as a prize fighter. When that didn’t work out, he turned his attention to baseball. The nickname “Charlie Hustle” was a derogatory name given to him by Mickey Mantle. Rose didn’t care; he ran with it and owned it.

No one in baseball ever hustled on the field the way Rose did. Instead of a slow walk or trot to first base when he was walked by a pitcher, Rose would run. He took nothing for granted and was on top of every play in the field. The way he played is the dream of all of the statisticians in this new era of metrics. He produced runs, not by hitting long balls (although there were some of those), but by hustling and outthinking the other team. He thought nothing of laying down a bunt with nobody on and beating the throw to first base.

O’Brien interviewed many of the people who surrounded Rose throughout his life, including Rose himself. What started as trips to a racetrack in Kentucky evolved over the years to much more. O’Brien details how Rose went from betting a few dollars on horse races to betting thousands on every sport there was out there. There were a variety of hangers-on who helped expedite this. They were the “yes” men who never once took Rose aside and said he might have a problem.

The details of what was uncovered about Rose are presented here. The allegations of betting on baseball and the Cincinnati Reds while he was a player and manager are no longer debated. For many years, Rose denied these accusations, but it’s clear he wasn’t telling the truth then. He was trying to do anything he could not to be banned from playing and being involved with the game he loved. However, there are a number of other accusations that can’t be proven. In the waning years of his career as he was chasing Ty Cobb’s record of 4,191 hits he had a couple of off seasons before coming back with a vengeance. Several people have stepped forward and allege that Rose used corked bats, including the man who supposedly made them for him. Rose was also frequenting a gym where steroids were on the menu, and his radical physical change one year at spring training gives rise to a possibility that he was also using them. These last two allegations are the ones that really give me pause about Rose being in the Hall of Fame.

Rose might not have done anything while gambling to alter the game, but if his life had continued on the way it is detailed here likely would have put him in a position where he didn’t have a choice. He owed money to a lot of bad people and was getting deeper in debt all the time. Would the enforcers for some of the bookies and those attached to him have eventually put pressure on Rose to throw games in exchange for the money owed? O’Brien doesn’t ask this question, but he makes it clear that Rose was in so deep he couldn’t get out on his own.

There are moments where the good things Rose did are depicted. He welcomed players to the team who were shunned by others. It was less than twenty years since baseball had been integrated when Rose began to play, and many black players were still ostracized. Rose treated them better than many others and often sat with his black teammates in the dugouts – the only white player who would. That’s not to say Rose was perfect in that regard. There are some clear moments of racial ignorance as well.

A quarter of the size of this book are O’Brien’s footnotes and sources. I breezed through this part, but a few caught my eye as O’Brien details who told him what, and lets people decide for themselves if they are to be believed. Pete was not a nice guy, but despite never being faithful to his first wife, I could see she still cares about him for some reason. My one criticism of the book is that a daughter Pete had from one of his affairs is never talked about when O’Brien talks about Pete’s kids. It took a lawsuit by the grown-up daughter to get Pete to recognize her as his daughter, and O’Brien fails her as well in this regard, always only counting the children Pete had with either of his two wives. Pete Rose had five children, not four.

I would recommend Charlie Hustle to baseball fans, particularly those who believe after all this time Rose should be in the Hall of Fame. It’s not just that he’s a faulty human being as the rest of us are, but that his hubris that he should be allowed to get away with it because he’s Pete Rose that changes things. Would he be honest about using a corked bat or steroids to affect the game and his playing? This is a well-written and well-sourced thorough depiction of Rose the human being.