All-time hits leader Pete Rose has applied for reinstatement from Major League Baseball's ineligible list, according to an ESPN report Wednesday.
Rose and his lawyers asked Commissioner Rob Manfred to reconsider Rose's ban from baseball, according to documents obtained by ESPN, after baseball's decision not to punish Houston Astros players involved in the recent sign-stealing scandal.
BREAKING: Pete Rose asks MLB for reinstatement, cites no punishment for Astros players for electronic signs-stealing. "There cannot be one set of rules for Mr. Rose and another for everyone else," Rose's 20-page petition to Manfred says. https://t.co/9CRCHBXkUy
— Don Van Natta Jr. (@DVNJr) February 5, 2020
"There cannot be one set of rules for Mr. Rose and another for everyone else," reads Rose’s petition. "No objective standard or categorization of the rules violations committed by Mr. Rose can distinguish his violations from those that have incurred substantially less severe penalties from Major League Baseball."
Manfred denied Rose's request for reinstatement in 2015 after meeting with him at the All-Star Game in Cincinnati earlier that year.
At the time, Manfred said allowing Rose back into baseball “presents an unacceptable risk of future violation by him … and thus the credibility of our sport.”
Rose, the former Cincinnati Reds legend, has been banned from baseball since 1989 for gambling on baseball while he was managing the Reds.