Cobb’s Record Looks Safe for 2 More Days : Rose Goes 0 for 4 and Says He’ll Sit Out Till Tuesday

Pete Rose, hitless Saturday but still a wonder, confirmed that he does not intend to play today or Monday. Three hits light of breaking Ty Cobb’s record, Rose insisted he would stick with his usual strategy, benching himself against left-handed pitchers and using Tony Perez.

Well, then, Rose was asked, suppose you and Cobb were tied, and a southpaw was pitching, and the next game was the last game of the season.

“Perez would play,” Rose said.

As with the hits he usually gets, Pete Rose seems to be single-minded. He says he has but one thought, that being to do what is good and proper as player-manager of the Cincinnati Reds. The 4,192nd hit, the Ty-breaker, can wait until Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday, against the San Diego Padres in Cincinnati--maybe even until Friday, when the Dodgers hit town.

By then, Rose said, he and everyone in the park will be so primed for the big one, “I might not even have to take a bat up there.”

Rose strode to the plate five times Saturday at Wrigley Field but hit the ball fair only twice. He grounded to second, was called out on strikes, lined to the mound, struck out swinging, and, with two outs in the ninth and a crowd of 30,300 on its feet, walked on a full count. The next batter, Dave Parker, hit his second home run of the day, a grand slam, but the Reds lost anyway, 9-7.

Rose’s line drive was speared by Cub pitcher Jay Baller, virtually in self-defense. “I don’t think he caught it,” Rose said. “I think it caught him.”

Baller, once a teammate of Rose’s in Philadelphia, called his catch a normal reflex action and said: “He’s going to get his hits and get the record. I just didn’t want to be known as the pitcher who gives it up.”

Rose still would have needed one to tie Cobb, but a lot of pitchers are on Baller’s wavelength these days. Few men particularly want to be a Ralph Branca, a Tracy Stallard, an Al Downing, a guy who is best remembered for surrendering a hit rather than preventing one.

On the other hand, according to the Sept. 2 issue of U.S. News and World Report, a Chicago firm has been rushing into production 4,189 souvenir certificates memorializing the date, the hit and the name of the pitcher--with three more certificates to come--and “a lot of the pitchers are buying them,” a company spokesman said. No word yet whether Ken Dayley of the St. Louis Cardinals, or Derek Botelho or Reggie Patterson of the Cubs, Rose’s most recent victims, have placed their orders.

Dennis Eckersley, who retired Rose twice Saturday before yielding to Baller, said: “I didn’t pitch any different than I have before. It wasn’t like he was one hit away from the record. But I probably would have pitched him different if he was one hit away.”

In 1978, when Rose broke a National League record by by hitting safely in 44 straight games, he was livid after the game because the last man to face him, relief pitcher Gene Garber of Atlanta, refused to “challenge” him with fastballs, throwing change-ups instead. Rose is far more relaxed these days, not because he is older and wiser, but because he is in no particular hurry to get a hit.

Baller’s catch reminded Rose that before Rose faced Garber that night in ‘78, Larry McWilliams stabbed a liner on the mound the same way. “I don’t get mad,” Rose said. “I probably have more hits up the middle than any man in history.”

One day last season, Rose was batting in the ninth inning against Lee Smith of the Cubs, who was trying to protect a lead with a runner on first base. Rose ripped one that hit Smith in the shoulder. The ball was caught in the air by the shortstop, who doubled the runner off first, ending the game. Otherwise, Rose would have 4,190 hits right now.

“How can you be mad,” Rose said of plays such as that, “when you know you’ll at least wind up on ‘This Week in Baseball?’ ”

Rose was not in the happiest of moods Saturday, having lost the game, but as usual, he pleasantly handled dozens of questions from dozens of reporters, not resenting a suspicious-sounding inquiry about taking called third strikes four times in his last four games and grinning widely when one man asked if he was concerned about Dave Parker catching Cobb before he did.

At one point, in an interview room near a Wrigley Field exit, Rose was interrupted by the sound of car horns from the street. “Somebody got married,” he said. “Dummy.”

About plate umpire Paul Runge calling him out on a pitch that the batter clearly believed to be outside, Rose said he looked back and asked, “Are you really trying?” to which Runge replied, “My very best.” Rose had been asked if he thought umpires were feeling pressure not to do him any special favors during the pursuit of Cobb’s record.

Even the official scorer, Don Friske of the Arlington Heights Daily Herald, approached Rose before Saturday’s game and asked if he wanted the record-breaking hit to be a “clean” one. Rose appreciated it, saying no one had ever asked him anything like that before, but told the scorer: “Hell, no. You call ‘em the way you call ‘em. You do your job, and I’ll do mine.”

Everyone seems to appreciate the fact that Pete Rose is on a sentimental journey. They assume he is so obsessed with chasing Cobb that every little detail matters. Yet, when asked if the home-run ball from Friday’s game--which very well could turn out to be the final homer of his career--had been returned to him, all Rose said was: “I don’t want it. What do I want it for?”

George McCambridge, 23, a college student from a Chicago suburb, had come to Friday’s game at Wrigley Field dangerously dressed, wearing a Cincinnati cap and jersey, in honor of his favorite team. After Rose’s homer sailed over his head in the bleachers in right-center field, McCambridge suddenly looked down and found the ball at his feet.

Other customers started clamoring for McCambridge to hurl the ball back onto the field--not so Rose could have it, but because a Bleacher Bum tradition is to reject all enemy home runs. “(Bleep) that,” McCambridge said. “I want money for it. I want to meet Pete.” Alas, Pete did not want the ball.

The crowd rose for Rose when he came to bat Saturday for the final time. He does not plan to play today (with Steve Trout pitching) or Monday against the Padres (with Dave Dravecky pitching), although he concedes that he might have to pinch-hit.

Assuming they might not see him bat again until next season, or maybe never again--you never know--the Wrigley fans stood. Seka, the adult-film star and personal friend of several Cubs, was among them. So was Ray Meyer, the former DePaul basketball coach, who recently lost his wife of 46 years, Marge, and came to the game because “Pete was her favorite player.”

These fans had made Rose take a curtain call after Friday’s home run, something Pete said had never happened to him before, at home or away. After batting against Lee Smith in the ninth inning Saturday, Rose said: “I heard the fans chanting my name, ‘Peeete! Peeete!’ and it felt good. And then I realized they might have been chanting, ‘Leeee! Leeee!’ for Smith, since I was the final out. Then I looked at the scoreboard, and it said, ‘Leeee! Leeee!’ ”

Rose took a 3-and-2 pitch that just missed the outside corner, walked, and Parker’s grand slam followed.

Rose found the umpire after the game. “Was it outside?” Rose asked.

“Yes,” Runge said.

“Damn right,” Rose said.