Credit: Imagn

MLB Reinstates Pete Rose and Joe Jackson – Hall of Fame Back on the Table

Rob Manfred clarified that MLB’s disciplinary reach ends with a person’s death

Credit: Imagn

In a seismic shift that rewrites a century of baseball precedent, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred announced Tuesday that Pete Rose, Shoeless Joe Jackson, and other deceased individuals on the league’s permanently ineligible list have officially been reinstated.

The decision ends what was effectively a lifetime ban, even after death, for some of the most controversial figures in baseball history. Most notably, it reopens the door for Rose, MLB’s all-time hits leader, and Jackson, the enigmatic star of the 1919 Black Sox scandal, to be considered for induction into the Hall of Fame.

Breaking: MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred removed Pete Rose, "Shoeless" Joe Jackson and other deceased players from Major League Baseball’s permanently ineligible list.

Manfred ruled that MLB’s punishment of banned individuals ends upon their deaths. They are now presumably… pic.twitter.com/YkIZ34jMUu
— ESPN (@espn) May 13, 2025

Manfred clarified that MLB’s disciplinary reach ends with a person’s death, a stance that marks a philosophical break from how the league has traditionally viewed gambling-related offenses, the sport’s once-untouchable cardinal sin.

Rose accepted his ban in 1989 after then-commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti concluded that the 17-time All-Star had bet on games while managing the Cincinnati Reds. Jackson, along with seven other White Sox teammates, was expelled from professional baseball in 1921 by Kenesaw Mountain Landis, the league’s first commissioner, for allegedly fixing the 1919 World Series.

ALSO READ: Roki Sasaki Injury Update: Dodgers Hit With Major Blow as Rookie Lands on IL With No Timeline

In total, Manfred’s ruling clears 16 deceased players and one deceased owner from the permanently ineligible list. Among them are several of Jackson’s former teammates, including pitcher Eddie Cicotte and third baseman Buck Weaver, central figures in one of the darkest sagas in American sports. The scandal, which nearly torpedoed the integrity of the game, became cultural lore through books and the 1988 film Eight Men Out.

Based on current eligibility rules, the earliest either could be enshrined is 2028. Jackson, who passed away in 1951, had been considered by various committees over the decades. Rose, however, was never allowed on the ballot. That’s because in 1991, just before he would have become eligible, the Hall’s board implemented a policy stating that any player on MLB’s permanently ineligible list could not be considered for induction. The clause would later be dubbed “the Pete Rose rule.”

Pete Rose, who died in September at age 83, long maintained hope that his suspension would be temporary. Jackson never lived to see his name cleared. Now, for both of them, Cooperstown is suddenly back in play.

ALSO READ: Pirates’ Paul Skenes Commits to Team USA for WBC 2026

Still, the decision raises serious questions about where baseball draws its ethical lines, and whether this could open the door for a flood of other contested legacies to be revisited.

Joe Jackson

MLB Hall of Fame

Pete Rose

Mohsin Baldiwala

mlb

Mohsin Baldiwala is a Master’s student in Journalism and freelance content producer who got hooked on baseball through Seinfeld’s hapless George Costanza. The same reason why he’s a Yankees fan. He writes about sports because he believes it can offer a brief escape from the world’s chaos. Even if that means enduring the heartbreak of the 2024 World Series.