On September 11, 1985, the Cincinnati Reds player-manager, Pete Rose, singled to left-center off San Diego's Eric Show and in doing so, broke Ty Cobb's record for most hits in a career. It was the 4,192nd base hit of Rose's career.
This was a monumental feat. Before Babe Ruth emerged on the scene, during the second half of Cobb's career, the "Georgia Peach" was considered the best baseball player of all-time. He still stands amongst the top echelon of players in baseball history.
Yet, Pete's long career—24 seasons—allowed for a lot of "counting stats" to add up. Rose is the lifetime leader in games played, plate appearances, at-bats, and hits.
Aside from some severe character issues off the field, Rose would have been a sure-fire Hall of Famer, but, what folks may—or may not—remember about Rose was that the "Hit King" was not nearly as good of hitter as Cobb.
"Charlie Hustle" nevertheless tallied a .303 lifetime batting average, which is typically considered great. Cobb, however, hit a lifetime .367, which remains the top mark in history and is on an entirely different plane of success. Another stratosphere perhaps. Top echelon indeed.
Rose's mission and purpose for the last several years of his career was to eclipse Cobb in the record books—to become the Hit King once and for all.
During that 1985 season, when Rose was chasing Cobb's then-record 4,191 career hits, all of America got on board. Fans of all stripes were enthralled with his pursuit (which made Rose's downfall a few years later even more shattering to the baseball public).
Nearly every newspaper concerned itself with the Pete Rose countdown. And it wasn't just the sports sections.
When Rose was closing in on Cobb, only 14 base hits away from breaking the record, a sportswriter asked the Cincinnati first baseman-slash-skipper, "Pete, you're a lifetime .300 hitter. How many at-bats will it take you to get the 14 hits?"
Rose didn't even think. "Oh, that's easy. Fourteen."
See, on the field, Pete Rose was a .300 hitter, which meant that on average, he got 3 hits in every 10 at bats. A .300 average means you are a great big league hitter.
Yet, in his mind, Rose was a 1.000 hitter. He got a hit every time he stepped to the plate.
In either case, you'll get what you expect.
As always,
Brian
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