Baseball: $100,000 Worth of Singles

• Share

(2 of 2)

If he stays in one piece. His hara-kiri habits sidelined him for two weeks last season when he banged up his shoulder diving for a sinking line drive. This year he ripped his hand open on the Crosley Field fence on the second day of the season. Next day, bandage and all, he collected two hits to launch a 22-game hitting streak.

Not one to learn a lesson easily, Rose took a dive after a hard-hit ball in the July 5 game against the Los Angeles Dodgers. The National League's No. 1 vote getter in All-Star balloting, Rose sat out the classic with a broken thumb, spent 23 days on the inactive roster. Now that he has recovered, the Cincinnati management can only pray and do what it can to keep its zealous star whole—such as emphatically denying him permission to play in an amateur football league this fall.