Rolen: To join Cobb, Ruth, Aaron in HOF ‘not real’
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Bradford Doolittle, ESPN Staff Writer
The long roads to Cooperstown for two of baseball’s most humble stars will end next week, when Fred McGriff and Scott Rolen are inducted into the Hall of Fame.
That humility was on full display Friday, when the two greats conducted separate video calls with the media in advance of the July 23 induction ceremony on the grounds of the Clark Sports Center in Cooperstown, New York.
“To sit here and say ‘Oh yeah, me and Ty Cobb and Babe Ruth and Hank Aaron,’ that’s not real,” Rolen said. “That’s not a real situation. These guys are true legends and I get a chance to share that gallery with them, which I’m greatly honored [to do].”
Rolen was elected over the winter in his sixth year of eligibility on the BBWAA ballot, completing a steady rise from being named on 10.2% of ballots on his first try to 76.3%, putting him over the threshold for enshrinement.
The wait for McGriff was even longer despite 493 career homers and six top-10 finishes in MVP voting. After a 24-year professional career that began in the Yankees’ system when he was 17 years old and the required five-year waiting period before ballot eligibility, McGriff topped out at 39.8% in his 10 tries with the writers.
Finally, 41 years after his pro debut, McGriff earned a place in the Hall thanks to the unanimous support of an era committee that met at the 2022 winter meetings.
“As a player, your goal is to make the big leagues,” McGriff said. “And then once you get to the big leagues, it’s kind of like I got to go out there and try to perform, then try to win a World Series. You just keep going on.”
Rolen credits his time with the Cardinals as being pivotal to his eventual election to the Hall. He spent five-plus seasons with the Redbirds, making four All-Star teams, winning three Gold Gloves and finishing fourth in the 2004 NL MVP voting.
Rolen also played 32 of his 39 postseason games during his time in St. Louis. That includes hitting .421 during the 2006 World Series against Detroit for the champion Cardinals which, according to Rolen, raised his stature in the eyes of the eventual Hall voters.
“I really believe that my time there, me being able to be inducted, is a reflection of my time in St. Louis, from a team success point of view,” said Rolen, whose Hall of Fame plaque will feature him donning a Cardinals cap. “I don’t think there’s any doubt that that’s the part of my career that really speaks loudest.”
Rolen came up with the Phillies and starred in Philadelphia almost from the start of his career, though the team did not make the playoffs during that time. Rolen downplayed suggestions that there is lingering acrimony between him, the Phillies or the fans. He will be honored in Philadelphia during a ceremony later this season, when he will be added to the franchise’s Wall of Fame.
“There’s no bad blood between the Phillies and me or my family in any capacity,” Rolen said. “We’re going back in September and that’s a huge thing. I’ve spoken to [owner] John Middleton and I still have a bunch of friends in the organization that we keep in contact with. My time there, I wouldn’t trade for anything in the world.”
McGriff’s plaque cap will not feature a logo, fitting for a player who moved around a lot and a performer of his stature. He played for six teams but none for more than five seasons. Often, his travels were not a product of him struggling but because teams on a championship quest viewed McGriff as a final piece to a title puzzle.
It happened after he was acquired by the Braves midway through the 1993 season, when McGriff helped lead Atlanta to the 1995 World Series title. In fact, McGriff, not given to hyperbole or edgy comments, said that the clincher of that Fall Classic is the one game he’d like to experience again from his long career.
“The World Series is right up there because baseball is an individual game and a team game,” McGriff said. “And so when you all come together and finally pull it off and you win a world championship, I mean it’s just a beautiful feeling.”
The beautiful feelings will continue for Rolen and McGriff next week when they deliver Hall acceptance speeches, the text of which both say they have already completed.
When that happens, two understated greats will look out over thousands of adoring fans blanketing the grounds beyond the stage, with legends lined up on stage behind them, some of them childhood heroes and others who were teammates.
Heady stuff for a pair who didn’t necessarily see themselves as likely members of baseball’s most exclusive club. In McGriff’s case, there was at least one peer who believed he belonged in Cooperstown all along.
“I always believed that Fred McGriff was a Hall of Famer,” Rolen said, adding, “I’ve always had a lot of respect for him as a person and certainly as a player. We’re going to be connected for quite some time and that’s a great honor.”
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Shwetha Surendran
The NCAA sent a letter to Kalshi, a company that offers prediction markets on college basketball and football, expressing its concern about the company’s “commitment to contest integrity and the protection of contest participants,” according to a copy of the letter obtained by ESPN.
In the letter, dated Oct. 30, NCAA chief legal officer Scott Bearby asked Kalshi how it monitors collegiate sports markets for integrity concerns and activity by prohibited customers, who it considers a prohibited customer, whether it will report integrity concerns to the NCAA and whether the company will cooperate with NCAA investigations.
“We welcome Kalshi’s stance on its efforts to protect the integrity of NCAA competitions and to reduce instances of abuse and harassment directed at student-athletes and other participants,” Bearby wrote.
The NCAA also asked if Kalshi would ban prediction markets similar to prop bets, which the company began offering this fall.
Prop betting markets, Bearby noted in the letter, heighten “the risk of integrity and harassment concerns.” In March last year, NCAA president Charlie Baker called for a ban on prop bets on college athletes in states with legal sports wagering.
The NCAA also asked Kalshi in the letter to review language on its website that the NCAA says implies a relationship between them.
“Kalshi has robust market integrity provisions required by our status as a federally licensed financial exchange,” a Kalshi spokesperson said in a statement to ESPN. “We value the NCAA’s feedback and are working on adjusting the language on our site. We are currently reviewing and addressing their additional requests.”
Prediction markets like Kalshi have emerged over the past year and are competing with traditional sportsbooks in the betting market. Kalshi is battling multiple lawsuits by state gambling regulators, who allege that the company is violating state laws by offering event contracts that mimic sports bets. Kalshi argues that it does not fall under state jurisdiction and is instead regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, a federal agency.
In March, Kalshi announced a partnership with IC360, an integrity monitor used by many collegiate and professional leagues.
The NCAA has faced an increasing number of alleged betting violations by players in recent years. In September, the NCAA announced that a Fresno State men’s basketball player had manipulated his performance for gambling purposes and conspired with two other players in a prop betting scheme. In total, the association has opened investigations into potential betting violations by approximately 30 current or former men’s basketball players.
CORAL GABLES, Fla. — Miami has asked the Atlantic Coast Conference for clarity on a number of officiating decisions made in its loss this past weekend to SMU, including a critical 15-yard penalty in the final moments of regulation.
Miami lost the game, 26-20. The Hurricanes, who were as high as No. 2 in the AP Top 25 last month, have dropped two of their last three games and are now ranked No. 18.
Hurricanes coach Mario Cristobal said Miami has not gotten an answer from the ACC. It’s unclear if any explanations will be coming.
“Certainly, we’re waiting what the response is, as well as on the roughing the passer one which we certainly don’t agree with,” Cristobal said Monday. “But at this point in time, the best we can do is turn it in and hope for a better result next time.”
The Hurricanes’ Marquise Lightfoot was called for unnecessary roughness against SMU quarterback Kevin Jennings with about a minute left in the fourth quarter, giving the Mustangs 15 yards and a first down. Miami had called time out just before the fourth-and-9 play was snapped, and the Hurricanes argued to no avail that Lightfoot did not hear the whistle.
Replays showed that Lightfoot, who did make contact with Jennings, tried to hold the SMU quarterback up after apparently realizing the play was dead.
That penalty gave SMU the ball on the Miami 37, and the Mustangs went on to kick an overtime-forcing field goal.
Miami also was incensed about how a pass interference flag that would have aided the Hurricanes was picked up, and how officials missed a Hurricanes receiver getting tackled in the end zone on a play that wound up as a Miami interception in overtime.
Miami was called for 12 penalties in the game for 96 yards, compared with four by SMU for 40 yards. The eight-penalty differential tied Miami’s biggest of the season; it had 13 penalties compared with five by Florida State when those teams played in Tallahassee last month.
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