Hall of Famer Molitor offers hitting tips at LLWS

Baseball Hall of Famer Paul Molitor idolized Pete Rose while growing up in Minnesota, though he sides with Major League Baseball when it comes to the career hits leader's chances of joining him in Cooperstown.

Rose was banned for life in 1989 for betting on baseball games. The former Cincinnati Reds manager and player has petitioned MLB, but commissioner Bud Selig has given no indication he's leaning toward reinstating Rose, who amassed a record 4,256 hits

"It's a very controversial topic and will be. I agree with the commissioner and only because, my way of looking at it, the one rule that Major League Baseball reads to ever player every year in clubhouses across America is that if you gamble on baseball, it will be a lifetime ban from the game," Molitor said Thursday a news conference before throwing out the ceremonial first pitch at the Little league World Series.

"So if they decide to let Pete in because he's the all-time hit leader, then every time (players) heard that rule, it would have no meaning," added Molitor in responding to a question about whether Rose belonged in the Hall of Fame. "Other people have done a lot of things that you can argue are possibly worse, but they weren't things that they had previously known if they did there would be a lifetime ban on baseball."


Molitor was pretty good at the plate himself, with 3,319 hits and a .306 average over a 21-year career that ended in 1998. But it was his pitching prowess that first got Molitor noticed on the baseball diamond while growing up.

A native of St. Paul, Minn., Molitor said parents of players on his youth teams asked coaches to move him up to the a higher division because the right-hander threw too hard.

"I don't think they had radar guns back then," said Molitor, who turns 55 on Aug. 22, "but for a long time my dreams of being a major league player were about being a pitcher."

Molitor was impressed with South Williamsport in his first visit to the World Series. His ceremonial first pitch was a strike down the middle of the plate.

"The key with hitting, even at a young age, is the ability to be patient in the batter's box," said Molitor, who met with Little Leaguers on Wednesday. "Hitting even at a young level, is about being able to see it before you decide what you're going to do with it."

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Green, who was born on Sept. 11, 2001, played Little League ball in Tucson. Her parents and brother will be joined by the brother of New York firefighter Michael Cammarata, who was last seen entering the World Trade Center following the attacks that same day.

Ten years earlier, Cammarata wore No. 11 while playing right field at the Little League World Series for a team from Staten Island, N.Y. The number is retired from use in the World Series in his honor.

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