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Cincinnati Reds icon Pete Rose died early last week. According to the coroner in Las Vegas, MLB's all-time hit leader passed away as the result of cardiovascular disease.
Despite Rose's polarizing reputation, the MLB commmunity mourned the passing of one the greatest players to ever don a uniform.
Rose, along with several other MLB legends, had attended a fan event in Nashville before returning to his home in Las Vegas. According to Rose's longtime friend and teammate Tony Perez, who was also at the event, the man they called "Charlie Hustle" seemed a bit off.
"He was in a wheelchair, he wasn't feeling that well, and he didn't look too good. We could tell that he was pale... we wasn't him at at all. He wasn't the guy I had seen last time," Perez told TMZ Sports about Rose's condition during the fan event.
Prior to his passing, Pete Rose was taking photos and signing memorabilia at the Music City Autograph Show in Nashville, Tennessee. Rose was there along with several of his former Reds teammates, including Tony Perez, Ken Griffey Sr., Dave Concepcion, and George Foster.
"I know he had trouble with his health and he had problems with his heart but he was never going to the doctor and he was never taking any medicine, he didn't want to do it. I guess he was thinking that he was playing a ball game and he could keep going and going but it wasn't that way," Perez continued on Rose.
From 1964 to 1976, Rose and Perez starred alongside one another with the Cincinnati Reds. The pair, along with their other star teammates, won back-to-back World Series titles in 1975 and 1976 as part of the iconic "Big Red Machine."
Pete Rose's legacy remains one of the most polarizing in MLB history
Even after his death, Rose and his legacy remains something that is up for debate. Despite being one of the greatest players to ever star in MLB, Rose found himself banned from baseball after an investigation revealed that he had bet on the sports while he was the Reds' manager.
As a result of the ban, Rose was deemed ineligible for the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
Throughout the years he had attempted to be reinstated by the league but to no avail, meaning that he was never able to see himself reach the Hall of Fame. The debate about whether or not Pete Rose should be inducted continues even after his death.
