A rose by any other name.

Memo to the Disney Studios: If you are thinking about a remake of Pinocchio, consider casting Pete Rose in the title role. And for the long wooden nose, how about his own Mizuno Pete Rose special?

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That Pete Rose was a great baseball player is beyond question. A man of modest physical tools, he parlayed equal parts of talent, hard work, and the hustle that earned him his nickname into what should have been a Hall of Fame career. For sheer determination and unrelenting effort, there were few like him. Pete Rose would be precisely the guy you'd want in the foxhole with you during crunch time. That's if he didn't have a bet on the war.

In his new best-seller, Pete Rose: My Prison Without Bars, the all-time hits leader admits that when he retired as an active player, he should have read up on how other great athletes handled their post-playing days. But, he admits, "I didn't read much." Chances are Rose doesn't dabble much in non-fiction, despite his book's place atop the nonfiction list in the newspaper rankings.

Significantly--or maybe just coincidentally, the author Rose supplanted atop the New York Times' best-seller list was Al Franken, whose Lies--And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them, only includes political prevaricators. Maybe Pete will get his own chapter in the paperback version.

Oh, Pete has his moments of contrition. But they're quickly replaced by the usual litany of lies. For a guy who remembers the details of spreads not covered 30 years ago, he has no recollection of when he first bet on baseball. He continues to deny all sorts of evidence compiled in the famous Dowd Report which prompted Commissioner Bart Giammati to suspend Rose in the first place.

Pete's tell-all confession simply fails every test of credulity. (It doesn't help that he chose to bare his soul in a book destined to earn him a six-figure fee.) Charley Hustle apparently believed that his boring tome would answer every question about his past and his immediate reinstatement to baseball's good graces would earn him instant Hall of Fame election. That's one reason why publisher Rodale Press released the book during the same week that the 2004 Hall election results were announced. Fugeddaboutit!

We'd be shocked if Commissioner Bud Selig lifts his lifetime ban. If he does, Pete won't pass muster in the next Baseball Writers Association of America balloting. A survey of BBWA electors revealed no more than 50% support, with 75% required for election. Failing that, a reinstated Rose would then come before baseball's Veterans' Committee. Several members have already announced their intention to boycott the Hall forever if Rose was elected. It just isn't going to happen.

If you believe that election to the Hall of Fame should be based solely on a player's on-field performance, it would be difficult to keep Pete out. And there are a bunch of scoundrels already ensconced in Cooperstown. But Rose violated baseball's most publicized rule, one that's posted prominently in every clubhouse. For another 14 years, he has resolutely refused to admit his transgressions.

Maybe Jack Nicholson was talking about Pete in the movie, A Few Good Men, when he bellowed, "You can't handle the truth!" For that, and no other reason, Pete Rose must continue to buy a ticket when he wants to visit Cooperstown.