Major League Baseball career hits leader Pete Rose, who was banned from the game and barred from the Hall of Fame for gambling on his sport, has died. He was 83 years old.

A spokesperson from Clark County, Nevada, confirmed Rose’s death on Monday. A cause of death has yet to be determined.

Starring for his home-town Cincinnati Reds in the 1960s and ‘70s, Rose was the heart and soul of the “Big Red Machine” and helped them win two World Series titles and four National League pennants.

A 17-time All-Star, “Charlie Hustle” was an unquestioned fan favourite on the field, known for his relentless play and passionate demeanour. Playing in 24 major league seasons, Rose accumulated 4,256 career hits, long considered one of baseball’s most unbreakable records.

Rose broke the previous hits record in 1985, surpassing Ty Cobb’s mark of 4,191 hits to nationwide adulation, and he even received a call from President Ronald Reagan.

Rose’s sterling legacy, however, was tarnished just four years later by one of the most infamous scandals in sports history.

On March 20, 1989, Major League Baseball opened an enquiry into gambling allegations against Rose, who had taken over as the Reds’ manager. The Commissioner’s Office found that Rose placed bets through bookies and friends on baseball games, including ones involving his own team.

MLB’s enquiry found that “accumulated testimony of witnesses, together with the documentary evidence and telephone records, reveal extensive betting activity by Pete Rose in connection with professional baseball and, in particular, Cincinnati Reds games, during the 1985, 1986, and 1987 baseball seasons.”

In August 1989, Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti announced Rose’s lifetime ban from baseball. “One of the game’s greatest players has engaged in a variety of acts which have stained the game, and he must now live with the consequences of those acts,” Giamatti said.

In 1991, the Hall of Fame ruled that Rose’s transgressions made him ineligible for induction.

Rose initially maintained his innocence and downplayed the ban, believing that he would one day be reinstated.

As time passed, however, he changed his tune. In a memoir released three months after his ban, Rose admitted to gambling on baseball, but legally.

In “Play Hungry,” a memoir published in 2019, he seemed to admit to all the allegations.

“I don’t think betting is morally wrong. I don’t even think betting on baseball if morally wrong,” Rose wrote. “There are legal ways, and there are illegal ways, and betting on baseball the way I did was against the rules of baseball.”

Rose’s banishment would go on to serve as a precedent, with certain voters refusing to vote for some players who played in the “steroid era” of the 1990s and 2000s.

As Rose aged, his disgrace gradually faded from public consciousness, and there were some who lobbied for the ban to be lifted, believing that four decades of ostracisation was punishment enough.

While Rose never got to see his bust in Cooperstown, he is represented by several pieces of memorabilia in the Hall of Fame, including the cleats he wore when he became baseball’s hits king.

Rose was voted the 1973 NL MVP, and a helmet from that season also resides in Cooperstown, a reluctant nod to one of baseball's iconic players.

While Rose played stints with the Philadelphia Phillies and Montreal Expos, he played more than 18 seasons with the Reds, sharing the field with Hall of Famers like Johnny Bench, Joe Morgan and Tony Perez.

The switch-hitting Rose was the lead-off hitter and tone-setter for the Reds’ feared Great Eight lineup, and Cincinnati inducted him into the team’s Hall of Fame in 2016. A year later, the club retired his No. 14 and unveiled a bronze statue outside of Great American Ballpark.

His fans will remember Rose for his enthusiasm and competitiveness as much as for his measurable achievements.

Rose was known for giving full effort to the game he loved, and he earned his “Charlie Hustle” moniker for running to first base even after walks.

In so many ways, Rose embodied everything baseball fans have loved about the game for over a century, but that legacy will forever be coupled with his wrongdoings and public fall from grace.  

Rose was a career .303 hitter who retired with more walks than strikeouts. He holds MLB records for games played (3,562) and plate appearances (15,890), and his 44-game hitting streak in 1978 is the longest in National League history.