Rose Blooms in Winter, Even If It’s Only on Film

CINCINNATI —  With snow falling and ice on the ground, baseball was being played here this week--on film that is.

Pete Rose’s head-first slides of last August boomed to life again on a cold January night as the Cincinnati Reds premiered their 1984 highlights film, “The Hustle’s Back.”

The man who managed the Reds most of last season--Vern Rapp--is never mentioned or seen. The film makers made him disappear as easily as Cincinnati management did last August when Rapp was sacrificed for the return of Rose.

Although Rose was with the Reds only for the final six weeks of the season, the film concentrates on his efforts to make a wilted team blossom again.

The movie begins with cold, stark frames of Riverfront Stadium and a solemn narrator moaning, “For more than five years, the hustle of Rose was missing in Cincinnati.”

Then, it’s August and, “The Hustle is back,” an announcer screams as Rose dives head first into third base after his first at-bat as a reborn Red.

The 26-minute film does back up for a few minutes to cover the first four months of the season. Dave Parker’s muscles ripple and Mario Soto’s fastballs are tamed in slow-motion as the Reds play decent baseball the first two months.

“But the high hopes were lost,” the narrator glumly acknowledges detailing the Reds’ mid-season collapse.