Schott misses the game

But since selling her general partnership shares in the Reds, Mrs. Schott hasn't been in the news much. She's still a part-owner of the club, but didn't go to the ballpark often last year.

“They banned Schottzie (her St. Bernard) from 401 (her private box),and they took away my steps (which let her leave via the field because of her bad hip) so it's just a lot harder,” Mrs. Schott says.

“They” are Baseball's powers-that-be, who forced her to sell the club and stripped her of her privileges so she would no longer have icon status at the ballpark.

“I miss baseball,” she says. “I would have never sold the team. In 15 years I gave it my life. If I was a man, I'd still have the team.”

That reference was to the way Baseball has ignored the transgressions of some male owners — including Atlanta Braves owner Ted Turner, who slurred Catholics and Poles — but forced her to sell the club, in part because of her use of racial epithets.

Mrs. Schott says if she were owner now she would have found a way to retire Pete Rose's jersey No. 14 and hang it on the outfield wall, despite Baseball's clear dictate to the Reds not to.

Mr. Rose has been persona non grata in baseball since being placed on its permanently ineligible list in 1989 for his associations with gamblers.

“If anybody deserves (to have his jersey retired and hung on the outfield wall) it's Pete Rose,” Mrs. Schott says. “He belongs in the Hall of Fame, too. I care about the fans, and I know they want that.”

On other topics:

• Mrs. Schott says that if she were running the Reds, she would allow the Findlay Market Parade to take its usual tour of the field on Opening Day despite the new grass field that replaces the artificial turf.

“The Findlay Market Parade is my special thing,” she says. “It has such a great tradition. The Budweiser horses (Clydesdales) are a part of that. I'd have found a way.”

• “And I think it would still be a good idea to take kids out on the field like I used to do before (home games),” she says.

“This is a kids' game. They're the future of it. They had such fun. People still come up to me from 10 years ago — they aren't kids, anymore — and they remind me I hugged them and signed an autograph for them.”

• Her health is “not too good,” she says. “I've been in and out of the hospital. Like always, I'm keeping the doctors and lawyers busy.”

Reds Stories

Lindner keeps Reds on tight budget
Reds' plan: Hang on until 2003
Reds spending limits criticized
The importance of revenue-sharing