Scarborough has a solid collection of scumbags, ne’re-do-wells, reprobates, criminals-with-a-sugar-coating, Facebook frauds, lying/cheating/stealing guys in three-piece suits, door to door tradesmen/scam artists, and Real Housewives of 04074 who would “cut off your head, put it in a blender, and serve it to you as a tasty snack,” (as they say at the Maine State Prison) if you got in the way of their kid and some longed-for path to success the mommy had Chloe or Biff on.

I know because I have dealt with many of them the past 20 years.

This is not fascinating. Dirtbags roam the earth. News flash.

What is fascinating is that the “pigs and piglets,” as a Little League buddy calls, are well tolerated.

Huh?

Let me explain.

Many people live in Scarborough only because they found a house here they wanted to buy. No past ties. Not much lasting future interest.

They look at their neighbors and fellow parents like people in New York look at those riding on the subway with them each morning. To be co-existed with.

Tell them the guy at the kindergarten soccer game is a triple axe murderer? “Oh, I don’t know him.” Or the lady at the PTA meeting recently went into a McDonald’s and mowed down school children with an AK-47? “I really don’t have enough information on it.” (What additional information, exactly, would you need?!).

Pete Rose should take note.

Scarborough used to have a hotel on the ocean called The Atlantic House. It was run for years by a businessman, philanthropist, and community leader, Dino Giamatti. He sold it in the early l980s. He did OK, and has gone on to lead an adventurous life that many of us yearn for. His brother used to be the Major League Baseball Commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti.

Bart was the person who banned Pete Rose for life from baseball. Rose was a chronic gambler. The evidence from a Giamatti investigation showed that.

In addition to being banned from the game for life, and not being able to coach anymore or be a team executive, etc., Rose also is not eligible for the Baseball Hall of Fame. If you are on the black list, you cannot be on the ballot. That is the rule.

I overheard Dino talking with someone about this. Rose is the all-time hits leader in MLB. Many want him in Cooperstown. A new commissioner soon replaces Bud Selig.

Dino’s thought? He was asked, if your brother were sill alive, would he continue to allow Pete to be outside looking in, banned from the game, not in Cooperstown?

Or would he go to Pete confidentially, play Dutch Uncle, and say, Pete it’s time; prepare a petition for reinstatement. Say you are sorry. Come clean. Apologize. The game will allow you back in. Then you can get voted into the HOF on the first ballot.

I saw Dino smile. I swore I heard him say, “Yup.” American loves a Second Act.

And Scarborough loves one too.

How fitting that the plan for Pete Rose’s re-introduction to the game might have been hatched here in the land of 04074.

Dan Warren is a lawyer in Scarborough. He can be reached through private Facebook message at the Jones & Warren Attorneys at Law page.