NEW YORK -- Thirteen years after he was banned from baseball and five years after his application for reinstatement was ignored, Pete Rose believes the game he once dominated has turned its back on him permanently.

"In the world of baseball, I'm dead unless they need me,'' he said Thursday after spending an hour signing autographs in a midtown sporting goods store. "In 1999, when I made the All-Century team, they needed me.''

Rose was welcomed to participate in ceremonies on the field during the World Series that year. Since then, nothing.

"They won't call on me until they need me,'' he said. "They're hypocrites.''

Rose was cordial with fans, posing for pictures, kibitzing with kids, schmoozing with adults, signing posters printed by Pony Sporting Goods that asked why he is not in the Hall of Fame.

Then somebody mentioned former commissioner Fay Vincent's book to be published in October and the all-time hit king's mood changed.

In the book, Vincent talks about Rose's transgressions, rumors of transporting cocaine among them. "Finally,'' the former commissioner writes, "there are baseball betting slips with Rose's handwriting and fingerprints on them.''

Rose bristled at that.

"This is what I would say to Fay Vincent,'' he said. "Show me the slips. Show me the phone records. Show me the fingerprints. That's Fay Vincent. He wants to live in the past.''

Cocaine was the drug of concern when Rose was playing. Now the talk is about steroids, especially after recent disclosures by Ken Caminiti and Jose Canseco.

"Steroids, that's why I hit so many home runs,'' said Rose, who finished with 160 among his record 4,256 hits.

"Caminiti and Canseco took steroids. I know that because they said so. As far as I know, that's the only two taking.''

The two also said use was widespread around the majors, Caminiti estimating 50 percent of the players were using and Canseco saying it was more like 85 percent.

"It's not fair,'' Rose said. "Guys go to the gym four times a week and as soon as they get hurt, it's steroids. I never saw a guy take them. I'm not saying they do or don't. But 40 percent of players are pitchers. It doesn't make sense for them to take them and get muscle bound.''

Rose remains bitter at Vincent and attorney John Dowd, who conducted the investigation that led to his banishment from baseball.

"Vincent and Dowd,'' he said. "They're the guys who got fired from baseball. Why did they get fired? What's the answer?''

Rose said he supported commissioner Bud Selig's decision to end the All-Star Game as a 7-7 tie after 11 innings when both teams ran out of players.

"The question you have to ask is do they want a competitive game or an exhibition,'' he said. "I want to win. If you're trying to win, you can't run out of players.

"Nobody wants to get hurt but Sammy Sosa went first to third with a headfirst slide and that kid (Torii Hunter) went to the fence for that catch. You've got to play hard. That's why they're there. They're All-Stars.''

Rose put his stamp on the All-Star Game in 1970 when he bowled over catcher Ray Fosse to score the winning run for the National League in the bottom of the 12th inning.

"I believe if I'm playing in a game and there are 50,000 people who pay to see it, my obligation is to win the game,'' Rose said.