After former MLB commissioner Fay Vincent and investigator John Dowd had their say on Pete Rose's possible reinstatement, current commissioner Bud Selig apparently has his own views.

According to a report in Friday's New York Daily News, sources close to Selig refuted a report that claimed Dowd had uncovered evidence Rose bet against the Reds.

"Do you think for a minute Bud would be considering this reinstatement of Rose if there were an iota of proof that (Rose) bet against the Reds?" one source familiar with Selig's deliberations with Bob DuPuy, MLB's chief operating officer and Selig's chief legal adviser, told the newspaper.

"This is McCarthyism at its worst."

The source also told the Daily News that MLB's brass "bristled" after Vincent said Thursday that Selig would ultimately make the biggest mistake of his tenure as commissioner if he reinstated Rose, and basically sent a message of "mind your own business."

Dowd, meanwhile, backtracked from a previous report in the New York Post. The newspaper reported Thursday that Dowd thought it was "probably right" that Rose not only bet on Reds games but that he bet against the Reds during the mid-to-late-1980s when Rose managed Cincinnati.

"I was never able to tie it down," Dowd told the Daily News. "It was unreliable, and that's why I didn't include it in the report. I probably shouldn't have said it. I was not trying to start something here. ... I had an inkling that Rose bet against the Reds but I never pursued it and I never put it in my report.

"I had a piece of information that I was never able to finish ... We didn't use it; we didn't put it in our report."

But Dowd and Vincent were in agreement on one thing -- it didn't matter whether or not Rose bet against the Reds. According to MLB's rules, if a player or manager bet for or against his own team, that player or manager faces a permanent ban.

News broke this week that Rose and Selig met secretly in Milwaukee on Nov. 25 and have been exchanging draft proposals that could end his banishment from baseball. ESPN learned Thursday that a group of Baseball Hall-of-Famers was invited to New York on Dec. 18 to discuss Rose's possible reinstatement with DuPuy, and possibly with Selig.

During both Dowd's investigation into whether he bet on baseball as manager of the Reds from 1984-89 and in the aftermath of Aug. 23, 1989 when he signed an agreement for a lifetime ban, Rose has steadfastly denied betting on baseball.

Nothing has been agreed to at this point -- including whether or not Rose will be reinstated or regain eligibility for Hall of Fame induction -- and while any potential agreement could still fall apart, it's conceivable a deal could be reached by sometime next month, sources have told ESPN.com's Jayson Stark.

Negotiations are still ongoing on the terms of exactly what Rose will be asked by Selig to admit to before he is reinstated. In order to satisfy constituents who are opposed to Rose's reinstatement, Selig is said to be firm in his conviction that Rose has to admit, in some form, that he bet on baseball.

Neither Roger Greene, Rose's agent, nor Roger Makley, his attorney, returned the Post's phone calls Wednesday.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.