Don't cross the baseball owners if you like your job as an arbitor. The owners were ticked with Shyam Das after he ruled for Ryan Braun in his steroid suspension appeal and opted to remove him as MLB's arbitrator.
That's not the first time we've had an arb get the left foot of disfellowship-
Many of baseball's grievance arbitrators have had brief tenures, with the list including Lewis Gill (1970-72), Gabriel Alexander (1972-74), Peter Seitz (1974-75), Alexander Porter (1977-79), Raymond Goetz (1979-83), Richard Bloch (1983-85), Thomas Roberts (1985-86), George Nicolau (1986-95), Nicholas Zumas (1995-97) and Eischen (1997-98).
Joseph Sickles heard one case in 1976, and temporary arbitrators were used between Eischen and Das.
Seitz was fired after he ruled against owners in the Andy Messersmith-Dave McNally reserve clause case that led to free agency. Roberts was fired after deciding management colluded against free agents between the 1985 and 1986 seasons.
Note that the players haven't been the ones to ditch the arbitrator. Interestingly, Das is also the NFL's lead arbitrator, who will have his hands full with Bountygate cases.
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