List of people banned from Major League Baseball

In 1920, team owners established the Office of the Commissioner of Baseball, ostensibly to keep the players in line and out of corruption's way.

He demanded nearly unlimited power over every person in organized baseball down to the batboys, including the authority to ban people from the game.

While Rose eventually admitted to betting on his team (which under the rules then and now in force are grounds for permanent ineligibility), his supporters argue that a lifetime ban is unjust due to a lack of conclusive evidence that his gambling directly affected the outcome of any games, and also due to modern society's more relaxed attitude towards gambling.

By the 21st century, the use of performance enhancing drugs had replaced the possible influence of gambling as the greatest perceived threat to the integrity of the game.

As a condition of accepting the Commissioner's post, Landis demanded and got nearly unlimited power to sanction every person employed in the major leagues, from owners to batboys.

In practice, Landis only meted out punishment for serious off-field transgressions he believed were a threat to the image and/or integrity of the game.

Disciplinary action for the on-field behavior of players, coaches and managers remained the responsibility of the respective league presidents, as it had been prior to the creation of the Commissioner's office.

Among other things the Agreement provided, for the first time, an independent process through which active players could appeal disciplinary decisions (up to and including lifetime bans) by League presidents or the Commissioner.

A. Bartlett Giamatti served only five months as Commissioner of Baseball before he died of a heart attack on September 1, 1989.