Arthur Soden

Arthur H. Soden (April 23, 1843 – August 15, 1925) was an American executive in Major League Baseball who was the president/owner of the Boston Base Ball Club of the National League and a Civil War veteran.

Soden was born on April 23, 1843 in Framingham, Massachusetts. Soden served as a Hospital Steward with the 22nd Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry during the Civil War. After the war, Soden was an amateur ball player of note. In 1874 he was part of the Boston club during their tour of England. He played center field in a game at the Kennington Oval.

In 1876 Soden bought into the Boston Base Ball Club. He and J .B. Billings later purchased controlling interest in the club and Soden became the team's president in 1877.

Soden is credited with inventing the baseball reserve clause – in 1880, standard player contracts began including a clause stating that the club could reserve the player for the following season; teams could reserve up to 5 players. In 1883, the number was increased to 11, which was a typical roster size in that era, and soon teams were allowed unlimited reserves.

In 1882, Soden served briefly as president of the National League following the death of William Hulbert. When the rival American Association was preparing to expand to 8 teams for the 1883 season, Soden acted to add NL teams in New York City and Philadelphia (both cities had been kicked out of the league by Hulbert after the inaugural 1876 season), replacing the Troy Trojans and Worcester Ruby Legs, the bottom two teams in the league. Although Troy and Worcester objected to their removal, their attendance problems – drawing only 6 and 18 spectators in their final two games against one another – sealed their fate.

...
Wikipedia