Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. likened his job to that of a baseball umpire during his 2005 confirmation hearing, but his stock holdings apparently will keep him from calling balls and strikes—or reversible errors—in cases concerning the Atlanta Braves.

On Monday Roberts recused in the Supreme Court’s denial of certiorari in Wyckoff v. Commissioner of Baseball—one of a number of perennial efforts to challenge the questionable exemption of Major League Baseball from federal antitrust scrutiny that has been on the books since 1922.