One person won’t be sticking around to help Jerry Yang and Yahoo deal with Carl Icahn’s proxy fight to dump Yahoo’s board in favor of a more Microsoft-friendly group. Kozel ended his nearly eight year stay on the board with his resignation yesterday.

PaidContent said Kozel stated a desire to spend more time with family as a reason for exiting. Microsoft’s takeover efforts and the subsequent bid by Icahn for control of Yahoo delayed what would have been an earlier departure for him.

The pertinent 8-K filing about the change said Kozel had planned to leave the board back in February. He intends to relocate his family to Europe.

Yahoo also moved to reduce its 10-person board of directors down to 9 with Kozel’s exit. Icahn will have to remove someone from his nominated slate of directors to match Yahoo’s update.

The entire Yahoo kerfuffle still includes negotiations between the company and Microsoft, but not for a wholesale takeover of Yahoo at this point. Instead, Microsoft would like to pick up Yahoo’s search and contextual ad businesses.

All Things D said the discussions with Microsoft should have an element of “adult supervision” going forward. Displeased, substantial institutional investors wanted a deal with Microsoft and were not happy with a hefty premium for Yahoo evaporating before their eyes.