Jenrry Mejia just made the worst kind of baseball history

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On Friday afternoon, Jenrry Mejia made baseball history. Normally, if you’re making baseball history during the month of February, either you waited a very long time to sign an extremely lucrative contract or it’s some extremely bad form of history. Unfortunately for Mejia, it’s the bad type of history as he ended up failing another test for performance-enhancing drugs. That was his third failed test, and it ended up being the one that earned him a lifetime ban from Major League Baseball.

It’s a staggering fall from grace for Mejia, who not too long ago was considered to be a bright prospect for the New York Mets. After recovering from Tommy John surgery, Mejia made it back and seemed to be on his way to locking down the job of closer for the Mets back in 2014. That was before he kicked off the 2015 season with an 80-game suspension, then earned himself a 162-game suspension a few months later with a second failed test. Now, here we are: February 2016, and Jenrry Mejia has joined Pete Rose as one of only two living players who are actively banned from baseball.

Now, there is a possibility that Mejia could be reinstated and make a return. However, if you take a look at what it takes for reinstatement in this situation, you could probably make a safe bet on never seeing Mejia in the majors again. You won’t be seeing him playing in Japan, Mexico or South Korea, either. The irony here is that Mejia is actually still eligible to play in the winter leagues in his home country of the Dominican Republic. However, it’s evident that his time as a big league pitcher is over, and it’s truly shameful that this is the circumstance under which it had to happen.