Yet Another Mota Article

David Lennon at On The Mets Beat writes about Guillermo Mota and what is different from last year compared to this year:

I wonder what could be wrong with Guillermo Mota? What is different about Mota this year than last season? If only there were one thing we could put our finger on ... Hmmm. How did Mota go from being a dominant reliever over the final two months of last season to ordinary -- and even bad -- this year.

Let's take a look at the numbers. Mota had a 6.21 ERA in 34 appearances for Cleveland before the Indians traded him to the Mets on Aug. 20. Practically overnight, Mota pitched to a 1.00 ERA in 18 games for the Mets with 19 strikeouts in 18 innings to finish the season.

Fast forward to the present day, and Mota is looking a lot like that lousy Indians reliever -- 6.38 ERA in 36 games for the Mets. In his last five outings, Mota has allowed 10 earned runs in 5 1/3 innings for a 16.88 ERA during that span.Last night's seventh-inning implosion cost the Mets a chance to rally back against the Padres in a 7-5 loss.

So what could be wrong with Mota? There was that little matter of testing positive for steroids, which was revealed in early November of last year and cost Mota a suspension of 50 games at the start of this season. Hmmm. I wonder ...