Bautista is home run boss - this year

Jose Bautista hits his 50th home run, putting him nine up on Albert Pujols for the MLB lead. He probably doesn't need to slug another homer in 2010 to win the race by a fairly wide margin.

Fantasy Impact: Career year or breakout season? That's what fantasy owners of Bautista must be wondering now with just over a week to go. Now with 34 more homers than in any of his previous four full-time MLB seasons, Bautista doesn't have much of a track record to expect future presence in the ranks of baseball's top power hitters. He does, however, have a decent-enough base of work to believe this isn't entirely a fluke. Brady Anderson was a guy who hit 50 homers in 1996 but failed to top 20 homers but two other times in a 15-season MLB career. That's not to suggest that Bautista is Anderson, but Bautista's previous four seasons comprised of a slash line of .242/.334/.412, suggesting he's going to come back to earth quite a bit in 2011. Let's argue against an epiphany for this journeyman ballplayer who is already with his fifth organization at the age of 29. He's a good sell-high candidate in the offseason, and maybe before the preseason, as a lesser spring followed by a little bad press will sabotage value on a return.