Perhaps it's the culture of baseball these days in the (hopefully) post-steroid era. Toronto's Jose Bautista just happens to be the latest target because he hit his 39th and 40th home runs last night to pad his major league lead. (Check out this animated .gif of No. 40 he hit after being knocked down earlier in the game.)  No American League hitter has reached the 40-homer mark since 2007, but what gives writers and bloggers a bad name is when they throw out random speculation that Player X might be using steroids with no rationale behind it other than an increase in power numbers from one season to the next.  Deadspin sums up the latest back-and-forth involving Bautista, who took the high road last night in a story by the Toronto Globe and Mail:  "I haven't heard it once," Bautista responded evenly when asked for his reaction to the unfounded allegations. "Nobody's said anything to me, and I don't see why they should."  It appears a Toronto Star reporter first raised the issue on his personal blog over the weekend. We'll see if it creates a firestorm similar to last season when another blogger (not affiliated with a newspaper) asked some of the same questions about the Phillies' Raul Ibanez.  Bautista's story is fairly well known by now. He started working on a new approach at the plate last September and it resulted in him hitting 10 homers over the final month. That power surge has carried over into this season, writes Dave Cameron of FanGraphs -- with the results showing up in an increased fly-ball rate.  2008 – 38.8%2009 – 42.1%2010 – 53.6%  For fantasy owners, Bautista has clearly been one of the best values of the year. From everything I've seen, his power is legit and he should be an elite source of home runs next season. Some people will continue to be skeptical, but they'll be the ones missing out on all those dingers.  To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor  . For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to  . Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to
First to 40 HRs, Bautista must deal with steroid speculation - Fantasy Windup: A community for fantasy baseball news and strategy - USATODAY.com