Jose Bautista

When the player's strike of 1994-95 ended, Major League Baseball began its 120th season of play. In the first 119 years, 50 home runs was a nearly unreachable plateau, reserved for the game's true elite: It had been done only 18 times, by 11 players. Cecil Fielder had last reached the lofty mark, in 1990. Before him, no player had smashed 50 since George Foster in 1977.

If you can understand correlations, you can begin to understand something essential to success in baseball. Why? Because correlations show how one variable affects another variable.

For example, we can see how strikeouts influence runs scored, and we would find that there is no notable correlation (actually true). 

The dictionary describes a correlation as a "mutual relationship." This relationship can prove that two things affect or do not affect each other. 

Jose Bautista, the Blue Jays right fielder, became the 26th player in major league history to hit 50 home runs when he launched a Felix Hernandez pitch into the left field bullpen in the first inning of a 1-0 Toronto win.

It's a special number, no doubt.

For those of you who haven't heard, Jose Bautista blasted his 51st and 52nd home runs today. There have only been 26 players in the history of baseball to ever hit 50 home runs is a single season; it's really a remarkable accomplishment. But for some reason, Jose Bautista hasn't been getting any pub for what he has done this year.

Last night, Jose Bautista became the first player in the Majors to hit 50 home runs this season, and, with only a week remaining in the regular season, he may be the last as well.

Wait...what? Who? Huh?

That would be the standard reaction from most baseball fans, spanning from the casual observer to the most diligent follower.

The first question to consider, of course, is, who in the world is Jose Bautista?

It has been a year of excitement and disappointment for the Toronto Blue Jays.