While the Jose Bautista has been a great story for the past year and a half, the Toronto Blue Jays have been unable to make as much noise as the Red Sox or Yankees in the challenging AL East.

Originally drafted by the Pirates back in 2000, Bautista finally made it to the show in 2004. After being tossed around the next several years like an unwanted gift with stints in Pittsburgh, K.C., Baltimore and Tampa Bay, he finally landed in Toronto midway through the 2008 campaign.

Here’s where this story takes a spin.

After hitting just 13 homeruns in his first full season with the Blue Jays in 113 games, Bautista came out of nowhere to

Photo/Keith Allison

lead the majors with 54 dingers in 2010. Leading the league again in 2011, many have questioned how Bautista went from fringe starter to one of the most feared sluggers in MLB.

While Bautista may simply have turned the proverbial corner, it’s also possible he may be the largest beneficiary of the Blue Jays stealing opponents’ signs.

ESPN surfaced a story about a man standing in the outfield signaling with his arms over his head in a variety of stances, looking like he was tipping opponents pitches. Toronto shrugged it off as rumors but opposing players have gone on record stating they spotted the same man signaling whether a fastball or off-speed pitch was coming at multiple games.

Since MLB Commissioner Bud Selig is sitting on his hands through yet another controversial incident, there is no way to force the Jays to admit to cheating but ESPN looked at some statistics and the results are shocking.

While all teams seemingly benefit from some sort of home-field advantage, the Blue Jays had a number of players with home-road splits that would make the pre-humidor Rockies blush.

The Jays enjoy a home-field advantage about seven times more than the average team. Either the best of the players comes out when they’re surrounded by ice hockey and Canadian health care, or the Jays are up to something like…well…like stealing signs.

Bautista is the biggest question mark among the Jays. Transforming from a guy who was bad even by Pirates standards to the star of the American League will turn lots of heads. Now, as more teams are picking up on the Jays sign-stealing (the Yankees and Red Sox have used multiple signs even with the bases empty) Bautista has taken a turn for the worse.

Since the 2011 All-Star game he is hitting just .214 with a pair of homeruns and an OPS over 400 points below his first half number.

As expected, the Jays players aren’t taking kindly to the rumors. Catcher J.P. Arencibia called the media clowns for the reports but normally when stories like this surface, there’s a respectable amount of truth to them.

Even if the issue somehow makes its way in front of Selig, don’t expect him to take action for fear of “ruining the integrity of the game.” Only in Selig’s mind are blatant miscalls by umpires and turning your back on cheating (think the early part of the steroids era) considered acceptable.

Just last year the Phillies bullpen coach was caught with binoculars yet the team was let off without punishment because “stealing signs has been around for 100 years.” While stealing signs doesn’t seem to be as widespread as steroids were in their heyday, it appears baseball may need  another gabber like Jose Canseco to bring the issue to light before it is taken seriously.

Used with permission of the author.

Along with contributing to Sports Climax, Brett Kettyle is the Atlanta Braves Community Leader on Bleacher Report and maintains a Braves column for MTR Media. Follow Brett on Twitter.

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