Well, I think it's safe to say we can wipe out ONE single-season home run record...

Too bad, for a lot of us, that record does not belong to Barry/Barroids Bonds or Mark McGwire/McLiar.

And it's a shame that it probably happened to this man, because, chances are, it might well not have had anything to do with him, in the final analysis.

Wladimir Balentien is an MLB journeyman who went to Japan to make his name in the Nippon Baseball League after a couple of unremarkable years in the United States.

Has he ever!!

Earlier this week, he hit his 56th and 57th home runs of the Japanese season.

In a league that has seen the likes of the world-record home-run hitter Sadaharu Oh (who held the record previously, at 55), Wladimir Balentien has broken the single-season Japanese home run record.

It's too bad that, given what came out today, he won't be able to keep it.

According to Yahoo! Sports, as a result of the all-too-probable reason Balentien broke the record, the Commissioner of the Nippon Baseball League has been forced to resign.

Friday, Japan time, Ryozo Kato, the three-term Commissioner of the Nippon Baseball League announced his resignation, due to the fact that he has been forced to admit that a Japanese power explosion is due to the Nippon Baseball League juicing the balls to make them easier to hit further and harder, effective the end of the year.

And am I too much a cynic now?  When I first heard of Balentien's chase while I was in Vegas, the first thing I thought was "What's he on?  What's going on??"

We now have our answer.