Great Scott! A Cubs phenom who won't be a bust!

On "Law and Order" new Cubs shortstop Starlin Castro would be guilty by association and on "This Week in Baseball" he would be a victim of the Cubs' curse.

Take your pick, young man, and understand that many of us have bought into the hype regardless.

Like, I'm ignoring that Castro until further notice has to be clumped into a sentence with Gary Scott and Kevin Orie.

And that he has to be positioned in the team photo somewhere between Corey Patterson and Felix Pie.

And that for older Cubs fans he has to awaken the echoes of can't-miss misses like Bob Speake and Danny Murphy.

How could anybody as astute as I am potentially be fooled one more time by another Bobby Hill, by the latest Hee Seop Choi, by the next Mark Prior for heaven's sake?

Easily, that's how. It's spring. Flowers and phenoms alike are expected to surpass expectations.

So forgive me, or commit me, but I can't resist a Cubs rookie called Star for short, as in shortstop, who Friday night drove in more runs than any player ever did in a major-league debut.

Chicago currently is barren baseball turf, which makes Castro the most interesting man in the land. If old enough he surely would drink Dos Equis when thirsty for beer.

Castro is barely 20, an age when most of us were trying to remember that the shorter fork is for salad and the longer fork isn't for soup.

No Cubs player that young can be that good, yet something compels me to believe that by July veterans will be carrying this kid's bags.

Listen, I'm not going crazy here. Going crazy would be to suggest that Castro will lead the Cubs into their first World Series since 1945 and to their first world championship since 1908.

Castro isn't doomed to become Prior and Pie, but if he makes the Hall of Fame he is doomed to be Ernie Banks and Ryne Sandberg. You know, never win a World Series in Cubbie blue.

Greg Maddux had to go to Atlanta to win his. Bruce Sutter had to go to St. Louis to win his. So many other Cubs had to go to so many other outposts to win theirs.

So one possibility is that Castro eventually leaves as a free agent to win a World Series with, say, the Pirates or Royals while the Cubs keep trying to merely play in one.

Another possibility is that the Ricketts family pays Castro whatever it takes to keep him here and become the best player never to win anything significant.

The final possibility is that Castro becomes the next great Cubs prospect whose career fizzles altogether under the burden of hexes and jinxes.

Anyway, it's difficult to envision this as just another phenom's phenomenal flop when it's a 20-year-old Cub named Star arriving with a booming bat amid blooming flowers.

A good guess is that Castro will become Superstarlin before he's done but the Cubs still won't win a World Series in my lifetime.

Not any more than they won one with Kevin Orie.

So instead of being greedy, Cubs fans, for now be prepared to settle for a player who succeeds and a team that doesn't.

mimrem@dailyherald.com