First Star: Starlin Castro (.171 WPA)
Second Star: Geovany Soto (.119 WPA)
Third Star: Carlos Silva (.110 WPA)
So we’ve now seen that the kid can play. Now can we leave him alone and let him develop? I’m not calling for him to be sent back down for further seasoning, but rather calling for the fans of this team to now let the kid play. It’s OK when he strikes out in a key situation. It’s OK when he makes an error. Let him make the mistakes that young ballplayers make and simply have time to develop, albeit on the big stage. We’ve seen prospects come up for this team to huge expectations only to see them torn down by the fans simply because they didn’t produce right away. Choi, Patterson, and even Soto (I’m guilty on this one) are all names we’ve jumped on after a slumping lack of production. Don’t forget the countless free agents we’ve trashed and run out of town. It’s time to be a little more forgiving and supportive of these guys when they struggle. It’s not about coddling them, but it’s not about running them out of town either. Starlin Castro has the chance to be a superstar in this league. Let’s not kill that before it even has a chance.
As far as the debut is concerned, all I can say is a big fat….WOW. I’ve been trying to get into using twitter more and yesterday I decided to try using TweetDeck. I had a column running that was just for the #Cubs tag and it was lighting up all night with Castro love. If you had no idea, you’d think that something had just happened to ole’ Fidel. His first at bat came in a fairly key time in the game, with Soriano and Soto both reaching base. I thought to myself “just don’t embarrass yourself here. Make contact, put the ball in play and maybe get a ground out that scores Soriano from third.” Instead, moments after Len mentioned that he wasn’t sure if Castro could hit a breaking ball, Castro takes a ball opposite field to right for a 362 ft home run to give the Cubs a 3-0 lead. All he could and all I could do was smile. I couldn’t stop smiling for at least 5 minutes. Those are the things you love to see and I saw it.
The second at bat featured another RBI situation with the bases loaded. While he didn’t go yard he did the next best thing in producing what I believe to be one of the most exciting plays in all of baseball, the triple, to score three more. At that point on twitter everyone, me included, started talking about the cycle and if anyone had ever done it in their Major League debut. I never saw an answer on that, but my guess is it hasn’t happened. No matter because it didn’t happen for Castro either. The rest of the night would be rather uneventful for the kid, but the impact has been made. It’s funny how quickly a move like this can brighten an entire team’s outlook, including the fans, toward the season. Suddenly the Cubs are players again. Suddenly the Aramis Ramirez and Derrek Lee are producing with lots of times on base for both. Suddenly the bullpen looks stable (that doesn’t include you John Grabow, put your hand down). For a moment last night, all was right in world of Cubdom.
We now return to reality.
