If all of this sounds too astounding to be true, you’re smart. You are not, however, a Cubs fan.

The Cubs’ run into late October in 2003 changed the dynamic in Wrigleyville. Fans are no longer happy to cheer for the lovable losers while downing Old Style in the sun-swept bleachers throughout a long and unsuccessful summer. They want wins. Or at least the illusion that the team is trying to win games, something the Cubs failed to provide in 2006.

The promise of 2003 has long since evaporated. The Sammy Sosa love affair seems like decades ago. Prior and Wood proved to be as reliable as George Bush’s pre-war intelligence. And just a few years after “In Dusty We Trusty” t-shirts were all the rage on the Red Line trains to Waveland Ave., the long road to the bottom of the standings earned Dusty Baker the ire of fans and a pink slip at the end of the ’06 season.

Hendry, on the other hand, has dodged the bullets and kept his job – but it’s a tenuous position at best. And therein lies the heart of the problem.

Hendry knows he needed to make a splash immediately to save his job beyond 2007. Ownership is looking to drive up the value of the franchise as it looks for a potential buyer in the near future. Thus the purse strings were opened.

The future is completely useless to both Hendry and the Tribune Company. Chances are, neither will be around to see Pie and Murton become stars. What matters is now, and the resulting spending to improve the team in the short run was enough to give most executives a coronary.

OK, so it actually DID give Hendry a coronary – but that didn’t stop him from inking players from his hospital bed. And with all the happy-go-lucky public relations spin that resulted from Soriano and Lilly and Marquis coming to town, the bleachers will be filled with drunken, sunburned fans for another summer.

Endless optimism. Eternal hope. Ice-cold Old Style. Some things around Wrigleyville never change.

But if the Cubs’ place in the standings is added to that list, that never-ending patience from the fans on the Northside won’t stick around long – no matter how many brats and beers they’ve had.

The fact is, the days of tolerance for the lovable losers are over.

The Cubs’ cross-town rivals are a year removed from a world championship. That other team that had gone the better part of a century without a title won one three years ago. And Chicago’s biggest nemesis in the National League won the World Series last year.

The Cubs are officially on the clock.

The NL Central is a very winnable division. St. Louis took the crown last year with just 83 wins. But that was still 17 more than Chicago had, and even $317 million can’t guarantee another 17 victories.

Can Soriano’s bat add more wins than his glove takes away? Will Lee stay in the lineup long enough to mash the Cubs to late-inning rallies the way he did in 2005? Can Chicago expect anything from Prior or Wood? Are Lilly and Marquis as overpriced as they appear? Can Floyd and Jones find the fountain of youth for one more season? Will Ryan Dempster protect more leads than he blows? Will Zambrano be around to see the season end?

That’s an awful lot of questions for a team that just spent a record amount of cash in one offseason.

Yes, the Cubs will be better. But sometimes, better isn’t enough.

And something tells me that for $317 million, Cubs fans are expecting a little more than better. They want a winner.

2006: 66-96 (6th in NL Central)