How often is hype actually hype?

That’s rhetorical, but the answer is very closely related to never-ever, not in a million years. In fact, urbandictionary.com defines hype as “A fad. A clever marketing strategy which a product is advertized as the thing everyone must have,” and that lends the connotation that the hype is exaggerated or in some sense false.

That was the biggest fear of Atlanta Braves fans going into the 2010 season, which opened on April 5 against the eternally cursed Chicago Cubs at Turner Field.

Those sorry Cubbies. Some funny guy brought an evidently demonic billy goat into the history soaked Wrigley Field, one of baseball’s most prized and most elderly possessions, in 1908 and thus began the curse of the billy goat.

In the 102 years since that dream-squashing and witchcraft-practicing farm animalcame to a game Cubs fans have been through it all, except victory. They have been through that clutz of a fan, Bartman – he interfered with a foul ball, deflecting it from the seemingly world-series bound glove of then left-fielder Moises Alou – and the dangerously entertaining tyrades of current manager “Sweet” Lou Piniella. Who could forget the showcase of homerun power from the cork-bat using, skin-bleaching, English-speaking-except-when-subpoenaed-by-Congress-about-steroids Sammy Sosa?

Well, the Cubbies have finally made it to the proverbial next year and maybe this will be the one to slip free from the life-sucking curse’s perinnial grasp. After all, the Cubs’ ace, Carlos “Big Z” Zambrano was going to be on the bump against the my once-great-but-not-so-much-anymore Atlanta Braves.

Led by the definition of a “baseball man,” manager Bobby Cox and their gritty and sometimes hobbled third-baseman Chipper Jones, the Braves are full of potential.

Potential doesn’t matter though.

The wins and losses do, say, around the end of September. The Braves find themselves in the same National League East division as the Philadephia Phillies. Yeah, those nasty, cheesesteak-eating 2008 World Champions. The same ones that made it back to the World Series in 2009, to lose to the next worse thing to a Philly, a Yankee.

But everything is different now.

The Braves have the most feared prospect in recent baseball history. The Braves’ number one prospect, well who are we joshing, all of baseball’s number one prospect, Jason Heyward, is being compared to Hall of Famers (HOF) Willie Mays and Hank Aaron and future HOF-er Albert “I won’t sign your baseball at spring training in 2007” Pujols.

That’s probably the best list to ever be included in. Picture the debate between whoever decided which presidents to put on Mt. Rushmore.

That’s where the “Jay Hey Kid” is projected to go. He is a 6’6” monster who launches baseballs into orbit but still doesn’t mind letting pitches go by and taking walks.

Before opening day I was skeptical but still excited. I felt like a pitcher with a no-hitter going. I didn’t want anyone to talk about Heyward; if they did, they’d jinx him, and ruin my faith in potential yet again – see Jordan Schafer from 2009.

But as he dug in his cleats for his first-ever Major League Baseball at bat, against the Big Z, I leaned over to my co-worker and said, “Here it goes. The ‘Jay Hey Kidd’ is going to blast off.”

First pitch.

Big Z buzzed Heyward’s tower, backing him off the plate in an obvious “Welcome to the Show” moment.

Second pitch.

Some kind of nasty breaking ball by Zambrano. It started out about belt high, over the outside third of the plate, and as it spun at approximately 90 mph, the ball dove to mid-shin height until it was pulverized by Heyward’s bludgeon.

I jumped out of my chair, screamed like a buffoon and witnessed history. On Heyward’s first ever MLB swing, he went “New Jack City” to right-center field, and as soon as he crossed the plate, Chipper Jones met him with a big-brother hug and those in attendence at Turner Field showcased fan-demonium, calling for a curtain-call by the 20-year-old phenom.

That’s what fanhood is about.

I’ll tip my hat to potential, it’s my new favorite intangible.

Get it. Got it. Good.