This is not going to be another year of being a Cubs fan on the brink of heartbreak. Yes, my heart has been aching for years, but this is going to be the year that Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo and the Chicago Cubs are going all the way. The team at Wrigley has been assembling this team for years, patiently pulling through seasons that are under thirty wins, and stands that are half-filled.

Through all the turmoil and close calls, I am still proud to call myself a Chicago Cubs fan through and through. I suppose growing up in Memphis helped a little bit. I never had a Major League team to cheer for. Both the Atlanta Braves and the St. Louis Cardinals are too far away to truly call yourself a fan. While Chicago is farthest distance of the three, I have still found a connection with the Cubs. It is the foliage adorning the outfield wall, or maybe it is simply the dedication of the fans themselves. No one is more passionate, or more involved than a Cubs fan. We have been through the tortures of the damned, starting each season thinking: “Hey! This could be the year. This is going to be the season that we push through. The year where we go out on top.”

Don’t believe me? That’s fine, but before you write off this season as another “What could’ve been” for the Cubs, hear what I have to say. These are the seven reasons that the Chicago Cubs are destined for greatness this season

1.While the team is youthful, the Cubs have a surprising amount of World Series experience in their dugout.

Jon Lester, John Lackey, and David Ross won the World Series with the Boston Red Sox; Lester won it with them twice. Ben Zobrist won the World Series last season with the Kansas City Royals. Maddon took the 2008 Tampa Bay Rays to the World Series, and Jason Hammel played a role on that team as well. Experience is another notch in the Cubs’ belt concerning a potential World Series win this year

2. The Cubs have great, deep starting pitching.

Jake Arrieta struggled a bit recently, but he still has a 2.25 ERA in 513 innings since the start of the 2014 season. Lester has been fantastic in a Cubs uniform as well, with a 3.24 ERA in 327 1/3 innings since last season. Kyle Hendricks is the unsung hero of the pitching staff, with a 2.39 ERA. That’s a tough top-three for a playoff series, and don’t forget John Lackey and all of his playoff experience, too.

3. The Chicago Cubs had some struggles in middle relief earlier this year, but they’ve seemingly fixed that with a flurry of moves.

They’ve added left-handers Mike Montgomery and Aroldis Chapman, as well as 41-year-old Joe Nathan. They’re 56–1 when leading after eight innings and 54–1 when leading after seven, which means teams will pretty much have to get at their starting pitchers in the playoffs or risk having the game end early..

4. Outside of the normal names you recall with the Cubs, they have several additional young players who show abilities to play well at the major league level.

Willson Contreras, a catcher who has also played in the outfield a bit, has a .852 OPS and five home runs in 33 games played since coming up with the Cubs in June. Javier Baez, who is playing all over the field in a super-utility role, has 2.2 WAR in 84 games, as well as 11 home runs and two game-winning homers, and he’s only 23 years old. Before it’s all said and done, the Chicago Cubs’ kids will play a big role

5. Few teams can match the greatness that the Chicago Cubs have at the top of their lineup this season.

With Dexter Fowler, Kris Bryant, Anthony Rizzo, and Zobrist, the Cubs have four of the top 40 hitters in baseball, according to WAR. They’ve also combined for 71 home runs in just 100 games this year, which is excellent. Bryant and Rizzo, among others, will battle for the National League MVP at the end of the season

6. The Cubs were long known as an extremely regressive organization with rumors once circulating that their scouts had no access to data and did not know how to use Microsoft Excel or an email account.

Those stories are as recent as five years ago, but now the Cubs are a leader in their industry concerning data, technology, and finding market inefficiencies. Manager Joe Maddon and team president Theo Epstein are well-respected, intelligent experts, and they’ll team up to bring the Cubs to the promised-land.

7. The biggest reason to believe that the Cubs are going to win the World Series this season? The odds say they have the best chance.

According to Fangraphs, the Chicago Cubs have an 16.4% chance of winning the World Series in 2016 — better than all other teams in Major League Baseball. The odds don’t always tell you what’s going to happen, and a one-in-five shot certainly isn’t a sure thing, but with the next closest team coming in at just 12.8%, it’s hard to bet against the Cubs