CHICAGO — Starlin Castro was fed up as the 2013 season came to a close, and not just because of another last-place finish for the Chicago Cubs, their fourth in a row. No longer was he a beacon of a brighter future. After making the National League All-Star team the previous two seasons — all by the time he had turned 23 — Castro was lost, his head swimming with other people’s ideas about the type of player he should be.

He had listened to Manager Dale Sveum and the concepts passed down from the front office: the tweaks to his swing and the pleas for him to be a more patient hitter, not to treat walks as if they were ketchup on a hot dog. All it had led to was the worst season of his career.

“After that, I just say, ‘No,’” Castro said. “I’m going to be who I am.”

It has almost always been more challenging for others to make peace with who Castro is than it has been for him. To embrace him is to be seduced by his gifts: the hands that are as quick as a lizard’s tongue; the strong arm; and the capacity to be unbowed, often wearing a smile or chomping on gum, in a big moment. But it is also to accept the baggage: the undisciplined swing, the struggles with routine plays and the mind that occasionally takes up residence in the clouds.

Those inseparable companions, the charm and the disappointment, made him a fitting latter-day Mr. Cub, a totem for another generation of lovable losers.