By Larry Fine NEW YORK - Optimism among baseball's longshots abounds at the start of the new season, spread by last year's rousing run by the small market Kansas City Royals, and the long-suffering Chicago Cubs have caught the spring fever. The Cubbies, who have gone 107 years without a World Series title, head a list of Cinderellas hungering for a taste of postseason success and open the season on Sunday against the visiting St. Louis Cardinals. The Royals ended a 29-year playoff drought with an inspiring battle all the way to a thrilling Game Seven of the World Series before falling to the San Francisco Giants. Their level of past frustration pales in comparison to the Cubs, who last appeared in the Fall Classic in 1945 and lost six other times in the Series since their last MLB title in 1908.