Bleed Cubbie Blue, a Chicago Cubs community

Former Chicago Cubs manager Lou Piniella will be a special contributor to the Yankees Entertainment & Sports (YES) Network for the 2012 season. I know I'll be using my MLB At Bat app to tune in to a few Yankees games to check out Sweet Lou's broadcast stylings. I didn't pay too much attention to him during his brief stint with Fox (?) before managing the Cubs. Oh, and remember, every time he says "Look...," you have to drink.

Larry Stone's usually on target, but here he just has a "hunch". Not this time, Larry -- after Lou's tearful final press conference when he said he was taking the uniform off for the last time, I believe Lou. He's retired for good.

OK, so this is my own piece -- I wanted to write a longer form piece for SB Nation Chicago about this topic. So have at it. My basic point is that if it's not Girardi (and I doubt he's available), it should be Ryne Sandberg. Time to bring this job back into the Cubs family. Hope you will take the time to read the whole piece.

From George Castle at the Times of NW Indiana.

FWIW: I have no idea if Greg Couch @ FANpeeps is a good or a poor source of information, so you may want to take this with a grain of salt.

The photo is worth seeing.

Quote from Lou (complete with obligatory "Look"): "Look, he's hit a lot of home runs. Put it this way: If the steroids (controversy) were not an issue, he would definitely be a first-round selection to the Hall of Fame. How the writers treat it ... I think my opinion means very little. "Is he a Hall of Famer? I would probably think that down the road he will be a Hall of Famer. Maybe not in the first few ballots, but people tend to forget, and rightfully so."

ESPN piece about whether the Cubs made a mistake not signing Joe Girardi. In my opinion, we might not have made the playoffs in 2007 and 2008 with him at the helm instead of Piniella, but we would be in a better place this season and beyond. Given that we didn't have any success in the playoffs, I'd probably prefer that alternate universe to our own.

I hope you all still can appreciate the humor from The Onion, after a tough day.