In his first "big-name" hire, Lou Piniella has decided to hire Frank Sinatra as the Cubs' new bullpen coach...
What's that, you say? Not "Sinatra", but "Sinatro"?
Oh. As Emily Litella might have said years ago on Saturday Night Live, "NEVER MIND!"
Good thing, too. Frank Sinatra died eight years ago.
Frivolity aside, Piniella has hired Matt Sinatro as the Cubs' bullpen coach. This is an old-buddy hire; Sinatro was Piniella's bullpen coach in Seattle and Tampa Bay; he's been a scout and a coach since his retirement as a backup catcher for three teams in 1992.
I don't know that much about Juan Lopez, the bullpen coach under Dusty Baker, but at least Sinatro was a catcher as a player, and has more than a decade's worth of experience in this position. The Cubs will also replace Benny Cadahia, the former bullpen catcher, and that's a good thing -- I don't think I have ever seen a worse bullpen catcher. At least three or four times every day pitchers would warm up in the LF bullpen at Wrigley Field, I'd see baseballs get by Cadahia.
This hire leaves two open coaching positions: 1B coach, and hitting coach