High-priced Cubs manager quick to criticize players

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The mix of "Sweet" Lou Piniella and the Lovable Loser Cubs already has been as combustible as feared, maybe even more so. Piniella threw tirades in back-to-back games last week, only to have a potentially lengthy streak of tirades snapped when the commissioner's office handed down what it originally called an "indefinite" suspension after it said Piniella made contact with an umpire in anger.

Though not announced, the suspension was initially set for five games. However, Piniella got the ban reduced to four after meeting with MLB executive vice president for administration John McHale. Presumably, Piniella had the sense to maintain his cool in that meeting.

Piniella shouldn't complain. MLB probably may have saved his health -- at least for the four games.

And for now, if he is having more tirades, at least they're not on TV. We've seen all this before from Piniella, though maybe not with this much frequency and air time. Cincinnati, Seattle and Tampa Bay -- his prior three stops -- don't get close to the coverage of the big-market, famous-for-losing Cubs, who have a pretty good shot at making it 99 straight seasons without a World Series championship this year.

Piniella has been a great manager in his career, and there's no doubt he is very entertaining. Yet at some point his continuing public complaints about his players' misdeeds will stop resonating.

His bosses spent more than $300 million to improve their fortunes last winter, presumably with Piniella's personal guidance and heavy input, and even if they won't say anything publicly, Piniella is wrong to complain aloud, as he did after Friday's embarrassing defeat (that's the one in which Carlos Zambrano kicked the tar -- and almost the teeth -- out of his catcher Michael Barrett, who went to the hospital to have his lip sewed back together). Afterward, Piniella seemed even more upset about the team's play, saying, "It's about time some of them start playing like major leaguers. Or get someone else in here who can catch the damn ball and run the bases properly."

Piniella has a long history of complaining about his players or complaining to his bosses that he needs better players. He once did this in Seattle after winning 116 games.

The Cubs have a lot of good players. The problem is, they're playing like garbage. Alfonso Soriano, Derrek Lee and Aramis Ramirez form as talented a middle of the order as anybody's, and both big free-agent pitchers, Ted Lilly and Jason Marquis, have more than lived up to their new contracts.

If this keeps up, Piniella may want to consider the possibility it isn't all on the players. Ten million of those free-agent dollars were spent on him, and as one AL scout put it, "Most people think he did a terrible job in Tampa." Sure, Tampa is an impossible job -- even more impossible than the Cubs -- but his performance and effort there might explain why they paid him $2 million just to leave. Piniella was probably lucky that either 1) no one else was paying attention, or 2) it was excused as Devil Rays-related. (Remember, George Steinbrenner had half a mind to hire Piniella last October.)

In any case, Piniella's Cubs will be something to watch. Sort of like a car crash.