At least six times during last night’s wildly entertaining Greg Maddux press conference (which, Karry Ling covered live for us during the Illini-Badger GameCast last night) somebody asked Dusty, or Jim Hendry or Greggie if this was the best pitching staff in the league.

I hate to rain on the parade of fat, uppity sportswriters, but does it matter?

Sure, it’s fun to compare this staff to the ’96 Braves or the late ’70s Orioles or whoever, but we know that they are good. Isn’t that enough?

Can’t we just worry about winning five more games in the playoffs than we did last year?

There were a few priceless moments from the press conference:

– Hendry looking like he carpooled to work with Gary Busey and Nick Nolte. Jim, it’s called a comb. Tape one to your cell phone, maybe it will accidentally get run through your hair once and a while.

– Over on the always overwrought Cubstalk.com message board, Cubs Fan Steve wondered how many of us would cry while watching the press conference. This isn’t like the press conference in 1981 with the released Iranian hostages, it’s a baseball player! It’s cool that Greggie’s back in the fold, and I did have a goosebump moment when he held up the Cubs home jersey with the #31 on it. But then, I got much the same feeling a few years back when Bobby Ayala did that. OK, not really.

– Bruce Levine is just creepy, isn’t he? He stood off to the side, leaning on the wall next to the only exit and asked questions that took about 75 seconds each to rattle off. At times Maddux looked over his shoulder at him and gave him the “stay away from my kids, creepy!” look.

– George Ofman asked Maddux if he was going to coach the other guys on the staff. Maddux tried to remind George he’s being paid to pitch, not coach. Remember this folks, an old guy on your team who can’t play is a coach. (See: Mark Grace, Arizona 2003). Greg’s not there yet. He’s still got a few bullets left to fire.

– A reporter asked Dusty if this is the best rotation he’s ever had. Dusty tried to ammend it to include the bullpen, too. But basically said his 1993 pitching staff with the Giants was the best he’s had. That team only won 103 games. Of course, it didn’t make the playoffs because the Braves added some chump that offseason named Greg Maddux and won 104. There was no wild card yet.

– Cubs evil PR director Sharon Panozzo (trust me) has dyed her hair blonde. It really softens her up, now she’s more friendly looking, sort of like the difference between the electric chair and the lethal injection table.

– Greggie said he doesn’t think much about getting his 300th win because, “I should be able to win 11 games in three years.” That’s what Danny Jackson said, too.

– Sammy Sosa called Greggie after the press conference. Karry Ling was able to eavesdrop on the conversation for us.
Sammy!: Hey buddy! Good to have you on the team, buddy!
Greggie!: Hi, Sammy, how’s it going?
Sammy!: Great, buddy! I’ll be there next week, buddy! Do you like Whitney Houston albums, buddy? I’ve got a couple of new ones, buddy!
Greggie!: Uh, sure.
Sammy!: OK, buddy! Keep the media warm for me, buddy! I’ll be sure to hug you next week right in front of the cameras! OK, buddy!
Greggie!: Sure.

What would be funnier would be if we find out later that Sammy thinks the word buddy is English for c@#$%^&*=+. Kind of changes the whole conversation, doesn’t it, buddy?

– Fat Jay said in his column that Mark Prior was “cool” to the idea of having Greggie on board. What part of, “I think it’s great” is cool? Besides, when you read gobblerneck’s take on the press conference today, check out how he tries to make it seem like he was actually at it. Hey Jay, give Karry a call, he’ll fill you in.

– Karry reported that after the press conference he saw Juan Cruz spilling marbles on the floor in front of Greggie’s new locker.

– I’ve got to tell you, the all-time best reason for this signing is that we get three years worth of use out of this picture.

– By far, the most astonishing part of the press conference was when Jim Hendry said that all of the money the Cubs are getting from the rooftop settlements (legal settlements, not homesteads…) and the new seating behind home plate, and from any other future seating expansions, will go right back into the payroll. For a moment my lower jaw went numb and nearly landed in my lap. I hope somebody was rolling tape when he said that.

– How typical of the Tribune is it that they have a guy named Crane Kenney? Why don’t these people just name themselves Filthy McRichie and get it over with?

– The part where Maddux thanked Barry Rozner for “buying all of the BS that Scott Boras told him.”

Today, Greggie gets to work with the rest of the pitchers. We’ll get lots of the obligatory shots of him standing by Prior and Wood and the Cubs will put their “new” promo together of Wood, Prior, Clement, Zambrano and Greggie that says FIVE ACES on it. And, because we’re unapologetic Cubs Dopes, we’ll eat it all up.

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As “seen” here on Desipio last night, the Fighting Bruce Webers vaulted themselves back into the thick of the Big Ten race with a home win over Wisconsin. Last week in a win over Michigan State, Illinois had a Paint the Hall Orange night and all of the fans wore orange and so did the team. They won, in impressive fashion and the players convinced Weber to let them wear the orange again. The orange didn’t contrast quite as well against the UW red as it had against the MSU green, on TV at least. My dog used to eat food that had pieces in it that were red, orange and brown and when he would eat too fast he’d throw it up, and it looked a lot like what was on my TV screen last night.

However, the Illini continued to play the kind of defense that wins conference titles. They took soon-to-be Big Ten MVP Devin Harris out of the game early and Deron Williams (the guy who I think is the best player in the Big Ten) lit up Wisconsin to the tune of 31 points.

I said it in the GameCast and I’ll say it again here, it looks like everybody needs to get off Weber’s back. Sure he’s awkward with the media and fans, and he dresses like he lives across the street from a Wal-Mart, but ever since their implosion in January up in Madison, the Illini have been the best team in the league. They play a much more wide open offense than Bill Self would let them and they haven’t slacked off the defense. He doesn’t say “awesome” and “guh-reat” as often as Bill did, but it’s pretty obvious he’s a good coach. So lay off his ability. We can just mock his appearance.

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The Desipio Baseball Preview that I promised you would come yesterday has been delayed a day by technical difficulties. You don’t want to know the gorey details, but basically, the American League East part of it is done, but the comments portion at the bottom (which, is very likely the best part of this site) isn’t working properly, so I may post it without the comments sometime today–if I can’t fix it before hand–and then add the comment form to it when it’s finally working.

The preview will be rolled out in chunks throughout Spring Training, and it has all of your favorite stuff, and some new things, too.

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Seabiscuit’s Jockey says Greg Maddux is happy to be back.

Fred Mitchell was around at the beginning and he never saw it coming.

Ed Sherman got a hold of Tim McCarver in Cabo San Lucas. Apparently McCarver was down there “bone fishing” with Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte.

Larry Himes is still a red-assed moran.

Mike Downey says Chicago’s big on comebacks. Yeah, well the Jordan one worked out pretty good for us. The rest? Not so much.

Phil Rogers is still a hack.

Juan Pablo Cruz is back looking for work. It’s a “jobless” recovery, buddy.

Andre Dawson and Greggie left the Cubs on my 20th birthday. Yesterday was a better day.

Old coot Bob Vandenberg remembers when the ’84 White Sox added Tom Seaver and still sucked. Big whup. Go have some more pudding.

Mariotti puts down the doughnut to throw in his two cents, which is worth about half a cent, really.

Carol Slezak on why Maddux left in the first place. This column is ponderous, and I could not finish it because I became hellaciously bored. You’ve been warned.

Mike Kiley on the suddenly free spending Cubs.

The Cardinals have locked Albert Pujols up until his AARP retirement age! Good for him.

The Fighting Webers are looking good.

Greg Couch is not a big Gary Barnett fan.

The Wizard of Roz put in a cell phone call to Greggie yesterday.

Bruce Miles on the return of Greggie.

Marc Stein says that if the Pistons can dump Chucky Atkins on some dumb chumps, they can deal for Rasheed Wallace.

A good look at the scout who found Maddux when he was a punk kid in Vegas.

The Boss isn’t real sympathetic to the Red Sox.

Stewey on the demise of Gary Barnett.

Some French dumbass ate coins until they killed him.

A hemorrhoid cream company wants to use “Ring of Fire” in it’s ads. Yikes. Wouldn’t something from Kings of Pain be more appropriate?

Stuttering John is going to replace Edd Hall on The Tonight Show. Edd is leaving to “concentrate on movies.” Well sure, with Jim Varney dead, there’s a niche to be filled.

America’s finest news source with the tale of John Kerry’s whistle-stop yacht tour. It’s inspiring.