Illinois Baseball Report

A streak of fire, a breath of flame Eluding all who reach and clutch; A gray ghost thrown into the game That rival hands may never touch; A rubber bounding, blasting soul Whose destination is the goal — Red Grange of Illinois! Grantland Rice Permit me to go a little off topic today.  On this [...]

Filed under: Feature on November 21st, 2009 | Leave a Comment! »

All these times I’ve crossed the cemetery on Florida Avenue on my way to Illinois Field to watch the Illini play, I never realized I was passing by the gravestone of a former major leaguer.  I learn from Kyle of the Chillini blog: Big Jeff (Pfeffer) was born and raised in Champaign and attended the [...]

Filed under: Feature on November 3rd, 2009 | Leave a Comment! »

A little non-baseball yet Illini-related material stuff in honor of tomorrow’s football game versus Illinois State.  For me, I can tell that it’s fall by the sound of a marching band.  You see, I have the privilege of hearing (and sometimes watching) the University of Illinois Marching Band practice right outside the building where I [...]

Filed under: Feature on September 11th, 2009 | Leave a Comment! »

For my money, Brian DeCaussin knows more about Big Ten baseball than any of us “regular guys” and more importantly, doesn’t back down speaking out about some of the issues facing the game. DeCaussin runs Big Ten Hardball, the “go-to” website for anyone who is interested in Big Ten baseball.  BTH acts as sort of [...]

Filed under: Feature on May 13th, 2009 | 1 Comment »

I remember two years ago I was talking to a father of one of the players at the 2007 Big Ten Tournament.  He shared with me that he wouldn’t be surprised if then freshman Brandon Wikoff would set the hits record for Illinois provided he played all four years.   Fast forward two years to [...]

Filed under: Feature on April 27th, 2009 | Leave a Comment! »

Last year at about this time, I corresponded with an Michigan State baseball fan named Tom Tompkins.  He was nice enough to write a bit about the 2008 Illinois-MSU series that was happening in East Lansing. Well, the 2009 MSU-Illinois series is almost upon us and Tom dropped me an email.  He tells me that [...]

Filed under: Feature on March 24th, 2009 | Leave a Comment! »

Yes, we have some photos of last weekend’s series! Morgan Gilman attended the Illinois series against LSU in Baton Rouge at the new Alex Box Stadium last weekend and snapped some photos while she was there. Many thanks to Morgan for passing these photos on to me! Here’s a good shot of the interior of [...]

Filed under: Feature on March 11th, 2009 | Leave a Comment! »

Joel Gillespie of the local online magazine, Smile Politely sat down with me Saturday and interviewed me for what can be best described as a "get-to-know-your-local-blogger" profile.  The end product, Zealous about Illini baseball turned out really well in my opinion. It also seems that he follows the Illinois baseball team.  It won’t be long [...]

Filed under: Feature on March 3rd, 2009 | 2 Comments »

Illinois freshman catcher Adam Davis was featured in an Inside Illinois article by Melissa Mitchell on University of Illinois athletes gaining "increased agility, dexterity through (a) dance class".  Apparently, it’s a popular move by all the sports coaches at Illinois.  The class they took was Dance 100 taught by Kate Kuper. Davis seemed to take [...]

Filed under: Feature on January 17th, 2009 | Leave a Comment! »