Catching Up: The Official History of the Eastern Illinois Baseball League

Fred Kroner's latest book chronicles the rich history of the Eastern Illinois Baseball League as it celebrates its 75th anniversary in 2010. The list of E.I. Baseball alumni who went on to bigger and better things includes a former big league manager, an umpire, and nearly a dozen major league ball players. There are stories about Dizzy Dean, Satchel Paige, and many others, plus complete standings from every year of the league's existence. Kroner, an award-winning sports reporter for The News-Gazette in Champaign-Urbana, began covering E.I. Baseball in 1975. This is his third book. His first was Citzen Pain, about NBA player Brian Cardinal, who grew up in nearby Tolono, Ill. His second book was Are You Ready, which profiled the career of Jim Sheppard, who was the public address announcer for the University of Illinois football and men's basketball teams for 22 years.