By MONTE DUTTON (Caleb Gilbert photo) Click here. This is no new refrain from me. The problem with college athletics’ relentless consolidation is that it doesn’t leave enough glory to go around. Most fans believe their favorite school is inherently superior. It has intangible qualities that separate it from everything else. I am at least …
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County Signs: Head in the clouds
By MONTE DUTTON (Monte Dutton photos) Click here. Either I’m harkening back to the carefree days of youth, or, as Jonathan Winters used to say, I’m starting the final glide path. Do you remember lying on your back in the yard – back in pre-fire-ants times – and staring at the clouds? When the power …
County Signs: Wilder Stadium adds video scoreboard
By MONTE DUTTON (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. Clinton High School continues to upgrade its historic football stadium, the most apparent improvement being a combination score- and video board to replace the old one behind Wilder Stadium’s south end zone. New stands and a restroom building are being constructed on the visitors side. Until 1960, …
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Baseball, hot rods, humble pie and Chevrolet
By MONTE DUTTON No telling what's out there. (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. Sunday was an excellent day for automobile racing. Lewis Hamilton, who, astonishingly, is about to turn 40, won the British Grand Prix for the ninth time. He’s at the age where it reminds me of what NASCAR’s Mark Martin used to say. …
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Furmanology: Hits and misses at Fourth funnies
By MONTE DUTTON (Pixabay photo) Click here. I’m no expert at Fourth of July celebrations. I’ve been to a few ballgames. For many years, I wrote about a stock-car race thereabouts. Mainly I just hear the bombs bursting in air. I miss the rocket’s red glare. Small towns have more sense. One of my familiar …
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County Signs: Football begins to beckon
By MONTE DUTTON Laurens head coach Greg Porter (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. In terms of organized sports, most fields are fallow as we await the opening salvos of Independence 2024. Me? I could use the time. Before long, the hills will be alive with the sound of pads popping. On the county scene, the …
Furmanology: A week to relax and regroup
By MONTE DUTTON (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. In the summertime, when the weather is hot, on the week of the Fourth, local sports subside. And so forth. The kids take a week to watch fireworks displays. They frolic about at beaches and lakefronts. In many cases, so do the grown-ups. As was regularly said …
County Signs: It’s all in the movies
By MONTE DUTTON Out at the plate (Monte Dutton photos) Click here. I did something I haven’t done since COVID. (Knock on wood.) I went to a movie. I munched popcorn in a cool arena with an enormous screen and thunderous sound. My previous movie, in the late fall of 2019, was Ford v. Ferrari. …
County Signs: To everything, there is a season
By MONTE DUTTON (Monte Dutton photos) Click here. American Legion baseball is a slight step back. It doesn’t have the tension of high-school ball in the spring. It’s the summer. It’s supposed to be fun. It is. I’ve made quite the transition. For years, when I was away watching fast cars, I occasionally proclaimed that …
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County Signs: Devil Junior Legion beats heat
By MONTE DUTTON Owen Glenn singles to left (Monte Dutton photos) Click here. It was hot. Before the Clinton Post 56 Junior American Legion baseball game on Wednesday – I was standing next to the table at the gate, watching Sean McCarthy take admission – it was possible, if I stood completely still, not to …
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Nightrider's Lament 