"Why do they [write] for their money? Why do they [work] for short pay? They ain't getting nowhere and they're losing their share. They must have gone crazy back there." — Michael Burton (paraphrased)
By MONTE DUTTON (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. The United States Open is being played in Moore County, N.C., which is a golf principality. Just to the south is Richmond County, which is a onetime NASCAR duchy. Every time I wrote about a race at Rockingham, I stayed at the Holiday Inn in Southern Pines, …
Continue reading Furmanology: The need for speed(ing tickets)
By MONTE DUTTON Paladin Stadium (Furman photo) Click here. I watched the ceremonies from Normandy on Thursday morning, and it made me wish America could come together like that on anything now. Culture shock hurts. Growing up, World War II veterans were prevalent. Teachers showed us mementoes in class. People told stories. The most mild-mannered …
By MONTE DUTTON Mike Bothwell, triumphant (Elena Davidson photo) Click here. I see lots of celebrations. The baseball ones, I think, are the best and most dangerous, albeit no precincts report these days at Furman. Basketball players are prone to exult in somewhat smaller groups. A single pair of eyes cannot capture the scene fully. …
By MONTE DUTTON Shortstop Brody Fahr (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. Presbyterian College is headed to High Point seeking another one. The top-seeded Blue Hose open the Big South Conference Baseball Championship on Thursday at 1 p.m. against fourth-seeded Charleston Southern (21-30). The tournament is being conducted at Truist Point in High Point, N.C., home …
Continue reading County Signs: Blue Hose go title-hunting in High Point
By MONTE DUTTON PJay Smith (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. I never saw Stephen Croone play in person, but I was a big fan. While Croone was playing for the Paladins, I was, unbeknownst to me, winding down my NASCAR writing career. I had a false sense of security. Other than the occasional blog, I …
Continue reading Furmanology: Adjusting to the speed of light
By MONTE DUTTON Evidence suggests the rain-shortened game was justified. (Furman photo) Click here. All is tangible, and all is not. Time, for instance. Precise. Measurable. Inviolable. Examined another way, it is not. For me, time crawls every morning, and then it gets faster and faster until late at night, when it runs out of …
Continue reading Furmanology: But first, a bit of aged philosophy …
By MONTE DUTTON (File photo) Click here. I went through college in a period of little unrest. I read about the 1960s and watched it all on TV as a boy, but the biggest threat to the Furman campus in the late 1970s and early 1980s was the invasion of Citadel cadets the night before …
Continue reading Furmanology: Just call the latest Paladin Smitty
By MONTE DUTTON J.P. Pegues is moving along. (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. Ain’t gonna be no more Willie Totten to Jerry Rice at Mississippi Valley. Walter Payton blazing a trail at Jackson State? Ken Anderson quarterbacking Augustana? Walt Frazier at Southern Illinois? Centenary’s Robert Parish? Get outta town! Maybe this is how it should …
By MONTE DUTTON (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. The lingo of basketball constantly changes. It’s as if coaches go off to clinics and camps and come back speaking a whole new language. This has been going on for decades. It's almost as fast as technology. Every time a fellow feels like he's caught up, everything …
By MONTE DUTTON (Furman photo) Click here. It’s all busy work, mostly thankless. Thanks to staking out Laurens County as part of my territory, I’m aware of the importance of baseball. It’s big. Clinton won the state title in Class 3A last year. An inexperienced team is getting better by the week and still has …
Continue reading Furmanology: On the bright side, lacrosse wins
Nightrider's Lament 