(Fletcher Pruitt Jr. photo) (Monte Dutton photo) I’d hate to pick between baseball and football, and basketball is rising with a bullet in this writer’s pop chart. You can dance to basketball. (For those of you too young for Dick Clark’s American Bandstand, it’s an old cliché. The crowds of wholesome youths would rate the …
Tag: football
Devils put spring’s toil on display
(Monte Dutton photos) By MONTE DUTTON The Red Devils have many holes to fill but ample seeds in the planter. Identifying which of those seeds will sprout is the first task of spring practice, which ended with Clinton High’s spring game on Thursday, pushed back by the unprecedented length of the baseball season and to …
Raiders show spring in their steps
(Monte Dutton photo) Ira Bedenbaugh was in midseason form on the public address, but the teams wore practice togs, and it was not unusual for players wearing green jerseys to clobber others wearing the same. The occasion was Laurens District High’s spring scrimmage at K.C. Hanna Stadium. As a rule, offensive players wore white and …
Are the Good Times Really Over for Good?
Clinton, South Carolina, Tuesday, September 1, 2002, 8:36 a.m. Wow. It’s September. When will wonders cease? For the first time in my life, something has happened that is as bad as it could be. I’m grading on a curve. In absolute terms, the novel coronavirus COVID-19 – epidemic regionally, pandemic worldwide – could theoretically dwell …
Forever Lulled
Clinton, South Carolina, Saturday, June 13, 2020, 9:53 a.m. What have I learned from the great vacant year of 2020? I’ve got plenty of time to ponder this absence of normality. It’s only half over as the calendar flies. The pandemic is a house fire that continues to flare up every time it looks like …
Satire at Sunset
Clinton, South Carolina, Saturday, April 18, 2020, 8:37 a.m. Back when I traveled most of the country, writing about race cars that went ’round and ’round and the mostly white men who drove them, my favorite device was not a shock absorber but its literary equivalent, satire. Once -- it was in Dover, Delaware, I …
A Quiet Man of Radio
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, January 30, 2020, 2:06 p.m. Bill Hogan had the same approach to broadcasting that I applied to scoring baseball games. I always tried to play it straight and be fair to both teams, not just the home one. Because I saw that team every night, I figured I would be slightly …
A Hefty Week at Home
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, December 5, 2019, 5:30 p.m. The week has been exhausting. I’ve worked late the last three nights, twice till 1 in the morning. It’s not just the number of tales to tell. Several stories have required that I bear down because they were worth it. A long City Council meeting. The …
What a Way to Go
Clinton, South Carolina, Sunday, December 1, 2019, 10:30 a.m. It was a lone outpost consisting of a pop-up tent, a silver-gray trailer with a big-screen TV, another whose screen wasn’t as big, tables of food, coolers of ice and beverage, and a small group of would-be celebrants. The Furman University campus was mostly vacant in …
A Couple More Days Till the Turkey
Clinton, South Carolina, Thursday, November 28, 2019, 8:11 a.m. My favorite holiday is Thanksgiving. This should come as no surprise. I’m fat, and there’s food. Family. Football. I must be 4-F in the Thanksgiving draft. I’m mostly a happy guy. I love baseball, too. Hot dogs, especially the ones at Whiteford’s Drive-In, the ones with …
Nightrider's Lament 