"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 Big boys. Hard-working boys. Jared Honeycutt (79), Cal Pitts (73), Hunter Lawson (75) (Monte Dutton photos) Click here. It was a perfect day in Orangeburg. Ten years ago, I watched another game there. That one was enjoyable, too.I managed not to make one of those absentminded mistakes that strike me early in …
Continue reading County Signs: Little memories of big things
By MONTE DUTTON (Furman photo) Click here. A nice man working the Columbia College-Presbyterian men’s basketball game – noon on Education Day at Clinton’s Templeton Center on Wednesday – befriended me. We had a chat in the parking lot, where he was guarding the staff lot near the back door.I usually like the men and …
Continue reading Furmanology: Sometimes a fellow can go too far
By MONTE DUTTON Clay Hendrix is riding the comeback trail (Furman photo) Click here. Perhaps there is some consolation in Furman’s 3-8 record in football.The Paladins are hardly alone in upward or downward mobility.Arizona State improved this year from 3-9 to 11-2. Florida State fell from 13-1 to 2-10. The Seminoles are a poster child …
Continue reading Furmanology: Paladins conquer Buccaneers, 58-42
By MONTE DUTTON Click here. It’s been a great football season for Clinton. It was a great one for Laurens Academy, a good one for Presbyterian College and a disaster for Laurens High.At the beginning of the season, I thought the Raiders would have Laurens County’s most improved team. Now I think they will next …
Continue reading County Signs: The game changes as much as the games
By MONTE DUTTON (Monte Dutton photo) Click here. My life is seldom mediocre. One night my old high school wins the Upstate championship game. The next morning my truck won’t start.No obvious reason except the cold. I drove straight home from Clinton High School’s Wilder Stadium on Friday night and worked till 3 a.m. on …
Continue reading Furmanology: Paladins return the Princeton favor
By MONTE DUTTON Click here. Believe it or not, it once snowed several times a winter here. This is one aspect of climate change I do not regret. I’ve grown too old for snow. It’s all I can do to walk across a gravel parking lot in the dark.Careful. Don’t get in a hurry.I watched …
By MONTE DUTTON (Furman photo) Click here. After a rash of brawls marring the great football rivalries of the land, I put some thought into the nature of untoward behavior at gridiron gatherings.First of all, I’m one to write. Among the mistakes of a misspent youth was once touching off a brawl in a high-school …
Continue reading Furmanology: Student-athletes gon’ be student-athletes
By MONTE DUTTON Click here. I can’t move on from football. Football is too great. I love it too much.To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven. – Ecclesiastes 3:1Mortals have made seasons overlap.In Clinton, the stadium is named after the quiet man who lived across the highway. …
By MONTE DUTTON Click here. Do you ever live in commercial world?If I ever go to New York again, I’m not going to the Empire State Building, Yankee Stadium or the Metropolitan Opera. I’m going to find that deck with the Statue of Liberty in the background. That’s where the action is.Several meds cause an …
By MONTE DUTTON Click here. The South Carolina-Clemson meeting of the Laurens County Touchdown Club – it’s held a week early because next Thursday is some holiday or something – was a civil, sportsmanlike affair at The Ridge.No one made reference to Chickens and Kittycats. Mascots didn’t square off and threaten to scuffle. No one …
Continue reading County Signs: Gamecocks, Tigers really love each other
Nightrider's Lament 