By MONTE DUTTON
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.
Have you noticed that everyone complains about the price of eggs, but no one has much to say about entertainment? I was curious to see how much higher the tickets were five years after my last attendance and was duly impressed. They are cheap in comparison to the concessions.
I like popcorn at a movie. If I had a lick of sense, I would have stopped by Dollar Tree and smuggled in some trail mix.
I’m a big fan of the cinema. Most of my favorites are at least 50 years old. When I’ve got time, I watch a lot of TCM. One motivating factor was I watched “To Have and Have Not” around noon.
The other motivating factor was an American Legion baseball game in Simpsonville pitting Chapin-Newberry Post 193/24 against Golden Strip 271.
I just slipped out early, stopped for gas on the way, and later discovered it was three cents cheaper after the game.
My truck thought the cineplex was at Costco, so I doubled back up wacky Woodruff Road and went to the one I already knew how to find.
Following the practice of the NASCAR years — typically when I had time to kill before boarding a plane — I went to whatever movie was starting when I got there. I watched Bad Boys: Ride or Die. Basically, it consisted of Will Smith and Martin Lawrence being witty amid a heavy concentration of automatic-weapon fire and explosions, garnished by the extraordinary appetite of a 16-foot albino alligator.
Happens every day. Like payoffs to a porn star.
Early on, there was a wedding without violence. To make up for it, the bride was later kidnapped.
It was entertaining – remember, I once made a living watching fast cars explode – but I don’t expect it to win the Palm D’Or at Cannes.
I picked out my seat on a chart. Seven others also did.
For as long as I can remember, the good guys – even as bad boys – shoot more accurately than bad guys, even though the baddies are invariably highly trained Special Forces or Navy SEALs who went bad.
I enjoy playing “Guess the Traitors.” It didn’t take long to finger the D.A. with political ambitions. I am old enough to have seen Dirty Harry movies.
Fortunately, I have been to Hillcrest High School before.
The first batter in Friday night’s game, Chapin-Newberry’s Jake Peterson, on the game’s fourth pitch, homered. The next two batters walked. Then shortstop Hunter Nabors turned a double play, and the next batter struck out.
Golden Strip (6-3) scored two runs in the bottom half of the first inning, went on to win, 11-7, and never trailed again.
Eleven of the Golden Strippers’ hits – oops, perhaps rephrasing is in order, Warriors – originated in the top four slots in the batting order.
Bennett Edwards, patrolling center field on the side, was 4/4, scoring three runs and driving in one. George Massingill was 4/4 with three runs and two RBI. Alex LaCoste was 2/3 with a double and a homer and four RBI. Coleman Coker was 1/1 with a run, two RBI and three walks.
Before the blazing summer, Nabors, Edwards and Coker, along with Asher Goss, Connor Rice and Joshua Hughes on the mound, were all on the Laurens Class 4A Upstate championship team. Nabors arrived from short to hurl the final two innings and earn a save. One and 2/3 innings of one-hit work earned Rice the win.
Golden Strip scored two runs in the first inning, four in the second, four in the fourth and one in the fifth.
Chapin-Newberry (8-6) pulled within a run in the top of the fourth, but a four-run outburst by the Warriors occurred immediately afterward. Noah Mills went 3/3 with a double, two runs and an RBI. Blake Stribble was 2/2 with a double, a run and two driven in.
Meanwhile, in Easley, Greenwood (5-6) fell, 6-3, to Post 52. A pair of Raiders, Jaedon Goodwin in center field, and Jackson Martin in right and at first base, started, though neither got a hit for the Braves.
Brandon Hershberger and Brayden Shealy each had two hits for Greenwood, which closed in on Easley with single runs in each of the final three innings.
Cody Wilson homered for Easley. He and Daniel Counts laced doubles.
Fort Mill Post 43 visits Chapin-Newberry at Newberry College on Monday night at 7. Legion teams take a break for Independence.
Golden Strip visits Greenwood on Monday, July 8, at 7 p.m. Anderson visits Chapin-Newberry that night.
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