From Each According To His $15M Salary, To Each According To ... Good Lord, We Really Are Going To Blow This!

What the f***?

Those three words best describe the collective feeling of Braves fans on the morning of September 28, 2011? The Braves are one loss from completing one of the great collapses in baseball history. After all of their terrible play over the course of the month, they woke up on Saturday morning with a three-game lead and five games to play. Since that time, they have lost four in a row, scoring a whopping four runs in the process. Last night, with the season very much hanging in the balance, Fredi Gonzalez pulled a Bobby Cox in October special, sticking with the underperforming veteran - Derek Lowe - until it was far too late. Yes, the Braves are in a difficult spot because of the injuries to Jair Jurrjens and Tommy Hanson,* but the rookies who have replaced them have been perfectly fine. Of the Braves' five starting pitchers this month, Randall Delgado and Mike Minor have the lowest ERAs of the five.  How much better would Jurrjens and Hanson have done than a 3.11 ERA in 52 innings?  Maybe they would have pitched a smidge deeper into games, but that's it.  Meanwhile, Derek Lowe, a guy who is taking up a smidge over one-sixth of the team's payroll, has an 8.75 ERA and a 1.99 WHIP in five starts.  He has been the losing pitcher in all five.  If by some simple twist of fate the Braves do make the playoffs** and Lowe pitches in any capacity other than long relief, then Frank Wren ought to relieve him of command on the spot.

* - Was anyone else completely non-plussed when Hanson and Jurrjens failed to return from the All-Star Break with their arms intact?  That's how baseball is now.  You have a good young pitcher and you immediately start counting the days until some arm injury that initially sounds innocuous, then the team can't figure out what's wrong, and then he's finally seeing Dr. Andrews.  Baseball manages to combine a turtle's pace with high-impact injuries.  Bravo, Abner Doubleday!

** - I'd put the odds at this stage at around 30%. They should win tonight with a favorable pitching match-up, but their odds in a one-game playoff will not be good.  The playoff would just be insufferable.  The Cardinals will be up 6-2 in the seventh and then Tony LaRussa will prolong our misery with a bevy of "look at me!" switches.  And G-d only knows what happens when he gets into the One-Game Playoff Supplement to his Compendium of Unwritten Baseball Rules.  Fredi could redeem a season's worth of frustration by decking LaRussa in a stupid, futile gesture at the end of a dispiriting collapse.  That would make the whole thing worthwhile.

And then, let's discuss the offense.  It has been a sore spot all year, with just about every offensive regular underperforming his PECOTA (or whatever Baseball Prospectus is calling it these days) projection, but September has been a total freefall.  The top of the order - Michael Bourn and Martin Prado - both have sub-.300 OBPs this month and have walked a grand total of nine times.  Brian McCann is in free-fall, having slugged .313 in September.  The team collectively has a .301 OBP in the month.  By way of comparison, the Giants - a team that is having a historically bad offensive season - have a .303 OBP for the year.  Parrish raus!

The glass half-full thought for a morning that desperately needs it is that I wouldn't trade places with a Cardinals fan for a second.  Yes, the Cards look likely to pull off a remarkable comeback.  All that gets them is a likely defeat at the hands of the Phillies.  Their franchise player is a free agent, which means that they are either going to lose him or they are going to have to sign him to a payroll-crippling contract.*  They don't have a single good, young position player now that their cantankerous manager chased off Colby Rasmus because his stirrups weren't perpendicular to his big toe or whatever else it is that LaRussa views as necessary to baseball success.  They rely on Dave Duncan to stitch together a pitching staff every year.  Their farm system is blah.  In contrast, the Braves have young keepers at first (Freeman), third (Prado), catcher (McCann), and right (Heyward), assuming that Parrish has not done permanent damage to some or all of them.  We finally have a lead-off hitter.  The Braves have five quality young starters and three quality young relievers, assuming that Fredi hasn't destroyed the relievers with overuse this year.  Do you detect a theme here?  The Braves' future is very bright if the on-field coaches don't screw it up.  Maybe the real silver lining here is that a collapse like this requires at least one fall guy in the dugout.

* - If you think that Derek Lowe making $15M next year is bad, think about paying twice that amount for Albert Pujols' age-39 season.

Salt, Meet Wound

Sigan Chupando

There is fun, there is great fun, and then there is watching Portugal get knocked out of the World Cup while Cristiano Ronaldo is punished for years of diving by being deprived of legitimate fouls. Simply glorious.

What was most interesting about this match to me was the fact that Vicente del Bosque decided it by taking off Fernando Torres. Torres had a terrific shot on goal in the first minute, but then produced the sort of rusty performance that has marked his World Cup so far. Del Bosque put Athletic Bilbao’s Fernando Llorente onto the pitch. Within minutes, Llorente had a great chance saved by the keeper, Villa had shot just wide, and then Villa scored a quintessentially Spanish goal after a series of short passes from the tika taka experts: Iniesta and Xavi.

The match was not unlike Spain’s win over Russia at Euro ’08. There, Spain struggled to break down Russia for a half. Villa picked up an injury, which forced Spain to change its shape. The new shape, with Cesc Fabregas in the middle and space for the full backs out wide, was devastating and Spain won 3-0. Yesterday, Spain didn’t change its shape, but bringing on Llorente gave Spain a traditional target man, which presented Portugal with a new threat. Portugal, like Russia, is coached by a tactical expert who most likely set his team up with a very specific plan to handle a Torres-Villa attack. When that attack changed to Villa-Llorente, Portugal was taken out of their plan. Spain are often criticized for having only one way to play, but yesterday’s game showed that La Furia Roja have terrific depth and can bring all manner of options off the bench. Del Bosque has a number of appealing tactical options as games progress; the question is whether he will continue to be willing to make significant changes.

The match yesterday also highlighted a theme from this World Cup: the underperformance of English Premier League stars. Torres is no different than Robin Van Persie, Didier Drogba, and Wayne Rooney, the strikers for the other members of the EPL’s Big Four. All four have been banged up and unproductive at this tournament. In fact, it’s hard to find a contender that is relying on an EPL star. (Argentina with the indestructible Tevez? Holland with Kujt, de Jong, and Heitinga?) I think that there are several factors at work here. First, the EPL is the only major league without a winter break. Second, the EPL has two domestic knock-out competitions instead of one. Third, and I think most importantly, the style of the EPL is fast, physical, and direct, aided by refs who let defenders get stuck in a little much. (Ask any Arsenal fan.) The style that makes the EPL the world’s most popular league takes its toll on its participants. Not only do EPL players end up playing more games, but the games that they play are more taxing. It is said that the passion that English fans have for football creates undue pressure on England’s players. More indirectly, the intense interest for football in England causes its clubs to over-schedule games, which means that the players are knackered by the summer.

What Color are Mike Hampton's Eyes?

I'm going with hazel:

Here I am, once again
I’m torn into pieces, can't deny it, can't pretend
Just thought you were the one
Broken up, deep inside
But you won't get to see the tears I cry
Behind these hazel eyes

I'm sorry, but I couldn't resist.

Five Thoughts on the Falcons

1. The offensive line is putrid and we can't blame that on Bobby Petrino. I was worried about Petrino's offense experiencing the same protection problems that bedeviled Steve Spurrier in the NFL, but the Falcons' inability to protect the passer comes down to the fact that they have a number of injuries on the offensive line and the personnel is struggling mightily to adapt to a new style. Lord, please let the Falcons finish low enough that Jake Long is on the board when we draft.

2. I hope the rest of you noticed Keith Brooking tackling Lewis Sanders on the Saints' winning touchdown yesterday. For those of you who don't know, Sanders is a corner for the Falcons and he had stood Bush up at the one-yard line when Brooking hit Sanders and allowed Bush to fall into the end zone. I kept showing the play on slow-mo to Der Wife, who was cackling away before heading to the computer to figure out if the domain name www.cutkeithbrooking.com is taken.

3. Who had "two quarters and change" in the "how long will it take before Byron Leftwich is injured on account of the Falcons' dreadful line?" pool? Leftwich looked pretty good before he got hurt, although he wasn't exactly going up against the '81 49ers secondary. Joey Harrington also looked OK when he had more than a half-second to throw the ball.

4. Why in G-d's name did the Falcons punt the ball to the Saints with two minutes to go? Did they really think that the defense could get a three-and-out? Fourth and long wasn't a great option, but it was the best of a bad series of options.

5. We're seven games into the season and we're still waiting for Jamaal Anderson's first sack.

Phu Yuck

A couple thoughts on the Braves' current doldrums:

1. With an $85M payroll, the Braves cannot afford to waste money. With that in mind, it's telling to consider that almost half of the team's payroll is rolled up into three players:

Mike Hampton - out for the year.

Chipper Jones - out for the foreseeable future with another injury that will not heal.

Andruw Jones - currently hitting .224 (although he is leading the team in homers, he's drawn a bunch of walks that make his OBP a more respectable .329, and he's shown a bit of a renaissance in the outfield, including last night when he made several excellent plays).

2. I don't entirely agree with Mark Bradley's argument that the Braves' starting pitching is their main problem. For one thing, Bradley underestimates Chuck James (and I would have said that before last night's strong outing). James isn't great, but he seems to be a solid #3 starter. If Lance Cormier's first start last Sunday can be attributed to cobwebs, then he's a perfectly decent fourth starter. All that said, Bradley has a point that the Braves' starting pitching isn't great, but with pitching in such short supply in the majors, I'm not sure what the solution is. Coming back to the $85M payroll, it's a lot easier to find cheap hitting than it is to find cheap pitching. Compounding the problem is the fact that the Braves' system seems to produce a lot more hitters than it does pitchers. In sum, Bradley is right about the Braves' starting pitching, although he overstates the case, and the unfortunate reality is that the team's pitching shortage is going to be a hard problem to solve.

Conversely, the Braves' hitting has been suspect over the past several weeks, as the team is not hitting many home runs. Brian McCann has lost his power, possibly as the result of a nagging injury. Jeff Francoeur's OPS has dipped down under .800 after a hot start. Chipper is out of the lineup, which means that Pete Orr and Chris Woodward are getting too many at-bats. Scott Thorman is totally in the tank right now, raising the possibility that Jarrod Saltalamacchia is going to be the starting first baseman sooner rather than later.

The denouement of the team's hitting problems were painfully evident last night when they waved at Rich Hill's offerings for eight innings. The sum total of the Braves' 28 at-bats against Hill were an opposite field home run that snuck over the wall, a seeing-eye single, a blooper to right, two sharply hit outs, 11 strikeouts, and a variety of meekly hit outs. It was fun to watch a well-played pitcher's duel that took 135 minutes and got me home at 10:20, but the game confirmed a lot of my fears about the Braves' bats right now.

Friggin' Phillies

The less said about the weekend sweep at the hands of the Phillies, the better. Tim Hudson came back to earth on Friday night, Buddy Carlyle pitched about how you'd expect a 29-year old AAA pitcher to pitch on Saturday, and Kyle Davies reverted to the form that he shows against pretty much every team other than the Mets on Sunday. Fortunately, Chuck James pitched well yesterday in Milwaukee and got both relief help from Rafael Soriano (who has been an absolute steal) and Bob Wickman and an extremely fortunate line drive right at Scott Thorman to eke out a 2-1 win. The win did little to reduce concerns about the team's slumping offense, which has produced 17 runs in the last six games. Over that stretch, the Braves are 2-4 and their two wins have both been 2-1 nailbiters. Chipper Jones's absence is quite noticeable.

And if the news couldn't get any worse, Mike Gonzalez is out for the rest of this season and a good chunk of next year with a torn elbow ligament. This is something I really don't like about baseball: it seems as if any time a pitcher has any sort of malady, the ultimate diagnosis is beyond the worst-case scenario. Lance Cormier experiences a little tightness in his triceps at the end of spring training and hasn't thrown a pitch for the Braves two months into the season. Mike Gonzalez experiences a drop in velocity and after three MRIs, it turns out that he is out for a year (and with Murphy's Law in full effect for pitchers, we can expect him to return some time in the next decade). And we haven't even mentioned my wife's least-favorite Brave Mike Hampton.

And it's not just Braves fans who get to experience this joy. Imagine being a Yankees fan, watching crappy start after crappy start. Your team calls Phillip Hughes up, he flirts with a non-no in his second start...and then promptly hurts himself and is out until G-d knows when because all pitching injuries have epic recovery times. These injuries highlight just how unnatural the act of pitching really is. They also remind us that John Smoltz is truly Der Übermensch, since he didn't miss a start after dislocating a finger on his pitching hand.

While I Was Out

Trying to actually live up to the title of this here blog:

Hawks

Far be it from me to be melodramatic, but last week might have saved the Hawks' season. After a 1-8 start to the second half, the team eked out three wins over Washington, Memphis, and Minnesota to halt their collapse. 35 wins, which was my goal for the season, is still attainable, although it will require an 10-8 finish and this club has shown an ability to tread water, but not much of an ability to get over .500 for an extended stretch. The interesting aspect of the three-game winning streak is that the Hawks accomplished it with Joe Johnson on the sidelines, which clearly indicates that the team had grown stagnant and dependent on its star player. While some have said that the Hawks' winning streak is a bad thing because it damages their lottery position, that claim doesn't really ring true to me because this team has plenty of young talent and it's more important at this stage that they learn how to win and play with one another. Durant or Oden sure wouldn't hurt and the winning streak only marginally decreases the chances of the Hawks landing one of them. The team is four and a half games out of a playoff spot, but they're also six games out of last place in the East. After 64 games, the Hawks are probably where they're going to end up. Whether they play well in the final 18 games will determine the future of Mike Woodson and possibly Billy Knight. OK, that and a law clerk for the Maryland Court of Appeals.

Thrashers

En Fuego! The team is 6-1 since acquiring Zhitnik and Tkachuk and there is a decent case for causation here outside of the usual platitudes of "Waddell showed the team that he cares" (although there might be something to that). Zhitnik has eight assists and is +7 since coming over, while Tkachuk has four goals and is +7. Add in Eric Belanger's 11 points and +1 in his 13 games since joining the team and you have good evidence that Waddell's efforts to improve the team's depth have been successful. Interestingly, the one area in which Tkachuk and Zhitnik were supposed to provide the greatest impact - the power play - has not been affected substantially, as the team is only 6/34 on the power play (17.6%) since the trades. That said, we do have sample size issues here, so insert customary caveats about how we would know more if Zhitnik and Tkachuk had been with the team for 5,000 games.

Braves

Mike Hampton is hurt again and Chipper injured his ankle yesterday, although the latter injury is relatively meaningless. I put almost no stock in spring stats, at least until the end of spring when there is a month's worth of data and the teams are playing a little harder by late March. I just want the team to be healthy when they emerge from the Magic Kingdom and Hampton's injury is problematic. I would be more excited about Mark Redman if Leo Mazzone was still rocking in the dugout, but he's a decent option for the fourth or fifth starter spot, especially since I don't have much faith in Kyle Davies based on what I've seen from him so far. The Braves' rotation doesn't look much better than it did last year, but then again, the Mets' rotation looks worse. Speaking of which, I found this snippet ($) from the Baseball Prospectus to be interesting:

Consider that 2006 Mets starters threw the third-fewest innings in the National League. If you think it’s counter-intuitive for a good team to be among the leaders in relief innings pitched, you’re right. Looking at innings pitched by starters over the past five seasons (2002-2006), the top 10 National League teams in that category averaged a 92-70 record, while the bottom 10 averaged 74-88. (For comparison, the 10 teams clustered around the average of 951 innings were right in between with their average won-loss as well, going 83-79.)

Much as we all fetishize the 1990 Reds and imagine that Gonzalez, Soriano, and Wickman can be our Nasty Boys (just like Texas fans are probably fetishizing Danny and the Miracles right now), good teams tend to have starting pitchers who shoulder most of the pitching load. The Braves' rotation, after Smoltz, is a series of question marks and the margin for error is going to be lower this year because of presumed offensive decreases from the first and second base spots.

Last night as a microcosm of the Braves' season

Three reasons:

1. Andruw Jones was the hero. The fact that he homered on a fastball at shoulder height only adds to the representative quality of the game. Do the D-Backs not have scouts? How do you throw three pitches to Jones in the 9th inning of a tie game and none of them are off-speed?

2. Dan Kolb blew a late lead. He saw three batters and gave up a fly ball to the warning track in center, a walk to punch-and-judy Quinton McCracken, and then a laced double to Tony Clark. Bobby had little patience for Dan's fine work and lifted him for Chris Reitsma, who bailed Danny Boy out of another loss.

3. The Braves' staff didn't do a good job of keeping the opponent off base (15 snakes reached base in nine innings, ten by the free pass variety, and a 3-2 game took over three hours as a result,) but they didn't allow any big hits (only one extra base hit allowed: Clark's double off of Dan Doodie) and therefore, they didn't allow many runs. For the past two years, the strength of the Braves' staff has been not giving up extra base hits. They're 5th in the NL in SLG allowed, but only 9th in OBP allowed; last year, they were 2nd in the NL in SLG allowed and 8th in OBP allowed.

Other thoughts on the game:

1. Jorge Sosa is incredibly consistent. He throws about five innings every start, given up very few runs, strikes out a fair number, and the only bad thing you can say about him is that his control isn't very good and that runs his pitch counts up so he can't last longer into the game. Once he learns to actually pitch, he'll be a real asset.

2. Watching Jeff Francoeur hit, you can't help but notice how the ball jumps off of his bat. The guy has real power. I've been more impressed with him than I was with Andy Marte, which is a bit of a surprise since Marte was thought of as more major league ready prior to the season.

3. Chipper and Hampton's struggles to get healthy illustrate the dangers of committing a lot of money to older players. They've given the Braves almost nothing since May and they suffer regular set-backs in their efforts to get healthy. At this stage, anything we get from either player has to be considered a bonus. I'm just hoping that one of Hampton or Thomson are healthy and effective by September. At this stage, Thomson seems like the more likely bet, but that's probably only because he hasn't tried to come back yet and we haven't been subjected to the "Thomson scratched after injuring shoulder removing carry-on bag from overhead bin" stories.

4. Rafael Furcal was clearly unable to figure out Brad Halsey's move to the plate last night because he was on base twice and never attempted to steal, despite the fact that the patient Kelly Johnson was at the dish. Furcal needed to be running more, given the Braves' struggles against Halsey, especially because Chris Snyder behind the plate has only thrown out 27.5% of the runners attempting to steal against him.

5. My G-d does the Snakes' bullpen suck.

Since when did pitching become more dangerous than U-Boat duty?

(Note for those not historically inclined: U-Boat duty was possibly the most dangerous position in World War II, with the exception of just about every infantry position in the Red Army in 1941.)

What is it with pitchers that they cannot stay healthy and then when they get hurt, it takes them obscene amounts of time to come back? At some stage, the Yankees and Red Sox are going to figure this out and develop eight-man rotations so they can be prepared for the inevitable maladies that strike hurlers. The Braves don't have their revenue, so they are vulnerable to instances like last night when Horacio Ramirez strained his groin scoring from third in the 5th inning. I played in a softball game with a collection of out of shape lawyers last night, there were 21 runs scored, and everyone managed to round third without putting him/herself on the 15-day DL (which is not to say that that's where Horacio is going to end up.) And the sad thing is that Ramirez was pitching very well last night when he got hurt.

At least Horacio's injury appears to be minor. Listen to Mike Hampton discuss his mysterious strained forearm in today's AJC:

"I don’t think it’s anything minor,” said Hampton, who has pitched once in five weeks and not since May 31. “I’m frustrated. I guess I’ll just hang out, do what they tell me to do. They can keep paying me not to play, I guess.”

The left-hander is 4-1 with a 1.83 ERA in nine starts this season. He’s scheduled to begin light throwing today, but didn’t sound confident.

“It ain’t no better,” he said of his forearm, which hasn’t responded to rest and extensive treatments, first prescribed by Braves doctors and reiterated by noted orthopedist James Andrews.

“We won’t know until he throws,” Braves manager Bobby Cox said.

Andrews told him “at least” two more weeks of rest on June 8.

“And if it don’t work, wait another two weeks,” Hampton said. “So that’s where we’re at now.”

That's encouraging. If this was the NBA, I'd automatically be suspicious that this is another gambling ban on the sly, like the one that David Stern purportedly handed down to Michael Jordan after the '93 season. Bud Selig isn't nearly competent enough to pull that off.

We're F***ed

Let's see:

40% of the pitching rotation from the start of the season is on the DL for the foreseeable future. Another 40% of the rotation is a serious injury risk. The final 20% can't get anyone out.

Chipper Jones is on the disabled list and possibly out for the entire season with an injured toe, thus illustrating why teams don't give out seven-year contracts anymore such that they're paying them big dollars in their late 30s. Well, teams other than the Mets.

The four players that I identified as the key to the season were Giles, Furcal, Andruw, and LaRoche. None of them currently have an OPS above .800, led by Furcal, a lead-off hitter with a microscopic .278 OBP and a bad shoulder. (Actually, this point is a cause for optimism. There's no way that these four will play as badly for the rest of the season as they have for the first two months. If the Braves get torrid in the summer as they've been wan to do over the past several years, then these guys will be the reason, along with the starting pitching, of course.)

The bullpen is listing like the Lusitania. The closer from April has been demoted and is probably a couple bad performances from getting axed from the team entirely. The current closer is pitching well, but has a history of burning out when he has to throw too many innings. The rest of the pen is dicey, with the exception of John Foster, who apparently won't give up an earned run all season.

On the bright side, we have enough injuries now to make me feel good about the end of the 13-year streak of divisional titles. (Actually, the bright side is bigger than that. We're getting a look at the future with Davies, Langerhans, Johnson, Marte, and possibly Francoeur in a couple months. Plus, the defense has been generally solid.)

I hope that I look back on this post in September and laugh at the pessimism, but it's hard seeing this team win with such a wrecthed offense and unhealthy pitchers.

I have very little to say

And not because I'm ignoring our beloved Braves and their dreadful week, but rather because I was in Charlottesville this weekend for my wife's hooding (that's receiving a doctorate, not something you do to the gimp, you dirty bastards) and my sports consumption consisted of 15 minutes of SportsCenter at 2 a.m. on Sunday morning and a couple innings of Braves baseball on the way back home. No Suns/Mavs, no FA Cup Final, and no Preakness. That said, I have a few random thoughts from the weekend:

1. Andruw gets so much grief from Braves fans in comparison to Chipper, who rarely gets criticized for anything. A lot of that disparity is racially driven, not in the sense that fans don't like Andruw because he's black, but rather because he's black and considered to be naturally gifted, but lazy, whereas Chipper is seen as a hard-working white guy. That said, why does Chipper not get any grief for being brittle, especially in comparison to Andruw, who gets all sorts of stick for being an "underachiever," but who also plays every day. Chipper's injured oblique was supposed to be a minor issue, but it's cost him three games, all of which the Braves lost. Meanwhile, Andruw just keeps playing every day (knock on wood) and gets no credit for being durable.

2. One of the disturbing developments from this road trip, other than Dan Doodie's demotion, two injured starting pitchers, and a sputtering offense, is the fact that Chris Reitsma, who had been the star of the pen, completely imploded. To a slightly lesser extent, Jorge Sosa, who had been the other star, also petered out, as he gave up two earned runs in 3 2/3rds innings. At this stage, Adam Bernero and John Foster are the only two reliable relievers and who knows how long that will last.

3. This quote from Jason Varitek is a classic "this is why you fail" summary for why the Braves' offense struggles so much: The Braves "gave us some early-in-the-count outs that kept [Matt Clement's] pitch total down." The Sox worked counts all weekend and were able to touch up Smoltz and Hudson as a result. (This makes me reconsider my belief that the Braves would be great in the playoffs because of Smoltz and Hudson. If this is how they get treated by a quality offense, then they aren't as great an asset as I thought.) The Braves swung at everything that moved and therefore allowed Clement and Wade Miller, two former NL pitchers with whom they are familiar, to dominate them.

4. After exams during my second year of law school, I made a one-night play for a girl I knew in school, but she said that she couldn't because she was going to the Preakness the next morning. Now, I associate that race with "I have to wash my hair and can't go out with you, Michael."

5. One of the advantages of having a wife who has a sophisticated understanding of statistics (as a result of having written a dissertation that required such analysis) is that I can bounce college football column ideas off of her and she can explain how she could analyze my data. We spent about 40 miles in South Carolina yesterday discussing how we would analyze 1) the importance of returning starters on the offensive line, as compared to other positions, and 2) whether success in close games replicates itself within seasons or from season to season. If I ever get off my ass and write these columns, I'll be sure to share them.

5a. I had a slight re-examination of my views on a college football playoff while talking with this wife on the drive. If the rankings are basically arbitrary because they are forced to compare teams that never played one another based on a limited sample size, then what's wrong with a similarly arbitrary playoff?

6. I've been driving for over 14 years. During that time, I've been in three cars pulled over for speeding. All three times were in North Carolina. I avoided such a fate yesterday, but we drove through four states and North Carolina featured, by far, the most pulled-over motorists. I received my only speeding ticket in 2000 in Salisbury, North Carolina. Not coincidentally, that same shithole had a 55-mph speed limit yesterday for "road work," even though there was barely any evidence of work being done. Moral of the story: be careful in Salisbury, but not so careful that you stop yourself from throwing your trash out the window as a show of defiance.