Maybe Stewart/Penske can do a trade? Newman back to Penske and KuBusch to Stewart? I always think that guys in turmoil or on a multi-year losing streak should drop back into a lesser series for a year to find their inner racer again. Kurt should drop back to trucks or Nationwide for a year to work on being nice and to build some confidence while dominating for a championship. Look what it did for that bald doofus that used to wreck the whole field every time he came up to race with the big boys.
Random responses: 1. Penske is not in the Hendrick-Roush-Gibbs league in terms of equipment, but they do have competitive cars and big name sponsors. 2. Crusty won 18 races over two years in the early 90's with Penske equipment, and would have had another championship or two were it not for Dale Earnhardt. 3. I believe the past champions provisional only applies to 4 races per year (I think that became known as the Waltrip rule). The top-35 points stay with the car. 3. Busch may have driving skill, but his all to frequent outbursts are not conducive to team building. He would do well to learn the old leadership axiom of "praise in public, criticize in private." He wants to win, and that is commendable, but he needs to realize that you can't win all the time. And when you can't win, keeping your head and getting the best finish possible is the professional thing to do. Interestingly, the sponsors stayed with Penske, so Kurt does not have a big pile of money to bring to another team. 4. He has made a real enemy in Jimmy Johnson, and that won't bode well for his future. Jimmy seems to be all puppydogs and rainbows unless he has to talk about Busch, then it is all daggers and darkness. Hendrick could afford to hire a guy just to wreck him in every race. 5. Busch got in trouble with the law and got fired from his ride with Roush. Remember the tearful apology, and the "I'm going to be a better person" comments he made? Guess what? He's still the same old asshole. He was the same old asshole when Spencer clocked him too. How many times can you reinvent yourself? There is nothing wrong with being an asshole, but embrace it, you'll get more respect that way. 6. He's now making noise about going drag racing next year. That is cool, hope he finds happiness.
I don't follow NACAR that closely anymore, but I have to differ with you over Penske's and Ganassi's competitiveness on the ovals. It is a rare day when they run at the front. Rusty had some good shows but that was 20 years ago. Thier new kid looks to change that, though. Regarding the Champion's provisional, I just repeated what Busch said in his SpeedTV interview. Maybe he's wrong or I got it wrong, but he used it as a selling point in getting a ride. What does Jimmy Johnson have to do with anything? He doesn't have a say in the driving careers of people outside his pitbox. The king of the modern day bad boys is Tony Stewart. The paddock media can't stand him, yet he's one of the very few people in the sport that is truly entertaining. I'd like to see him pick a fellow bad boy just to piss off the dweebs like Doctor Jerry Punch and that knucklehead 'excitement' guy who used to run around at the back of the pack. Who gave him that excitement tag anyway? Tony Stewart, the Busch brothers, Juan Pablo, KH and even Carl Edwards are interesting because they are fast, combative, and full of emotion. They had a long line of teachers too, starting with AJ Foyt and polished by DE. Who wants to watch Jimmy Johnson...
Busch and Keselowski have both run up front this year. There are lots of teams that don't win any races year after year, but Penske has been winning of late and has been in the Chase for a number of years. Ganassi won several of the big races last year with McMurray, and Montoya was in the Chase. To pull that off, you have to be competitive. I'm no Jimmy Johnson fan, but he is going to be a competitive force for a while, and he has teammates that are pretty loyal to him. 4 against 1 doesn't make for a good fight if you're Kurt Busch. I like Tony Stewart as well, and he is a bad boy. But he doesn't try to deny it, which is what gives him credibility. Jimmy Spencer won a race or two in the Winston Cup days, and a metric buttload in various modified series (where he got his nickname). He was an outstanding modified driver. I enjoy watching all the above race, but can't support the Busch Brothers. The whining and tantrums are too much for me. If you like them then that is cool, we just agree to disagree.
Ragan, Reutiman,Logano and their lot are nothing but a bunch of mid pack bitches.Throw in 2/3rds of the field along with them."Our car ran well today,my guys did a great job,we want to build on our 15th place finish,BLAH BLAH BLAH!"Too many things wrong with NASCAR for me to be even a casual fan anymore.
In any good drama MC, you need white hats and black hats. Otherwise, what fun is it? That is the biggest problem the new NASCAR has with their original fanbase. Sometimes, a guy just needs to be poked in the nose. That may be why I love hockey! Brain and Dulltone have been successful with the WWF format of marketing, but the bloom is off the rose. "Boys have at it" until it interferes with our PC vision. The Busch boys are the last refreshing throwbacks. Harvick and Stewart have even bought into the Dulltone browbeating. I thought Kesowlowski was going to a great black hat too, but he has toed the line too now. Bahhh Humbug.
I heartily agree about having a villan, and Dale Sr. was always my guy. But I want villans in the guise of Dirk Dastardly, guys like Pearson, C. Yarborough, B. Allison, B. Baker, Earnhardt and others. Guys who were legitimately tough, and didn't try to softshoe it. Maybe that person can't exist in the new NASCAR, but the Bushes strike me as Polly Prissypants masquerading as a tough guy. I don't buy that they would stand their ground for a minute. If it came to fight or flight.........well let's just say I don't think they have the fight reflex.
All those guys you mentioned were fun in their day. Cale was my fav. There was Tim Richmond too. Nobody came through the pack like him, except maybe Tony S at Homestead a couple weeks ago. Tim always ran a loose car with the outside rear tire smoking. :eek1 When Jeff Gordon first came up, he was a lot like that too. It was almost like his inverted starts as a teenybopper in his midgets. You knew when he was coming to the front, be it a road course or oval. He sort of went soft on us, but he got his share, so who can blame him. I can't say about Kurt Busch, since he rarely has a car capable of winning, but his brother makes me think of Tim Richmond and Cale Yarborough. As far as being a prissy pants, I don't think that kid is afraid of anything, let alone, getting punched in the nose.
Not so sure about Kurt, but Kyle would be glad to spar at just about anything I think. He might get his butt kicked, but he is like a beagle. Heart bigger than his body. Kurt, I can hardly blame him for not taking on Spencer. I can remember Jimmy squeezing into his mod (which I don't think he could do anymore.) Even back then in his youth it looked like 2 tons in a one ton sock. (It was an awesome spectacle when he Geoff showed up for a race. They had no problems helping each other out. ) He is a pretty sizeable guy and did not earn the moniker "Junkyard Dog" by proxy. Heck, I bet his biceps are as big as Kurt's leg. The only other altercation I can recall him having was with Tony, but it was in the trailer and second hand accounts. I would concur he is not as driven as the younger brother. An aside, Kurt is not all that bad a guy in person. He came over and signed our Red Sox tickets when he was still at Roush after the little guy kept calling, errr yelling, his name. He finally turned to him and gave him a "just a minute" signal. As soon as he finished the ceremony he came right over and could not have been nicer to him. Must have spent two very pleasant minutes with him. Doesn't seem like much, but with their schedules that is pretty gracious. The boy thought it was the best meeting him. Even though he is a Tony Stewart supporter, which I was glad at 5 that he did not share at the moment. I still maintain they are good for the sport because they do piss you off MC. That is entertainment. Emotion, it is what keeps em coming back.
Even today, my money would still be on Cale in a bar fight. He was one tough little sumbitch (and I mean little... he's like 5'3")
I think Jeff had kids and that freak crash where his car somehow got into the only gap in the inside wall really threw him off his game. What track was that? It was out here, Fontana or Vegas? I forget. It was nasty and at the time Jeff said he wouldn't be driving a car there again if they didn't fix the track. I think the crash that Jimmy had this year really threw him off his game too. The soft wall safer car generation haven't ever really had bad crashes and I think it scares the hell out of them when they do. Did you guys see pics of Robby Gordons trophy truck that he rolled at 130 mph in this years Baja 1k? I wish that guy could land a better deal in Nascar as I think he's the only real badass in the field. I mean who else in Nascar has thrown themselves out of a moving Indy car while on fire, done the funky chicken in the grass putting out the human fire, then climbed back in the same car and tried to get the safety crew to bump start him?
Yeah I saw the clips. That guy is too lucky to still be alive. He's badass for sure, but he's always missing that half second/lap. He might have been a force, if he was a little less badass. You can see the best of him at Sears Point. If he's got a 10th place car, he's going to take it to the front and there won't be any fenders left when he gets there.
I think you have something there. That seems to be the measure of a driver, how they come back after a hard hit. I've heard the old timers say, "that so and so is a good young driver, but let's see what happens after he gets in a bad wreck." The wreck Gordon had was extremely violent, and the Johnson one was eerily reminiscent of Dale, Sr. It is a credit to the cars design, track improvements and their intestinal fortitude that they climb back in, but it does tend to take the starch out of some drivers. Gordon has been in good equipment before. He spent a few years at RCR, but didn't do much with the opportunity. He can drive anything, but it seems that he suffers from the desire to drive everything all the time. He doesn't seem to concentrate on one series and maybe loses focus?
They are good for the sport in that regard. The nice thing is we've all had a pleasant conversation without a bunch of BS being tossed around. The first guy who comes in here and references flushing skittles, I'm gonna go kick his bike over and then play tonsil hockey with his gf/wife.
I hear that comment about RCR a lot and wonder if they really do have good equipment or just lucked into the best stock car driver of all time that probably could have driven any car in the field to the exact same wins? How many championships in cup for RCR since Earnhardt died? I mean, their last cup championship was in what? 1994? Not a good track record. Not being a smart ass and we ARE having a good run of stock car discussion here for a change.
No question, the quality of the RCR garage has been suspect for a long time. RCR seems to be running closer to empty than full. It's a good theing they have Menards... On the other hand, how many top tier team garages are there? Three? Two? Maybe one more if Stewart can get a little bigger. Hard to imagine that with the sponsor rotation he does, though.
Stewart-Hass is basically a Hendrick team. They get thier cars, engines and tons of technical support from Hendrick. Funny situation at Hendrick right now with chassis development and Stewart's team. The Hendrick team cars were running a "new and improved" chassis this season which none of the teams truly got figured out. Stewart was running last years Hendrick chassis that Johnson won the past five championships with. Hendrick teams are now considering going back to the "old chassis".
Harvick has been real close, last year and one other IIRC. Bowyer was right there at least once too. This year not so good. With the exception of Burton, they have been regulars in the chase. As has been seen, that is quite an accomplishment in its' own right. I think, the bigger issue may be, Chevy and RCR used to be like one mind. With the emergence of HMS, with Jeff Gordon, I think that some of the race tipping information may be hitting that shop as least as often or more often than RCR. It takes a fair amount of ingenuity to make that kind of power with the aspiration and exhaust setups they are required to use, and get better on top of that. Richard is doing ok, and DE was probably a once in our lifetime type of character. Even if another came along, like say Kyle Busch, who can wheel a car every bit as good and maybe better is considered a pretender. (he lacks the character of DE, but if he had that package, he would still be a pretender.) RCR's grandson is on the way, he has a burn that may be quite interesting when he arrives. The competition is a lot more competitive today. DE had to worry about 2 or 3 guys. Now you have 3 or 4 teams of up to 4 cars that are a legitimate threat. Jimmy Johnson may well set all championship records before he is done if he and Chad stay together. If so, that will be the most remarkable feat ever IMO. Richards 200 is safe from him, and I don't consider Kyle amassing 200 wins in three classes the same thing.
