My Two Cents Worth for 10/19/04

By Todd Berger, LGR Staff Correspondent

NASCAR went home to Charlotte and has entered the stretch run as it relates to their newfangled playoff thingamabob.  Let’s see how things are looking right now. 

With five races to go, the new format standings are as follows:

1 Busch 5850

2 Earnhardt Jr. -24[+1]

3 Gordon -74

4 Sadler -157

5 Martin -186

6 Stewart -204

7 Kenseth -215

8 Johnson -227

9 Newman -271

10 Mayfield -349

The chase for 11th

11 McMurray 3878

12 Jarrett –74

13 Harvick -216

Using the boring old points system:

1 Gordon 4328

2 Earnhardt Jr. 4327 -1[+24]

3 Busch 4139 -189

4 Johnson 4120  -208

5 Stewart 4021  -307

6 Sadler 3984  -344

7 Kenseth 3942  -386

8 McMurray 3736  -450

9 Martin 3654  -466

10 Jarrett 3804  -524

11 Newman 3760  -568

12 Mayfield 3684  -644

13 Harvick 3662  -666

14 Labonte 3652  -676

15 Kahne 3626  -702

Certainly doesn’t look much different at the top.  Oh sure, it’s Gordon for his fifth instead of Busch for his contrived first, but who cares?  You also may notice that with strong runs over the last few weeks, Dale Jarrett and Jamie McMurray have worked themselves into the “old” top ten.  That would have put them on the stage for their sponsors in New York.  Thank God the top ten was decided over the course of only 72% of the race season.

But the good news is that the ratings are thru the roof…right? Um, actually Mr. France, they’re not.  Saturday’s night race aside (there’s no comparative data since this was the first night race on this weekend), Ratings have been within mere tenths of percentage points of last year and years past or down for the last several weeks.

But the new chase will really heat up when we get to Homestead, since so many guys will be mathematically in the chase…right?

Ummm…no again, boy wonder.  Seven of the ten remaining drivers are more than a race worth of points behind.  The most any driver can make up or lose in a week is 156.  Everyone from Sadler back is 157 points out or further.  Even a bad day by both or all three of the leaders on the same day won’t tighten the field much. 

Face it, folks.  We just have a more heavily marketed championship, not a better one.

You have to feel for Kasey Kahne by now.  That guy led 300 of 400 miles before a right front failure.  But then again, why on earth did they not come in for tires when they were clearly the fastest car on the track. All day long.  Makes you wonder…

Dale Earnhardt Jr. will have his appeal heard today by whatever the name of that committee is that’s led by a NASCAR employee, a Mr. George Silbermann since 1999.  My own rantings aside, the committee’s record on appeals in that time is as follows:

Of the 53 appeals they have heard, the committee has upheld 37 of them, reduced the penalty in 11 of them, overturned NASCAR’s decision four times, and once they increased the penalty.

I don’t look for the number overturned or lessened to go up on this one.  I expect that this meeting / hearing will occur in the direct presence of Mr.’s Helton and France.

I look for the Bud team to head to Martinsville without said points, but I think we all knew that anyway…didn’t we?

The news on Trackside Friday night that Mark Martin would, in all likelihood, run a full schedule in the Craftsman Truck Series in 2006 was not shocking to this writer.  After hearing Bobby Hamilton talk endlessly about how little stress there is compared to Cup, that he sleeps great, longer and more often, it’s cheaper to field teams and there isn’t nearly the headaches associated with Cup racing, I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find many of the older drivers pasturing in the CTS. 

Mark’s deal is a little different, given that I am sure he is getting a truck team set up so that when his son Matt is old enough, the infrastructure is in place to get him a quality ride and to start his ascent to a Cup racing career.  I could see Mark having an ownership in all three tiers as a path for Matt, a’la the Pettys and how they had things set up for Adam before his accident.

It appears that NASCAR is almost certainly going to ease its ban on hard liquor advertising and sponsorship.  Nice to see that for years they can say it isn’t good for the sport when every company in the world wants to play with you.  It’s quite another now that sponsors are running from the costs and looking for better places to advertise with their dollars.  Expect to have about 10 cars or nearly a quarter of the field sponsored by hard liquor companies by 2006.  They’re the new dot com’s after all.

For about the fifth time since he arrived at Richard Childress Racing, there is talk of moving drivers, crew chiefs, sponsors and more both to and from Robby Gordon’s team.  For all the things people say about him, he sure is not one to complain when this happens over and over and over to make the 29 team better. 

And if you ask Kevin, it’s not the bodies, crews, tires or anything else.  It’s the motors…period.  Richard is quickly getting a case of the “holy crap…what happened to my race team” blues.  I only hope he rights the ship or sells to someone in time to avoid a total collapse of the entire racing operation.

If I haven’t said it enough, I’ll say it again.  Thank God for head and neck restraints and the SAFER barriers.  If it weren’t for them, we’d probably be burying another racer today.  This time, it’d have been David Reutimann and / or Bill Lester.  That crash was absolutely brutal, and I don’t have any doubt that Mr. Reutimann would have been terribly injured if not for the advances in safety made in recent years.  I think Brian Vickers is another example of someone saved grievous injury this weekend by the SAFER barrier.  Considering where Blaise Alexander crashed at Charlotte in 2001, it was a good decision to put the barrier in the tri-oval.

Despite not one but two wrecks or incidents on Saturday night, Kurt Busch and his team did an amazing job keeping the 97 car in contention and up front, as did the 24 team and Robby Loomis.  The 24 team may or may not win the title this year, but if it doesn’t happen, it won’t be because of Loomis.  That guy is solely committed and probably works harder than nearly any crew chief out there.  Everyone yelling, “fire Loomis!” every time Jeff finishes third ought to actually watch some races rather than just one driver.  It’s surprising what you can learn.

Jimmie Johnson became the first driver to sweep the charlotte races since 1986 and he is only the sixth driver to ever accomplish that feat.  That’s pretty impressive, as is the 48’s record at Lowe’s over the last couple of years.

I know everyone (including myself) jumped to blame Jimmy Spencer for that mess with Brendan Gaughan that took out Mark Martin and Ryan Newman.  Turns out, Brendan had a tire going down and tried to get low but couldn’t get low enough to get out of the way.  Sometimes, it’s easy to forget that the cars are going between 150 and 200 mph, and they can’t just stop or flick the wheel to miss stuff that happens that fast right in front of them. 

It was last Wednesday when Slugger Labbe stepped down as crew chief for Michael Waltrip’s NAPA team at DEI, and it was announced that Slugger would be moving into an admin position to help Martin Truex Jr. win the Busch title.  This week, it is being reported that Labbe may be going to Sterling Marlin’s team.

Why can’t these things just happen?  Why the “resignation, reassignment, denial” stuff?  It never ceases to amaze me that every year teams don’t get better at handling this stuff.

In the worst kept secret ever category, Jason Leffler was announced as the 2005 driver of the Joe Gibbs Racing FedEx #11 car.  Oddly, it was announced this week that Joe Gibbs Racing was handing out pink slips to crew members.  If I were Leffler, I’d start checking the lugs before races myself.  Understaffing can lead to all kinds of problems.

The series is returning to Martinsville for the first time since the surface was repaved this summer.  I only hope they didn’t ruin what they had by doing it.  Tracks that get re-surfaced tend to have bad races in the race or two (or more) after the job is finished, and NASCAR simply doesn’t need that right now.  This track and this race as it relates to the Chase are very important, and a 500 lap, 15-caution parade is not what the series needs at all. 

Finally, I’d like to thank everyone that has been sending me e-mails regarding my columns lately.  While we may never agree on everything, I enjoy nothing more than debating various racing-related topics with other race fans. 

Keep it coming and I’ll do my best to keep answering them in a timely manner.