We now venture into dangerous waters

I come today to say that NASCAR isn’t always wrong. Nor is it necessarily corrupt.

This, of course, means that I have been forced to drink the Kool-Aid. Or paid to walk over to the dark side. Or threatened to have my garage pass revoked if I don’t toe the line.

It can’t be that I am giving you an honest opinion.

Nobody’s allowed to do that these days, in a world where the truthful definition of “fair and balanced” is anything but that and where people are no longer allowed to respectfully disagree.

You’re either for us or you’re the enemy. That’s that.

But what the heck, I am stupid enough to try this anyway.

We’ll start with “debris cautions.” Late last year, after a race at Atlanta in fact, I wrote a column in which I said NASCAR is damaging its credibility by throwing caution flags for suspect reasons. I have not changed that opinion, at all, but after last Sunday’s race at Atlanta I also feel it’s important to point out that not every caution flag should automatically be considered suspect.

Just because a television broadcast doesn’t follow the safety truck around the track to show workers picking up debris, that doesn’t necessarily mean there was no debris there. I’m convinced some fans wouldn’t be satisfied unless the safety truck brought a piece of debris to the “Hollywood Hotel” so the experts there can offer their analysis of what the debris actually is.

You have to remember that NASCAR has to make decisions in real time. If something is on the track in the racing groove, officials have to decide if it constitutes a hazard. It might be a harmless piece of plastic, or it might be metal with a razor-like edge on it. If there’s any doubt, the yellow has to come out.

My main criticism of NASCAR, then and now, is the double-standard they seem to apply. In my opinion, the right thing to do is to throw the yellow when there’s any doubt that the track is unsafe for racing. But that should be done 10 laps into a race or with 10 laps to go – with no difference in how quickly the decision comes. I still maintain it was absolutely ridiculous that no yellow was thrown on the final lap of this year’s Daytona 500 until after Kevin Harvick and Mark Martin crossed the finish line.

It’s a problem for NASCAR that fans assume a late-race caution is bogus until they’re convinced otherwise. That’s the credibility issue I keep harping on, and one day I hope NASCAR realizes it’s a problem it needs to go work on.

That notwithstanding, however, it’s absurd to believe that NASCAR throws a caution with 20 laps to go in an attempt to manipulate the finish of a race in any particular way. The late-race caution at Atlanta was not an effort to hand Jimmie Johnson a victory, no matter how convinced you are that’s what happened. Sorry, but that’s just now how the sane world works.

We move on.

NASCAR got sued last Friday by AT&T, and Brian France had a pretty good line about it on “The Morning Drive” radio show on Sirius NASCAR Radio the other day. He said it’s flattering, in a way, to have companies suing for the right to stay in the sport.

The deal is that Jeff Burton’s No. 31 Chevrolets have been sponsored by Cingular. But Cingular, as a brand name, is going bye-bye. Cingular has merged with AT&T and the new company wants to put its logos on Burton’s car. NASCAR, however, says no because changing the brand would violate the terms of a grandfather clause in its agreement with Sprint Nextel.

The easy stance to take here would be to say Nextel should take a chill pill and let AT&T do what it wants to do. But how is that fair to Nextel? They’re paying $70 million a year for 10 years to be the title sponsor of Nextel Cup, and part of what they were supposed to get in that deal is exclusivity in the wireless sector.

Remember when Winston was the title sponsor? How close to a NASCAR garage did Marlboro ever get? That was being “loyal” to the title sponsor. How come Nextel doesn’t get that same “loyalty?”

Nextel allowed Cingular and Alltel to stay in the sport as long as they stayed where they were – they couldn’t move to another car or change from an associate to a primary if that had been a possibility. But one of the things Nextel was “getting” for its $70 million was the right NOT to have AT&T and Verizon and other competitors come into the sport and counter its involvement with sponsorships of their own.

I’ve got nothing in the world against Richard Childress Racing and Jeff Burton’s team – in fact, I know as many guys on Burton’s team as I do any other team in the garage. It stinks that this Cinuglar-AT&T merger puts their sponsorship deal in peril, and if there’s a way it can be worked out so everybody’s happy, that would be great.

But if can’t, I think NASCAR is right to take Nextel’s side on this one.

I hope you don’t think that makes me one of “them."