Look, you don't have to be a genius to figure out that if you write about Dale Earnhardt Jr. race fans are going to get fired up, especially when you're talking about drawing conclusions about his performance or his standing in NASCAR.
The reason I wrote a blog Friday about what Jimmy Spencer said on last week's prerace show is that I felt people would be interested in hearing what Spencer said when we asked him to expand on his remarks when he was on "The Morning Drive" on Sirius NASCAR Radio.
I love it when people accuse reporters or people who write on the internet of "just trying to get hits" or merely writing something so people will read it. Well, duh. What are we supposed to do? Look for obscure things to report about people nobody gives a dang about?
But anyway, back to Earnhardt Jr.
If you're a Dale Jr. fan and you believe that "the media" has put unreasonable expectations on him as a driver, I would point out to you that the reason he said he was going to Hendrick Motorsports was to win races and contend for championships.
The media didn't say that, he did.
He made the Chase this year, but was never, ever a factor in it. He won just one points race and, more to the point, his team did not seem to get better as the season went along. Indeed, he was much stronger earlier in the season than later. Was that because his team fell off or because other teams got better at a faster rate than his did? I don't know, but it doesn't matter.
When the championship is on the line during the Chase your team has to not only be at its best, it has to be better than everybody else.
I will guarantee you that Earnhardt Jr. was disappointed that his team didn't wind up beating any other team that made the Chase.
On the other hand, I will also guarantee you that if you're one of the Dale Jr. haters who thinks you're insulting him by saying he'll never be as good as his father, you're never going to hear Earnhardt Jr. himself argue with that. While he has said he wants to be a champion, he has never said he wants to be his father. In fact, he's gone out of his way to say he knows he'll never be that.
And this just in, nobody else will be, either.
Dale Earnhardt will be in the first class to enter NASCAR's Hall of Fame. There's absolutely no question or argument about that. He, Richard Petty, David Pearson and Bill France Sr. are slam dunks for the inaugural class. Earnhardt changed the sport and he was one of the great figures in all of American sport.
If you're trying to hold Dale Jr. - or any other current driver - up to the Earnhardt standard, he's absolutely going to fall short. But there's nothing wrong with measuring Earnhardt Jr. to the standards he set for himself, which are by the way the same standards any top-tier driver should be reaching toward.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
The Earnhardt yardstick really isn't a fair measure
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
23 comments:
Part 2. For theresa to drive DEI into the toilet and merge with another team is equally unforgivable. I have been a nascar fan for over 40 years, over the past 5, I gave up hope that everyone would do the right thing, maintain the standards that Dale had instilled,that sense of belonging,comrodery and family.
Now it's a bunch of poo butt prima donnas in a generic plethera of steaming horse sh** ! Thanks Bill.
Thanks Jr. and thanks and good riddance to Laughcar. Who won the Kotex cup this year? I'm sure it's a hendick car and whatever tampon on a rope driver's turn it is to win......
Part 1. Jr. sucks, Nascar as a whole sucks and blows. Since the real reason that nascar became profitable and insanely popular died #3 R.I.P. nascar and it's monopolizing teams
have turned it into a big generic joke. Jr. went into hendrick knowing the guy is one of the biggest P.O.S. lying,cheating and stealing anyone and everyone. For Jr. to even contemplate a move to the dark side is unforgivable.
sorry for the order of my post, as you can see there is a part 1 and part 2, they are just inverted.
I'm going to try to make this short as my other comments did not seem to make it "in". Maybe someone does not like what I have to say.
I think one of the reasons NASCAR is on the downswing in that everyone is so sick of France politics and some of the political gibberish that the voices of NASCAR are emoting that they are just "turning them all off."
What do you expect Jr. to say? "I just want to ride around and show my face when I have to." Of course he wants to win races and at least one championship. He doesn't have to say it...being a participant in the sport (if that is what it still is) says that. However, it is the media that will not stop comparing him with his father and finding him lacking. Out of the other side of their collective mouths they say he is his own person. It is true that some of his defeats this year were snatched out of the mouth of victory because of mistakes, but where is it written that his team can be no less than perfect?
What happened to Kyle Busch? He was unstoppable during the regular season, but faltered during the chase. What happened to Jeff Gordon? He didn't win even one race all season. I don't see anyone writing them off as mediocre or washed up.
The truth is the move to somewhere was necessary. No one with a major team ever had so many engine failures in one season as did Jr. in 2007. It was ironic that most of them occured after he announced his departure. Perhaps there is good reason for the hatred TE has for her stepson, but that should not influence the business relationship...that is something called professionalism which seemed to be lacking at DEI. I, personally, would have been happier if Jr. had chosen Childress, but given the business relationship between him and TE, maybe that would not have been a good move.
At any rate, this year is over and unless the economy goes completely bust, there is a new year coming. Winning and championships are the measure by which most judge drivers and their teams, but there is another measure that counts for more. It is called character and it is something Jr. has and should be proud of. Those who were his friends before he became famous are still his friends which is more than can be said for some others in the business.
Once again, I agree with David on this one.
I do have a question though.
I tend to blame Jr's Crew Chief on how the car starts out in the front at the beginning of the races, but fades as the laps go on.
I have been wondering if the problem also lies with Jr. not giving good info. to his Cousin??
Maybe when Jr. starts settling down and thinks during the race, good things will happen.
As far as sour grapes comments about NASCAR, methinks that internet junkies, and not real NASCAR fans are doing a lot of posting around here.
I am a NASCAR fan, and am looking forward to Feb. when the engines fire up once more.
I want to know why no one is writing about Kyle Bush?? His team when up in smoke when the chase started but I don't hear any reporters harping on him? Dale Jr ran really well for the first half of the season and his stats compare well with all the other top drivers. It is no mystery Jimmie Johnson is one of the best of the best and he is extremely hard to beat, but he didn't hit his high until the chase actually started. If the season would have ended before the chase began Jimmie Johnson would be lucky to have managed a top 5. Lay off of Dale Jr. He didn't have the season he hoped for. By no means was he in contention for the championship during the chase, but his performance during the first half was very respectable. There are kinks the be worked out and adjustments to be made. Those changes will come, believe me. Things have to change if Dale Jr. wants to be able to contend for championships. However, opinions from the likes of Jimmy Spencer and David Poole are utterly ridiculous and have to grounds. Jimmy Spencer doesn't know what the hell he is talking about. He just wants to get exposure so he knows the best way to do that is to insult NASCAR's most popular driver. David Poole on the other hand is a freakin retard who seems to be on a mission to piss Dale Jr fans off. Hey it worked!!! Glad you got your exposure. Keep writing you idiotic blogs and completely ridiculous articles. I refuse to read them anymore. You are just an dim-witted old geezer who makes his living writing garbage about issues he has no expertise on! I'd like to see him try to contend for a championship, that is if he could even fit his fat butt into the car!
The cars are to big and lumbering even at 200 m.p.h. They gave the car (c.o.t.) to the hi tech, big money engineers and they ruined the car. Ruin the car, ruin the sport.See how exciting the truck's were this year? They could still race. The music died when Dale died.
1. One of my favorite all time NASCAR quotes is from Kyle Petty. To paraphrase it: "I'm not Richard Petty, I'm Kyle Petty. I'll never be as good as my father. I'm me and people are going to have to realize that." Maybe the Jr. Nation needs to accept that Jr isn't his father. He's probably not going to be a 7 time champion. Too many of his fans expect him to win everything in site.
2. To answer Anonymous' question. The reason everybody is talking about Jr and not Kyle Bush is simple. Everybody loves Jr. and everybody hates Kyle. If they were talking about Kyle it would be about how happy they were that he did so bad.
Dale Jr. is overrated. It's as simple as that. He has his father's name, but not his talent. He's brash, arrogant, and a bit headstrong, and he should have never made his demands of Therea. On the other hand, Therea should at least consult with some xperts, and at least consider Jr.'s ideas, but Jr. should not have demanded so much from Theresa. Both of them should just quietly go away.
I love the folks whom have to be ANON:
"want to know why no one is writing about Kyle Bush?? His team when up in smoke when the chase started but I don't hear any reporters harping on him? Dale Jr ran really well for the first half of the season and his stats compare well with all the other top drivers."
AND LEAST BUT NOT LEAST:
Stewart
" To answer Anonymous' question. The reason everybody is talking about Jr and not Kyle Bush is simple. Everybody loves Jr. and everybody hates Kyle. If they were talking about Kyle it would be about how happy they were that he did so bad.
11/22/2008 10:43 PM"
Well since you brought that up(Kyle B) last I checked in the offseason everyone stated, "Kyle would fail at JGR, him, Tony and Denny would fight", "blah, blah, blah"..
In comparison to Junior?
There is not a ounce of it as Kyle B won more races, finished higher in the points, led more laps adn won in all 3 series..
Hate all you wont, but as Poole said, JuneBug said he was "going to win more and win a championship"..
Kyle romped the 88 all year and will continue to do it.
Should Eury Jr be gone , who are you going to blame. The track, the groundhog, the tires, the wind??? Man up and let your driver take some blame
imawhole, first of all NASCAR didn't become profitable becuse of Dale Earnhardt. He was by no means the sole or even primary reason people became NASCAR fans. Saying that ignores the genuine fan draw of Tim Richmond, Davey Allison, Mark Martin, Alan Kulwicki, and others during the Earnhardt era. What standards did Earnhardt ever instill? If you're talking about his raceteam (DEI), it was Teresa and Don Hawk (later Ty Norris) who instilled those standards because they were the ones who ran it.
If you're inferring that Earnhardt brought a sense of belonging to the sport, that's laughable. It wsn't until his death that the hatred that had permeated the entirety of his Winston Cup career disappeared. Of course he had a strong fanbase, but we need to stop enying that he was hated as no one else had ben before - and contrary to the myth, hatred didn't draw more fans to the sport.
You clearly blame Teresa for DEI's collapse. You're wrong. Under Teresa's control DEI won 21 Winston Cup races races following Senior's death (22 counting the Talladega win seized by NASCAR). The collapse came because DEI was priced out of contention by the magna-teams and their $100 million annual budgets.
Now you apparantly hate the magna-teams and there is reason to dislike them, indeed - they do need to be contracted and their budgets reduced because the sport's spendaholism has to be stopped once and for all.
Anonymous #4, NASCAR is drying up for three reasons -
1 - There is no restriction on spending, and the result is an untenable economic structure for raceteams and a net shrinkage of raceteams.
2 - Related to #1, fewer and fewer teams can compete. The sport has not seen a new winning team since 2002 and the one comeback team seen after 2001 was Ganassi Racing. New and comeback winning drivers are also scarce to nonexistent.
3 - Where are the lead changes? The racing is not competitive almost everywhere the sport races.
ElyBoy, could it be that Junior does not know what he wants in the car to relay properly to his crew chief? We've seen this with drivers such as Jamie McMurray who go through crew chiefs quite a bit.
Anonymous #6, Kyle Busch won eight races in 2008 - that's why his collapse in the Chase isn't a big story.
Anonymous #7, the Trucks had a surprisingly good point race but their racing was no better than the COT races - at Talladega there was almost no passing up front unil the final one or two restarts, and paucity of passing has plagued the Trucks all three times they've raced there. Let's not exaggerate the competiveness of the Trucks - they were not that competitive at all.
"The music died when Dale died." "Dale" wasn't music.
The bottom line is Dale Junior is a good racer, but he is not great. He will not win a championship nor should he because winning he most races in a season is a more credible gauge of a season than points. Even contending for wins is more wothwhile than points, and whle Junio did cotend for some wins, for the most part he simply does not fit in the Hendrick way of doing things - with Kyle Busch Hendrick won a lot of races with all of his cars; with Earnhardt the feedback and info exchange doesn't work.
David Poole, I would love to know from you in detail how ol' Dale changed the sport. I know you didn't start following the sport till Higgins retired in 1997.By that time Dale's career was on the down swing. Go back and watch races from then till the end not all but most he wasn't even competitive a lap or two down most of the time.What it is is that Dale's death put him in that lagacy thing like James Dean. You know die young or unexpectedly and your legend grow's bigger than it ever would have if they would have lived to be ninety. But back to changing the sport, if anyone changed the sport it was Jeff Gordon who brought fan's in from west of the Mississippi from the middle ninety's on. But to put Earnhardt ahead of France and the King for the HOF you really need to get your head out of your a--. Cause it's like the late Benny Parsons said several time's, and i quote, Every driver in these garages and pit's need to walk up to Richard Petty and shake his hand and thank him for what he done for the sport all time. But back to the HOF the first class in should be France Sr. France Jr. Lee Petty, Richard Petty, and Earnhardt to keep his fan's happy but never ever first. If he goes in first that will be a travesty and a "joke".
Dale Jr. has a handycap in being a junior A lot of his fans are because of his name {Petty, Baker ect} and they became the redneck army making him most popular driver causing a swelling of income and letting his billfold get in the way of the go pedal plus he has started to belive he is smarter than his crewchief, plus NASCAR has used him to further there image and cover there dictatorship
I hate to say this - but some of us who have watched NASCAR longer than Junior's lifetime know that to even expect Junior any success at all in the first year on a new team may be premature. In fact, I would hope that everyone remembers what Rick Hendrick said to Junior in Victory Lane at Michigan.
Truth be told, Junior does have a handicap, and its really being dealt with being the son of a 7 time champ. The only person who can relate to that is Kyle Petty.
How many times have we seen new teams, and new owners, and even new drivers pop up on the radar, only to fall by the wayside. Look at folks like Ricky Rudd, or Harry Gant, or how about folks like Mark Martin, who has a huge supply of trophies in his trophy case, but still after all these years has yet a cup Championship. Look at the team side - Yates Racing always comes out of the box strong at Daytona, but has but one Championship at the hands of Dale Jarrett. How many times have we seen it happen, even in the NFL or the NBA, or how about baseball? Pick any sport, and you will see the same kinds of missed opportunities, bad games, and poor performance leading to lost championships.
Maybe we should all take a page from the Good Book: Let HIM who is without guilt cast the FIRST stone!
boomer1964, there indeed could be something to the "first year transition" that hits new driver/team combos over the years.
boomer1964 - VERY well said. Thank you.
I hate to say it, but yes, Jr. does not have the focus to win a cup title. At his current level of intensity he'll just be the next Kyle Petty, which is fine for him, he'll rake in plenty of money to retire on but his fans will never be happy.
Shrubby Bush's is doing great for being so young. But unfortunately like most kids he blew his load way to early. By the time he made it to the chase he had nothing left in his bag of tricks at the point that most of the 'weathered' drivers started to kick it in to overdrive.
After 2 years of back to back titles JJ figured it out, wait till the chase and start winning. Run a steady regular season and then pull out all the stops in the chase.
Not that he has all the answers or is the only one that knows that secret, but I think he might need to tell his teammate/boss in the #24 that had such a bad season that the #88 actually looked pretty good with a regular season win and a chase birth. I'm not dogging, the #24, I think he's a great champ in his own right. He just hasn't figured out the new car yet...
I just wanted to comment on something that was written up here and something that I have heard a million times before.
People are always saying that Junior Nation needs to realize that Dale Jr is not Dale Sr. Well, Junior Nation was around before Dale Sr. passed and most Junior Nation fans are fans because he ISN'T like his father. We bacame fans because of who Jr. was not because of his daddy.
Certainly an intelligent group responding this morning.
No, Dale Jr. isn't his father (adult term for "daddy'), nor will he ever be.
Insanity is.... "doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results."
Bringing Eury Jr. to HMS as Jr.'s CC equals insanity.
Flip side, Jr.'s ability to communicate with any crew chief has been, at best, poor. So, it's not all Eury Jr.'s fault.
What we have is a mediocre driver with a mediocre crew chief and the best equipment money can buy.
The season wasn't a failure, its just the Dale Jr is an average driver and he had above averagr expectations. Its the equivalent of taking a run of the mill player and put him on the very best team and expect a championship. He's not championship material, and he never will be, regardless of who he races for, that's not a shot against him, that's the truth. I'm a Kevin Harvick fan and he ain't cut from championship cloth either.
I have to ask why on Pooles blog do so many have to be freaking ANON???
Damn show a pair and a screen name..
Love how some JR fans felt the need to brinf Kyle B. into it.
With that please note he won several races in each series not just 1 in one series.
Doesnt blame his mom, stepmom, dog, Crew Chief, dog or drivers suit.
How many freaking excuses can you make for Junior?
This comes from a DIE HARD SR fan..
Damn, he isnt a god send and nver will be nothing but a Chase driver. Damn you all seem to think he is DAD reincarnated.
Least some are willing to admit he isnt, but stop tooting his horn. Its not freaking there for the desire.
hell next year he fails it will be my fault or the weathers fault.
Get off the excuses. Damn
Thanks to those who appreciated my comments.
I grew up watching David Pearson, AJ Foyt, Richard Petty, and Cale Yarborough, and trust me those guys lost more championships and races than I could count. We could ramble on about it but the point is those guys are legends today for winning somewhere between 10-15 percent of the time in real "stock" cars using tires and safety equipment I wouldn't trust to tune up an old Mustang! Junior is.....31 years old?!?!?
I fail to see how holding him or any other driver out there right now, including Jeff Gordon and Jimmy Johnson for that matter, makes much sense. Nor can I comprehend the notion that someone moving over to the team of Rick Hendrick is going to make you an instant champion. I would have better luck turning water into wine!
Now maybe Jimmy Spencer is right, or maybe he isn't. There is only one way to find out.
We interrupt this marriage to bring you the next racing season!!
Post a Comment