NASCAR's 'back to basics' should involve significantly more than simply punching numbers on a jukebox

Just what, exactly, does it mean to “go back to basics?”

How, precisely, does NASCAR plan to change to re-connect with its core fans?

Frankly, the preseason talk about that kind of stuff is just a public relations bill of goods. Oddly, that may be all it takes to satisfy some of the sport’s fans who’ve been so vocal with their displeasure.

I was reading a column over the weekend from a guy who said NASCAR has “turned its back” on its core fans in North and South Carolina, Georgia and other fans in the Southeast. He even went so far as to invoke the name of the holy of old-time holies, North Wilkesboro Speedway.

Let me just tell you something. NASCAR ain’t going back to North Wilkesboro. Not now, not ever. That ship has sailed. Rockingham isn’t coming back, either.

NASCAR also isn’t going to abandon the car of tomorrow and bring back “stock” cars. It’s not going to abandon the rule that guarantees the top 35 in points a spot in each week’s race.

Despite all the talk about “loosening up” on letting drivers express themselves, NASCAR also isn’t going to allow people to go around having fistfights or swinging tire irons at each other. (Does anybody even have tire irons anymore? Maybe now it would be sway bars.)

The garage area isn’t a barroom and even if NASCAR tried to look the other way on physical confrontations the very fans who swear they want to see it would make such a big deal out of every such incident the teams and sponsors would immediately put the kibosh on such antics.

Does anybody really think that by putting Dale Jarrett in the booth and moving Rusty Wallace to the studio or running off Brent Musburger and Suzy Kolber, ESPN/ABC is going to “fix” everything that’s “wrong” with stock-car racing?

Certainly no speech at a news conference, by NASCAR chairman Brian France or anyone else, is going to change the economic realities of this sport.

Teams with the most resources and the most good people are always going to be better than teams that have less. Actually, that is going back to basics in one sense because it has not ever or will it ever be any other way. Money buys speed. Period.

Every era has had its dominant teams and those dominant teams were the ones who marshaled the most forces – things like money, equipment, expertise and experience – toward accomplishing that success.

From the sport’s broader perspective, the law of large numbers is going to apply as much going forward as it has in the past. It’s always going to be about selling more tickets and having more people watch on television.

That’s just how you keep score. No matter how many times anybody says it, NASCAR isn’t going to schedule a points race at a dirt track that seats 20,000 people. It’s not going to “ban” Cup drivers from racing in Nationwide races, either, because the big names sell more tickets and draw more fans to television and that’s what pumps the money into that series.

So far, the most significant change I’ve noticed in this “back to the basics” business is that Brooks & Dunn will headline the Daytona 500 prerace show.

Brooks & Dunn have actually been to Nashville once or twice in their lives, and over the past five years or so that would have automatically disqualified them for that job. Anything that keeps Kelly Clarkson away from the race track is fine with me, but punching different buttons on a juke box hardly qualifies as a new direction for a major American sports franchise.

NASCAR officials will spend a lot of time this year talking about how good the competition is. That will be the primary talking point, and to be honest the new season does shape up to have several potentially compelling storylines on the track.

If enough of those play out – if Dale Earnhardt Jr. has a big year, if Toyota emerges as a realistic challenger, if the other manufacturers eat away even somewhat at Chevrolet’s dominance (or, at least, the Hendrick Motorsports dominance), if Juan Pablo Montoya shows that a driver from South America can race with just as much fire and passion as one from South Carolina can – NASCAR could have the kind of year it’s going to need to have.

If that’s what Brian France means about going back to basics, he’s right. If the racing is compelling, if the competition is what everybody wants to talk about each Monday morning, then a lot of the other stuff people seem to get hung up on these days won’t matter nearly as much as it seems they have in recent years.