NASCAR - Congrats, Jimmy; Other Musings

Well, another long NASCAR season is finally over and Jimmy Johnson exorcised his demons and landed his first of what I think will be a few championship trophies. Congrats to the entire Hendrick organization and JJ for a solid season.

There's been a lot of talk about NASCAR's TV ratings this season, with USA Today catching a lot of heat for a story they ran on Friday about the ratings decline. Ironically, the ratings for Homestead were down 10% according to news reports. I don't think this should surprise fans or NASCAR, but it is cause for concern. The problem is multi-faceted. First, the sport has grown in popularity exponentially since 2000. Hell, I wasn't even a fan before Fox started broadcasting the series. The rate of growth in all areas is simply not sustainable, regardless of the sport. NASCAR also suffers from extreme OVERexposure. No one can deny that, although I didn't hear it mentioned in any of the talk on Speed or TNT this weekend.

The amount of money spent on advertising, promoting drivers and promoting the races has gotten out of hand. Everywhere you look, it's NASCAR NASCAR NASCAR. The general population gets tired of it.

Another reason, and I forgot who brought it up on Wind Tunnel on Sunday, is that fans are getting pretty tired of NASCAR turning into F1 in the sense that only a small handful of drivers/teams can win. There are 43 drivers in every race. Granted a few of them don't deserve to be there (Derrick Cope, Morgan Shephard, etc.), but most do. But only drivers with big teams (Hendrick, Roush, RCR and DEI) have a shot at winning each week. What chance does Joe Nemecheck, Robby Gordon, Travis Kvapil, Jeff Green or Dave Blaney have week in and week out? Virtually NONE. Maybe I am in fantasy land, but it wasn't this way 20 years ago. And as I've said many times before, it gets pretty boring watching Tony Stewart, Jimmy Johnson and a small handful of others winning each week.

To compound that, how many races went down with the leaders banging it out at the finish? Mot many.

I also agree that many of the races are way too long. One of the many benefits of having Tivo is that you can get around this easily. Roundy roundy round for 5 hours is sleep-inducing. It's boring watching Kasey Khane or Matt Kenseth leading lap after lap for hours on end.

TV coverage has been abysmal with the TNT/NBC crew and commercials. Missed cautions, missed restarts, missed accidents, missed passes...And Bill Weber's nauseating, melodramatic commentary just kills people. I can't believe TNT signed him to continue for the next few years. I'd rather listen to BP and Wally, because they've been there, done that and know what they're talking about without injecting a bunch of over-dramatic platitudes.

The number of races and venues used absolutely needs to change. GET RID of one race in California. I don't care who sells out where, Rockingham races are infinitely more exciting to watch than those lame-ass parades put on at California. Or, use the road course for one of the California races. Do something, NASCAR. Other venues need to change as well. There should be some sort of rotating schedule year to year.

I'm already looking forward to next season, with the debut of Toyota (which is a good thing, folks) and several new teams. But I think everyone - fans, drivers, teams - desperately needed a break. But my Tivo is ready and waiting for late January!!!!

NASCAR - One to Go

ACK!!! Can we please have a NEW winner in Nextel Cup this season besides Harvick, Johnson, Khane, Stewart or Kenseth?? Maybe Bobby Labonte or Joe Nemecheck can come through for a surprise win at Homestead next week.

Anyway, a fairly competitive race Sunday. It was nice to see Mark Martin leading again, but a real bummer to see him fall short yet again. We got our usual dose of Mr. Stewart dumping yet another competitor. Let's hope Jaime McMurray delivers a nice payback next week. One thing that struck me (again) is how far Roush Racing has fallen this year. Greg Biffle can't buy a win this season, whereas he was a weekly contender last season.

Did someone pull at fast one at Robby Gordon Motorsports? What the hell has happened to that team down the stretch? Robby was well into the top 20 and now sits 30th in points. And here we thought Robby would be sitting pretty going into next year. He was leading races the first half of the season, nearly winning a few. Now? It looks like he hired Kenny Wallace to drive his car and finish several laps down each week. It's not looking pretty.

Misc. Thoughts:

• Did anyone even notice Ward Burton was at Phoenix?
  
• Word to Michael Waltrip: step it up a notch, will ya? I've been a big fan of Michael, even though he's never done particularly well. But this year has been embarrassing to say the least.
  
• Who else thinks Ray Evernham was chuckling when Jeremy Mayfield failed to qualify for Sunday's race?
  
• Speaking of, what the hell happened at the end of the Busch race Saturday? Looks like his sweetie Erin Crocker got booted pretty hard AFTER the Start/Finish line. But they cut TV coverage pretty quickly and didn't talk about it at all.
  
• I loved Juan Pablo Montoya's comments after the race. This is why he's going to be fun to have in the Nextel Cup garage: "It's tough passing these guys -- they seem like they don't see you, they just sort of play dumb....When you run up front, the guy up front runs a lot cleaner, a lot smarter. The guys in the back are just too dumb. I'm trying to keep the car in one piece and its very hard, because, yes, I am a rookie -- but no, I am not a rookie."
  

F1 - Why Americans Don't Get F1

No one can deny that Formula 1 is the pinnacle of racing when it comes to sheer technology and, possibly, talent. One of the things F1 definitely is NOT short on is arrogance and pettiness. And I think this haughty taughty, caviar and plastic surgery culture is a major reason most American motorsports fans don't particularly care for F1.

The most recent case in point is the continuing - and hopefully near ending - saga surrounding Juan Pablo Montoya and his quick departure from McLaren. If you don't already know, JPM didn't have any standing offers from a reputable F1 team by the middle of this season. He decided enough was enough. He wanted to get back to REAL racing, as opposed to race cars on parade. He wanted to get away from the petty bullshit so prevalent in the F1 garages and offices. he announced he would drive for Chip Ganassi in Nextel Cup in 2007. Rather than honor its contrct with JPM, McLaren kicked him out of his ride for the remainder of the season. As if to say "F you, Juan Pablo!," McLaren forbid JPM from sitting in another race car for anyone else until the end of the year. The pettiness was in full effect. They threw condescending insults at him in the press for months thereafter.

Today, there's an article on f1live.com where the McLaren "bosses" (aka crybabies) continue to place blame on the team's pathetic 2006 performance:

Montoya exit was 'disruption' to McLaren

Juan Pablo Montoya's premature departure from Formula One this year was a 'disruption', McLaren's chief executive has said.

As Colombian Montoya prepares to make his debut this weekend in NASCAR's premier category, Martin Whitmarsh suggested to Speed TV that the 31-year-old's soured end to his Grand Prix career might have influenced McLaren's failure to win a race in 2006.

But Whitmarsh said: "We can try and apportion blame and responsibility there, but it didn't work out.

"Whether it was 90 per cent his fault and 10 per cent ours or vice versa - he didn't really blend in.

"He didn't really blend in at Williams either, but we hoped we could achieve more with Juan than we did."

Montoya won seven Grand Prix from 95 starts.

Last time I checked, JPM didn't make the decision to part ways with the team halfway through the season and disrupt things. He was forcefully removed from his seat. He signed a contract in Nextel for NEXT year, you idiots. Not this year. So the disruption his removal caused was YOUR doing, not his. Do you care to explain why Kimi's season was such a disaster from the first race? Or was the JPM's fault, too? It's this type of childish bullshit that really makes me want to piss on the people who run Formula 1. No wonder JPM is a million times happier being part of a series where the competitors can actually be friendly and helpful and where former teams don't spend months badmouthing a former driver.

Maybe if F1 ever got rid of its snotty air, they *might* attract more fans. Maybe not.