Diehards Fan Editorial

If there was something to talk about this season, I think Carl Edwards was part of the discussion.  The biggest story, in my opinion didn’t come when he and Stewart battled it out for the title, all the talk came in a span from May to August.  When the media was taking every little rumor and speculating on where Carl Edwards was going to go next year, he was still keeping his mind straight on the track and scoring solid finishes.  Dale Earnhardt Jr., maybe the most popular driver but when his contract is up, even with the rant and rave of 2006 when he left Dale Earnhardt Inc, to go to Hendrick; his deal did not bring as much media rave as Carl Edwards’ contract negotiations this season.

Once again Jack Roush and Ford won out on the deal as the driver decided to stay put with his current race team and contend for future titles on the track.  Everyone had said that Edwards was going to sign with Joe Gibbs Racing and there was one helluva deal laid on the table for Edwards to sign his name to from Home Depot and Toyota.  But apparently at the last minute Ford Racing wanted Edwards even more than Gibbs and Toyota did.  Sure, having three superstar level drivers on the same team would have looked good, but truthfully it goes back to the old saying “too many roosters in the house.”

I think that all of the media was focused on Edwards leaving and when it came time to make the decision, Edwards made the observations and wisely decided to stick to the team he was with.  Even with the big deal put on the plate by Gibbs, Home Depot and Toyota; Edwards made all those that said he was leaving look very stupid.  Two days before he announced his deal with Roush, an ESPN writer had said he knew that it was all but done, NASCAR rumor writer Mike Mulhern had said he had heard in New Hampshire two weeks before that it was a done deal for Edwards to move to Gibbs.  But did he?  No.

It shows that the media likes to talk and so does teams around the garage.  The news really stood out when Edwards made his announcement to stay with Jack Roush and his organization.  He and Jack Roush have been together since 2003, and have had success through the hard times.  Roush even went down the road of signing Edwards’ crew chief Bob Osborne to a long-term deal to help seal the deal and keep Edwards there.

So when you really look at what went on during this time period, Edwards’ contract was one of the biggest stories overall this season in NASCAR, and not just for himself.

I’ve been getting emails in the inbox the last couple of days from people telling me that it was not right for Busch to get nailed by NASCAR with being parked for the two remaining races of the weekend in Texas.  And then came the Carl Edwards hate mail.  Yeah, Carl did dump Brad Keselowski at Atlanta last March and he came back on the track at Michigan in 2006 and nailed Dale Earnhardt Jr., but here’s the big difference folks.

Edwards hasn’t been on NASCAR’s radar for the last year, Kyle Busch has been on NASCAR’s mapping system ever since giving an official the finger last fall in Texas.  This season, it started with the incident at Darlington in May with Kevin Harvick.  Later that month, he was popped with a major speeding violation, and in June he had the incident with owner Richard Childress.  It’s added up, and then Friday night he did something that no driver should do.  He got behind the 33 of Ron Hornaday at TMS, and he pushed him going over 130 miles per hour and when he couldn’t turn him by pushing him, he moved over and got the right rear quarter panel and turned Hornaday’s truck head on into the wall.

Carl Edwards and Tony Stewart share a friendly rivalry going down the stretch(May 14, 2011 - Photo by Jason Smith/Getty Images North America)

You can say that the punishment doesn’t fit the crime but it does.  These things have been adding up for Kyle, and it’s been getting out of hand with him.  I think that there are a lot of people that don’t look at some other things that goes with being a race car driver.  As a sponsor Mars Candy, which is the maker of M&M’s Candies, was very disappointed with their driver and when the sponsor puts out a statement like this, you are in trouble.

“The recent actions by Kyle Busch are not consistent with the values of M&M’S and we’re very disappointed. Like you, we hold those who represent our brand to a higher standard and we have expressed our concerns directly to Joe Gibbs Racing.”

M&M’s decided to back out of the last two races but will return next season.

I think that is a bad sign when the driver gets that response from their sponsor.  Especially a sponsor that takes a lot of influence from kids and the younger generation. This company has a lot of kids that like Kyle for the sponsorship.  And when you have a driver that throws the finger at officials, uses terrible language on the radio to his team, and then wrecks driver who is in the hunt for the truck series championship, when he is not even a regular in the series.  I think you have to go back to how a driver reacts after a race as well, Busch is one of the most ignorant drivers in the garage area if he hasn’t won a race.  I think that’s another difference in he and Carl Edwards, proof of that is last night when Edwards went over and congratulated his competition for beating him, Tony Stewart.

Busch is one of the most talented drivers out there, but he lacks respect to other drivers and when you lack that, you don’t get it from other drivers.  In this Chase, right now Carl Edwards and Tony Stewart have a friendly respectful rivalry.  These two guys are joking and carrying on a very good fight for the title, but the difference in the two of them and if it were Busch, the respect is there.  I remember back in 2008, Carl Edwards putting the bumper to this guy at Bristol Motor Speedway and at the end of the race, Busch retaliated on Edwards, however, it was Busch that took the embarrassing spin on the front stretch at Bristol and went to name calling.

That is something that you don’t want when you are a sponsor for a major driver in this sport.  You have to look at the pros and the cons when it comes to these things, and Mars has a lot of children that watch their car just because of what is on the car, not the driver.  I am not someone who thought what Edwards did at Atlanta last year was right, but there is still a difference as I said (no probation, no history with competitor, and when you listen to the radio the crew chief tried to cool Busch down.)

A friend of mine and I talked last night.  She made a point to me that a lot of teams feel that it is the crew chief’s responsibility to keep its driver calm and cool.  But you could hear clearly that the crew chief in the truck series for Busch tried keeping him from causing the incident from happening, however, Busch did not feel it was worth listening.

NASCAR is a very fan oriented sport, the most dedicated fans surround the stands each weekend and if we all liked the same driver.  However, in the past week I think I have found out more that Kyle Busch’s fans don’t understand what really happened last week.  There is the old saying “the good doesn’t outweigh the bad.”  That is the case here for Kyle Busch people.  I am on NASCAR feeds on facebook and read quite a bit on twitter as well and I have heard of Busch’s fans saying they wanted to boycot NASCAR for what they did to Busch because Carl Edwards got by with wrecking Brad Keselowski. 

Every fan has a different opinion of every driver and they have their favorite driver, but here is the deal that I’ve gotten from most Shrub fans.  They can dish it out but they can’t take the criticism.  Fans have to understand that if you go for a driver and he causes a lot of mayhem on the track, he’s going to get bashed and talked about.  My friend, who I not name, and I talked about this situation and compared it to living in the hometown of your rival teams school.  I am a Tennessee fan and I live inside Gainesville, Florida, and she lives in College Station, Texas and is not a Texas A&M fan.  So we both take criticism for that.  It is the same for Kyle Busch fans, if you are going to go for the most disliked guy in NASCAR you are going to have to take the hits for your driver people and not whine about everything when he gets bashed. 

I lived through Carl Edwards’ hard years of racing, when Carl and Kevin Harvick had trouble, and Carl and Tony Stewart had issues.  Drivers mature through a period but I have not seen a difference in Kyle Busch.  One thing I have to say is Carl does do a lot of behind the scenes charity work, he doesn’t have to tell everyone what he does, because he likes it to be unknown.  I hear Kyle’s fans preach because he does a lot of charity work for kids that should outweight what he does on the track, well I am sorry it doesn’t.  A true fan doesn’t whine and cry to other drivers fans when theirs is being bashed, they stick up for them and handle it.  I never back down in a debate about Carl Edwards, I know my grounds and know when to back down. 

Kyle Busch’s fans have a habit of throwing the punch but not taking it.  Driver criticism is part of this sport, always has been and yes it always will be.  It’s going to be like that forever, and if you can’t take driver bashing and criticism, I don’t recommend you being a fan.

Fans don’t pay attention to every little thing a driver does off of the track.  Most of the criticism comes from on the track, and when you have done some of the things Busch has done, the good can’t outweigh the bad.  It just doesn’t work that way, so don’t go comparing Carl Edwards’ past to Kyle Busch.  You just can’t do it.

Yeah Tony, remember that.  I remember Denny Hamlin trying to play the mind games with Jimmie Johnson and it backfiring on him, the difference – Carl Edwards.  Edwards is a fierce competitor and he has three very good race tracks left on the schedule for him to gain valuable stamina at.  If there were three races in the Chase that Edwards would like to have as the final three, he probably couldn’t ask for three any better than Texas, Phoenix and Homestead. 

Stewart does have three wins inside the Chase.  However, what is favoring the 99 car in the Chase is solid consistency.  Edwards worst finish in the Chase came two weeks ago at Talladega when he left with an 11th place finish.  His average finish in the Chase has been an extraordinary 6.14 in the first seven events.  Now its crunch time.

Edwards and Texas.  The only three time winner at the fast 1.5 mile oval in Fort Worth, and he’s been very good in the past at finding top-five finishes when he has not had other problems.  He won his last race at the track in 2008, and it was in this very race where he dominated.  In the spring event at TMS, Edwards scored a third place finish in the event when his teammate Matt Kenseth dominated the event.  Just a few weeks ago, he did something very similar when he drove to a third place finish at Charlotte when Kenseth won there.  Edwards’ average finish at the track isn’t a reflection of how great he has been there in the past, it’s only a 16.5.  But look at the numbers that go with the average finish and you can see he is great at the track, 479 laps led at the track, 4 top-fives, and 5 top-ten finishes at the track.

Then the series takes on a newly reconfigured Phoenix International Raceway.  Drivers believe it will be much faster than in the past and the new pavement brings up a lot of questions for everyone that might throw another wildcard in the book.  But if you go by past statistics at the track, Edwards isn’t too bad there either.  He’s won the last two poles at the track, and was looking very dominant in the spring race before Kyle Busch sent him down on the apron and tore the car up.  He led 21 laps before the incident occurred and he dominated last November at Phoenix, leading 93 laps and winning by a dominant margin over Ryan Newman.  He’s had 14 starts at the track, scored 1 win, 5 top-fives, and nine top-tens, leading 201 laps and averaging a 13 even there. 

Then there is the great one.  Homestead-Miami Speedway, no one can beat Edwards’ numbers at the mile and a half in Miami.  He has ran seven events at the track, scored two of the last three wins there, scored four top-fives, and six top-tens, and his worst finish came in his rookie start at the track with 14th place.  He’s led 441 laps, and averaged 5.7, better than anyone else on the series at the track.  Last November, Edwards led 190 of the 267 laps of the race on the way to his second win at the track.

So if Tony Stewart wants to get down and dirty, Carl Edwards can.  Some might think there is an even playing field for Stewart to beat Edwards, however, the 99 car has had more success than the 14 car at these tracks.  People have been talking about the momentum that Stewart and Darrien Grubb have built since the Chase started, but who can beat Edwards and his consistency.  Some call it all luck, but Edwards has been good at places, only to have uncertain mishaps occur such as the speeding penalty at Dover.  However, the team has overcame problems to get good finishes and that is what wins a championship.  Matt Kenseth went on a rail back in 2003 and led the series standings from the fourth race of the season on, and won the title on one victory, so it’s not impossible to do it on one win is it? 

Consistency has always been what wins a title.  Edwards lost the title in 2008, on a nine win season to JJ, and that is something that he can remember very boldly.  The team has been putting itself on the leaderboard with consistency and that is going to be what wins the title for them.  I know there is always the case of a bad race, and it isn’t good to have it this late in the season, but if Edwards does keep his rolling consistency going, it is going to be hard to overtake him.

There’s a lot of hatred towards a 20-year old kid over a decision he made on Sunday’s race at Talladega.  Trevor Bayne decided to go with a teammate instead of Jeff Gordon, and it seems that “Saint” Gordon’s fans can’t let it drop.

I have read so much trash talk about this kid that’s made my blood boil and it’s made me write this.  I hope every Gordon fan reads this, and gets a taste of what they are posting, because Trevor Bayne did what was right.  I don’t care how great Jeff Gordon is, how much of a legend he is, and what great things he has done for charity.  Gordon is still human, and he’s not perfect either.  I can remember Jeff Gordon ruining a driver’s championship hopes himself back in 1992 when his team left a roll of duct tape on the car at Atlanta Motor Speedway in the great battle for the championship and it took Davey Allison’s championship hopes out.

You fans that are calling this kid a liar, a traitor, and even worse, you’ve got a lot to learn.  Racing is a business and when you work for someone, you help the other cars in that organization.  You bash a 20-year old, who has great charactor, and heart, and call him things he definetly doesn’t deserve.  You criticize one move that he made in this race and you act as if it is a death blow.  Jeff Gordon, if anyone, knows that no one is perfect.  I can remember a lot of trouble that this guy has caused since 1992 in the Sprint Cup Series.  I remember him taking out Rusty Wallace at Richmond International Raceway in 1997, and it coming back to bite him in the butt later that season when Rusty came back at him.  Racing is just that, racing.  It isn’t life.  We are not the guy’s that are out there piloting these race cars and making quick decisions on the track.

Trevor Bayne is part of Roush Fenway Racing, even though, some nutcase Gordon fans hate to realize that since he was in the 21 car, however, his job was to help the 17 car, not the 24.  Yes I know that not all of Jeff Gordon’s fans are this way, only the 80% that flooded the kids facebook and twitter account with bashing comments.  One of my best friends is a Hendrick fan, and she was respectful enough to agree that teammates come first in this sport.  But Jeff isn’t a perfect angel himself like I said before, and they need to remember that.  Trevor isn’t the first driver to back out of a decision to help someone in the draft at Talladega and Daytona, it’s part of restrictor plate racing and it has been since they first started running with the plates.

Gordon’s done it, Earnhardt did it, it is part of racing.  It is time you Gordon fans get a grip on life and move on.

While I am probably going to get some people responding to me about this one, it’s that matter of opinion thing, you know, the right to say what comes to you?  There are all kinds of athletes in this world, football and baseball players get the most credit for being the better athletes while racers tend to take the least amount of credit because many people think that it is all about the car.  But this is of a different matter.  Drivers are different, they come from a total different breed of people, and we experienced why yesterday.  There is a major risk when you get behind the wheel of one of these high speed vehicles, whether it is in a stock car or an open wheeler, danger is racing, racing is danger, no matter how you want to word it.

I listened to IRL champion Dario Franchiitti last night after his friend Dan Wheldon was killed in that terrible crash at Las Vegas, and he said it best. 

“Days like today is it worth it? Absolutely not,” said Dario Franchitti, . “But we’re race car drivers, it’s what we do

“We can put so much pressure on ourselves to win races and championships, and that’s what we love to do,” Franchitti said. “It’s what we live for.

 ”But on days like today, it doesn’t really matter.”

I am a fan of all forms of auto racing, I’ve been called an addict by many others because I watch it all, stock cars, Indy cars, F1, and road course sports car racing.  But when something like yesterday’s incident comes around, it makes you think how these men and women do it.  As I said you can say that these people are not athletes all that you want, but they are.  They are in their own league.  Yes there are death’s and many career ending injuries in other sports, but when it comes to racing nothing stands out to be even close as I said last night unless you look at bull riding or even boxing. 

“But it’s part of our sport. He knew the risks; we all know the risks when we get in the car.” Michael Andretti stated on Sunday.  “ It probably touches me a little more because of everything that was going on. It’s a terrible thing, but unfortunately in our sport we’ve had a lot of days like these. They suck, but that’s the way it is.” 

When something like this happens, it brings these guys back down life and it makes them realize the chances that they take each race.  I think that there are so many people that think it is a simple thing to learn to wheel a race car.  Not everyone can do it.  It is totally different than a game of football, and a lot more dangerous.  When on the track these people are dealing with competitors surrounding them, they know at any moment that something can happen.  It is something they put in the back side of the mind, and try to forget that there are dangers in their cars.

“We don’t think about things like this,” Indy car driver Tony Kanaan said. “As race car drivers, we have to block out that possibility. Unfortunately when it happens it’s really hard.

 ”But what we do is dangerous and we face that every day,” Kanaan continued. “It’s been happening for years, for decades. It’s just hard to swallow, but we have to move on. We’re racers; we love what we do. Eventually we’re going to have to turn the page and remember him with the great memories we have. I know exactly what he would say if I told him I was going to quit: He’d say he was going to take my place.”

NASCAR and Indycar drivers are of the same mold, no matter who would want to debate it.  It takes a special person to race and do it successful, it takes an even bigger person to handle these tragic moments and still race.  It was two years ago that I seen Carl go airborne in Talladega when he was tagged by Brad Keselowski and seen him walk away from that incident.  It has amazed me how stock car racing has turned the innovation of safety around since 2001 when Earnhardt was killed at Daytona.  We have grown so comfortable to the fact that these guys have ran safely since 2006 without a death in either series that we had forgotten what it does to drivers.  We’ve seen crashes that happen and wonder how they still do it, it is that different mindset, that drivers have inside of them. 

I’ve seen drivers get behind the wheel with broke hands, arms, eyes taped from an injury the week before, torn ACL’s, and broken ribs.  These guys do what other athletes cannot.  So the next time you question them as athletes think again.  They are more so an athlete than any other sport you see.  I just think a day after tragedy on the track it is said that many people from other sports were emailing me and telling me that racing needed to be banned, that it wasn’t a sport and needed to be taken off the air because kids did not need to see such horrible stuff on tv. 

Take into consideration that yes it is that dangerous game that these guys’ play, but they do it because it is what they love and it is what they do for a living.  These people are certainly in their own league in the sports world.

Race teams have to be in it to win it, but they always have to be able to rally in the darkness.  In three races this season, Carl Edwards, crew chief Bob Osborne and the rest of the No. 99 Aflac Racing team has provided each other encouragement in the first four races of the season, including three rallies in the late part of the events to score two top-fives, and three top-tens.  They are the only team in the Chase to score four top-ten finishes in the first four events going into Charlotte this weekend.

And it seems to be becoming a habit on Edwards for these late race comebacks.  Edwards had a bad handling race car in New Hampshire, at what he considers to be one of his worst tracks on the schedule and finished in eighth place.  At Dover, a miscue by himself with a speeding penalty had many thinking that his chances were over with, however, the driver overcame the issue and finished 3rd at Dover.  Last weekend could very well, however, be called the comeback of the season for this team.  A call in the garage area on Saturday to make a gamble on the front chassis setup did not prevail for the 99 car. 

Crew chief Bob Osborne made the calls and it worked to give Edwards a top-five finish after many thought it would result in a very bad points day in Kansas.  This weekend the series is going to Charlotte and there has been good and bad to come from races at Charlotte.  Edwards has gone four races without a top-ten finish at the mile and a half oval in Concord, NC., however, he has had success including a win in the All-Star race in May.  The team will be taking the car that finished ninth at Bristol in August, and hopes that they are able to add to their series points lead. 

Yet there is one edge that Edwards has.  This is a intermediate oval and he has been the best at these tracks in 2011.  Of the eight tracks on these 1.5 mile venues, Carl Edwards has scored a top-ten in seven of the events.  The only event he didn’t?  Was Charlotte in May.  Yet, some people forget that some tracks change over a six month period and some drivers run better when it is completely cool and dark.  Edwards dominated the All-Star race under those circumstances in May, and I compare this race more to the All-Star race than the Coca-Cola 600 conditions. 

These late rallies have been good for the 99 car, and going into Charlotte they’ve provided the team with a 1-point lead over Kevin Harvick. Erase the rest of the season, and put up the four races for the Chase and Carl Edwards has the best average so far of fifth.  He’s scored a 4th, 8th, 3rd and 5th place finish in this season’s four Chase events.  Remember before the Chase started?  We had some very harsh critics among fans and our media.  No one was picking this bunch because of their fall off in the summer and I made that call “Don’t count these guy’s chances out.”

In the summer stretch from May to August, Carl Edwards fell off.  He lost the points lead to Kyle Busch after a bad spark plug in Michigan caused the team a solid finish there, and many fans were thinking that he was heading to Joe Gibbs Racing.  Edwards baffled the media when he turned everything around and announced that he would be staying put at Roush and things have come back to the way they were during the early part of the season.  Wins are good, but I do believe that it was Harvick that said it best that he’d take a fifth-place average to win this season’s championship over the wins that he already had.  Edwards has been the one that has kept the fifth place average up and he’s still flying below radar to the media and some fans.