Old Stats Are Fun, but They Shot Down a Good Theory
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I keep hammering on the driver development programs and
the insistence by teams and sponsors on elevating young drivers to Monster/Cup
rides before they’ve built decent fan followings (or, in some cases, their
abilities). I still believe that’s a big negative for NASCAR’s popularity, but
I tried to do a little quick research on this year’s playoff situation to
support my position, and folks, I struck out.
What I was looking for was some evidence that the
champions of old brought more fans to the track because they’d been around
longer and typically had a bigger fan base. Oops! Take a look at what I found
out.
Here are some stats from the old days that I hoped would
support my case, using a couple of years from each decade to pull together my
case:
-- In 1959, Lee Petty won the Grand National championship
at age 45 after having been a regular in NASCAR’s traveling circus since its
start 10 years earlier. The following year, 1960, Rex White claimed the
championship at age 31 in his 5th year as a Grand National regular.
Lee Petty had
plenty of experience when he won his NASCAR championships. Maybe today’s champs
would bring in more fans if they wore shirts like that during the races.
-- In 1969, David Pearson was the champ at age 34 after
10 years on the circuit, and the next year Bobby Isaac claimed the crown after
nearly a full decade competing.
-- In 1979, Richard Petty won the last of his
championships at age 41 with 20 years of Grand National racing under his belt.
The next year brought a rare newcomer, Dale Earnhardt, who claimed the title at
age 29 in only his second full season. The rare newcomer, we would soon learn,
also was a rare talent.
-- In 1989, Rusty Wallace was Winston Cup champ at age 32
after 7 years (following some success and fan-building racing with the old ASA
circuit). Earnhardt claimed another title in 1990, now at age 39 and with 12
seasons under his belt.
The Intimidator won
championships regardless of age or experience, but we probably won’t ever see
that kind of performance again, regardless of rules, cars, charters, playoffs,
or anything else.
-- In 1999, Dale Jarrett claimed the championship at age
42 after 13 seasons as a circuit regular, and 2000 saw Bobby Labonte take the
title at age 36 in his 8th year.
Except for Earnhardt and Rex White, most of those
champions had been racing for about a decade - some much more - when they
outran everyone else. That sounded good, until I looked at the final eight
contenders for 2017. There are the two under-25 “babies,” Ryan Blaney and Chase
Elliott, each in only his second full season, but the next least “experienced”
is Brad Keselowski with 8 (really 8-½) years, and he’s 33. The other five have
12 or more years racing Cup, and while Kyle Busch is still only 32, Kevin
Harvick and Jimmie Johnson are both 41.
Harvick and Johnson
are relative geezers in today’s youth-oriented Monster/Cup world, but they’re
also guys who still win a lot - and bring lots of fans to the track.
So while Blaney or Elliott might end up with the trophy,
it’s more likely we’ll see it in the hands of someone just as experienced as
all those champs of decades past.
Frank, your theory just hit the inside wall without a
Safer Barrier. At least it was fun looking all that stuff up.
What I didn’t shoot down is the argument that NASCAR’s
decline has been linked to NASCAR-designed, nowhere-near-stock race cars, an
overdose of rules, cookie-cutter tracks, and (we don’t talk about this one as
much) tires that make these highly aerodynamic cars so good that there just
ain’t much action. I’ll stick with that as my diagnosis.
But somebody still had better find a way to get a lot
more fans wearing Eric Jones, Daniel Suarez and William Byron shirts and caps,
or when the Harvicks, Johnsons and others follow Jeff
Gordon, Tony Stewart, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and now Matt Kenseth out the door,
there won’t be even fewer fans around to watch.
Rex White’s ‘59
Chevy had vent windows, windshield wipers and sheet-metal covers over where
actual headlights used to be. What are the chances you’d find anything at your
Chevy dealer’s that looked like Chase Elliott’s ride? Yet we expect people to
look at the #24 and its counterparts and say they’re fans of stock car racing.
Frank’s Loose Lug Nuts are all in his head this week. Let’s see what happens at
Homestead, and we’ll spread a few around after we conclude the 2017 season.
On
second thought…
The things you find
while looking for other things. I’m saying here that NASCAR has put too much
emphasis on aerodynamics, and we might have more fun watching races if we had
cars built like this again. (By the way, a few years after this photo was taken,
I was old enough to pay attention to cars and sometimes dealers, and I have no
recollection whatsoever of Lauritzen Nash Motors in
Richmond.)
I just love this
photo of Richard Petty and Junior Johnson at Hillsboro. You head down the
backstretch, aware that a wrong move might put you in the trees. Can’t see any
fans in these, though, like you would have seen on the backstretch at Richmond.
If NASCAR doesn’t
want teams working on their cars after wrecks, maybe we should just go back to
building them so the work wasn’t needed. Here’s Lee Petty at Detroit in 1951,
driving his car AFTER rolling it.
Can’t put a bunch
of seemingly pointless old pictures up without including one of Fulton’s and my
hero from the ‘60s, J.T. Putney. Go get ‘em, J.T. (even though you seem to be
racing in the grass).