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Another One Bites The Dust…by Chuck Abrams ~ January 15th, 2008. Filed under: Chuck Checks In!. |
Morgan-McClure has shut down its operations due to lack of sponsorship.
What next, no more small teams at all?
With once mighty Yates racing struggling to find sponsors you have to wonder about the state of the sport a little bit.
A lot of sports go through cycles and this may just be another of those as NASCAR — the sport — transitions once again. The end of smaller teams may soon be upon us and it is something fans and media have been pondering for the past couple of years. Bill Davis Racing, Yates, Red Bull, Petty, Wood Brothers – all single- or two-car teams that are having difficulty staying competitive in the face of teams built around three or four cars.
And while they do have sponsors lined up for 2008, we all know that sponsors these days come and go at the drop of a hat. What appears to have been a season long sponsor can suddenly take a leap like a bad mortgage rate.
Not all transitions are easy ones and some leave us forgetting how bad some of the racing in the old days was. Remember drivers winning at Daytona by several laps? While you may not like today’s restrictor plate pack racing, you do have to admit it is not a snooze fest. Well, most of the time it is not. Most of the changes that have happened have made the sport more competitive. Better drivers (for the most part) are running in better and more evenly matched equipment than in the past, leading to more cars finishing on the lead lap.
The lost sponsorship dance also leaves drivers like Ward Burton on the outside looking in as teams vie for younger drivers who are debatably more “marketable” with a lot of debatable “upside”. All the while many fans prefer to see the known entity that has been racing and paying his dues over the young gun who has simply run in the top 10 in ARCA or Busch. In the good old days, it was a consistent top 5 or even a Busch title that was required to make the jump to Cup. Or you had to be a winner in Indy cars back in the day when drivers drove in both series.
But younger drivers are in better equipment in the lower series these days and Cup talent scouts are on the prowl for the next driver to take an owner and sponsor to the Promised Land. This talent transition that MAY bode well for the sport if the talent pool is not drained too early or too often in the hope of manna from heaven.
And as the talent transition continues, small teams get left out of the bidding pool because of a lack of funds, high visibility sponsors and perceived competitiveness. All of which eventually becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy; more distance between the Haves and Have Nots. And the Have Nots always lose.
Let’s hope that this small team transition period is one that is good for the sport and not one that may leave us yearning even more for good old days.
Fast Jr.
“Yes” it is only testing and “no” cars are not under NASCAR regulations scrutiny but Jr. fans have a good reason to hope again. Jr. was second to Jarrett on the speed charts in his 88B car on Monday morning. His 88A car ran 12th.
Also of note was Dario Franchitti placing 3rd and 16th in his two test cars. But we all know that testing is not racing with 43 other cars in a turbulent draft on a very bumpy track. Good luck Messr. Franchitti – me thinks you will need it.
Drive fast, turn left and keep the shiny side up. Let me know your thoughts on all this.
Feel free to send Chuck your thoughts on this and other race topics at chucka@turnleftracing.com. The blog at www.turnleftracing.com is down now due to spammers. We will have that back up as soon as we can.
January 15th, 2008 at 9:01 am
You forgot to mention BAM. They seem to have new-found ingenuity when it comes to new sponsors, and this may be the wave of the future. There are just so many large companies willing to make heavy investments in NA$CAR, but BAM appears to have found a way to lure a lot of smaller investors. Heck, I thought BAM would’ve folded by now, but they keep finding new hope.
RM
January 15th, 2008 at 1:05 pm
I used to be a race car fan-atic. Those days are over, I now only watch the very start and the last 20-30 laps depending on the track there at. I first lost interest in the cars themselves and thought the drivers were still very entertaining. Now the drivers themselves are all clones. Look close and you’ll see a trend in the the driver characteristics. I call them them the DOT’s (drivers of tomorrow), driving the COT’s. And they all work for the TOT’s (teams of tomorrow). All this adds up to one thing, SOY-(sport of yesterday). Ask me what I want to see. Cars built from an actual production car. build the roll structure in to it like they used to do. Keep the same drivetrain they race with today. Fords should look like Fords and A Chevy should look like a Chevy and so on. Take away the million dollars of R&D it takes to make a front fender and you take away the big team advantage. If the Ford body has an edge, great, leave it and let the manufactures deal with it. don’t penalize the with different spoilers. Let the drivers talk ther own language, (personality). I used to love to listen to Ward Burton talk. If I want to hear a bunch of cring babies, i’ll go hang out at a nursury.
John Tokash
January 15th, 2008 at 2:27 pm
John Tokash has it right. Also, one can thank the top 35 rule for making sponsors less willing to put up the money it takes to run a Cup team. Who wants to put up a bunch of money just to see it go to waste on a “no-win” qualification process. It won’t be long before there are only 35 teams and the stands will be about 35 percent filled. Thanks a lot NASCAR!
January 15th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
John, how in the world could you understand what Ward Burton was saying? Did you have an interpreter?
RM
January 15th, 2008 at 3:08 pm
LOL!!
January 15th, 2008 at 10:42 pm
You are right BAM is still around someway somehow. But I don’t see that as a real good way to compete, and I mean compete for a win on any given week. They can certainly put a team on the track but the cost of NASCAR technology has gone through the roof. Cup racing has to be second only to F1 in in technology costs. But you do have to hand it to BAM, they seem to be surviving when others, and some larger others, are struggling.
January 16th, 2008 at 8:32 am
John …….you hit the nail right on the head.However Brain will not be interested in something that the teams and the fans want.He needs those big sponsorship $ to keep his version of racing alive,and bring all those big bucks to NA$CAR.Take a look at the tents at Daytona,who is paying the shot for them?As was stated at the congressional hearing on baseball yesterday,that many sports are becoming entertainment,not sport.It is just a matter of time till the big 3 wake up and cut the funding to these sticker cars.(Change the stickers and a Ford becomes a Chev.)
January 16th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
Very well said John!You nailed it!FOREVER3GODALEJR.!!!
January 16th, 2008 at 3:58 pm
Yes ioldealer, the days are numbered alright. COT= STICKER CAR= BORING. It’s a good thing my kids are still young and can provide me with real entertaiment and youth sports. Those dollars you are talking about have ruined the sport, even if I can afford to take my family to a local track, I can’t afford to feed them there. We stop and get food beforehand and eat in the parking lot before going in. OH, wait a minute,I fogot I no longer have a local track. They tore it down to build more houses. OH, wait again, the housing market busted and now it’just a vacant field. I hope you sensed some bitterness here. You won’t catch me throwing any of my hard earned cash at that SOB (son of Bill).
John Tokash