OK, so the title is a little misleading, but at least it rhymes. Earlier this week Penske Racing officially announced the hiring of David Stremme for the #12 car. Like every other Silly Season announcement, it’s been known about for weeks.
Between Stremme and Reed Sorenson’s new rides it will be interesting to truly see where Ganassi cars are. In two years in Ganassi’s #40 car Stremme managed three top tens. Was it the car or is Stremme a good Nationwide driver but can’t cut it at the Cup level. I have a feeling both questions could be answered in 2009. Stremme definitely deserved another chance at the Cup level, and Penske is definitely a step up from Ganassi, albeit a small step. While Stremme gets a deserved second chance at the Cup level, he needs to make the most of it. He has never won a NASCAR race at any of the top three levels (203 starts) and has never even finished in the top ten in points in the Busch/Nationwide Series. There is the chance that with 75 Cup starts Stremme now has the experience to run up front or that he is some kind of late bloomer. It’s possible, but unlikely.
The hire is also an indictment on how far Penske’s prestige has fallen. Three years ago they were able to lure the defending Cup champion, Kurt Busch, to drive for them. Now when they need to replace Ryan Newman the best they could do was a winless Cup driver. Even with the organization’s struggles in recent years, Newman never finished lower than 18th in the points. Either Penske has unrealistic expectations for Stremme, or they have lowered them to unprecedented lows. It will certainly be an interesting year for Penske, especially to see whether Busch is willing to stick around with the team’s current standing on the Cup ladder.
Other Notes
SI.com’s Tim Tuttle wrote a candid piece on the CoT and how the season has gone with the new car.
The CoT was built for greater safety, which it has delivered, but also for closer racing and to limit the cubic dollars a team can throw at it to gain an edge and bring more drivers and teams to greater competitiveness. It’s been a failure in the second and third goals.
And Tuttle is correct. And if goals 2 and 3 are a flop, it seems like many people believed goal 1 could have been better applied to the old car. On the competition tip, Tuttle sums it all up as well as makes a grim prediction for the Chase:
The best teams and drivers are always going to win the majority of races, but the CoT has created more have nots than haves. Does NASCAR really want a series dominated by two or three drivers? What’s the point of the Chase in that scenario?
It’s more true than ever. Instead of 3 or 4 mega-teams dominating, it’s now one or two drivers dominating. While that does offer a return to the “Good ‘Ole Days” of NASCAR, I don’t think that’s what NASCAR had in mind. And even among the big teams there is a huge gap from Gibbs/Hendrick/Roush to Richard Childress and Evernham.
Do you have a friend that is always antsy and can’t sit still? Maybe he switches jobs yearly or buys a new car every six months. In NASCAR that guy is Robby Gordon. He has had three different manufacturers in as many seasons and it looks like he may have to find a fourth in 2009. Gillet-Evernham (GEM) is filing a lawsuit for breach of contract. The deal was to absorb Gordon’s car into GEM and Gordon would be the driver of the 4th car. Gordon apparently wavered and kept his team independent. I really thought his move last year to align with Yates engines was a good one that could help his team grow and expand. Then he jumped to Dodge only weeks before this year’s Daytona 500 (and apparently against GEM’s advice). All of the moving around has to make it tough to settle and I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that’s why he’s on the verge of falling out of the top 35.
It only took NASCAR officials most of the summer, but they apparently agree that heroin and operating 800HP autos is a bad mix. A revisedDrug Testing Policy will be enacted for 2009. While it’s easy to say, “What took you so long?!”, it’s better late than never.
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