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Is it possible that Dale Jr. just isn't an elite NASCAR driver?

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by Double Down, May 29, 2009.

  1. Double J

    Double J Active Member

    Kyle Petty came closer to winning a Cup championship (1992, 133 points out) than Junior has done. Just saying.
     
  2. Football_Bat

    Football_Bat Well-Known Member

    Junior got run into the wall in '02 at TMS by Shawna Freaking Robinson.
     
  3. lono

    lono Active Member

    Maybe it was your use of the words "or he's gone" that confused me. He is in absolutely no danger whatsoever of losing his ride with Hendrick. Let's be clear about that, OK?

    There's another important piece of the equation that has to be considered here: With the advent of the COT, the sport's gotten much more technical. The driver has to be very precise about the feedback he gives to the crew chief during the race, so the crew chief can make proper adjustments to make the car handle better as conditions change.

    That's where the other Hendrick drivers excel and where Junior/Eury struggled. Hendrick himself said that on the teleconference this week.

    The No. 88 almost never gets better as the race goes on, only worse. Junior needs to learn to give better feedback than, "This thing's a POS. I can't drive it."

    If he can learn that, he can be good. If not, he's screwed.
     
  4. novelist_wannabe

    novelist_wannabe Well-Known Member

    Slight threadjack here .... When Days of Thunder was in theatres, I went out during a thunderstorm to try to get a picture of lightning behind the marquee, so I could run a stand-alone with a cutline that said, "... and Nights of Lightning." Alas, I couldn't get the shot. Wasn't, and still am not, a very good photographer.
     
  5. How did Dale get so much father than Kerry?
    Is it because the old man was still around and Kerry's name was not Dale Jr.
    The two are probably about the same level of driver, though Jr. went, much, much farther.
     
  6. kleeda

    kleeda Active Member

    Junior is a good driver and, for pure on-track skills, maye be an elite one.
    But I would go farther than lono but opining that he had never been good at communicating to his crew what is wrong and what he thinks may be worth trying in order to fix his car. And you good often get by with that in the old car.
    The new one is fussy, I believe largely due to mismatched tires, and requires constant adjustment.
    I think the ability to communicate what's wrong and how to fix it is the weak point in his game and at this stage of his career can't be improved.
     
  7. imjustagirl

    imjustagirl Active Member

    This is a fantastic point.
     
  8. playthrough

    playthrough Moderator Staff Member

    For all the excuses of the COT, the best drivers/teams are still figuring out a way to make it work (The 48's title string spanning new and old car can't be lauded enough, imo). The statute of limitations is almost out to use the car as a blanket excuse for lack of performance, though Junior deserves time with his new guy to see if they can somehow create a language that he and Eury never had.
     
  9. imjustagirl

    imjustagirl Active Member

    Oh, I don't think it's an excuse at all. It's an explanation.

    Anyone who has listened to Junior's radio hears things like "Hell, this thing's loose as all hell" and "I can't drive this thang." Then you listen to Johnson, who tells Knaus exactly where it's tight, where it's loose, if it's drifting in traffic, etc. Knaus knows where to look for improvement...Tony Jr. had no direction from the guy in the car.
     
  10. What I can't figure out, and this happens all too often, is if the Hendrick teams share information, and they claim they do, how can the other three teams find the right setup and Junior's team misses it by a mile? Not only does Junior's car not improve. It's nowhere near ready to race when they unload it.

    If Eury Jr. had that much say over setup, then yes, he had to go. And it's also possible that he and Junior were just too close, always squabbling. Maybe Junior needs an eminence grise in the pits, like Eury Senior was, to keep him in line and focused.
     
  11. playthrough

    playthrough Moderator Staff Member

    It's both. Certainly a new breed, but it's still a car.
     
  12. 2muchcoffeeman

    2muchcoffeeman Well-Known Member

    What I've always been told is that Eury Jr. worked off the notes he brought with him from DEI and used setups very different from those the other Hendrick teams were using. The insinuation was that the 88 and 5 teams were using completely different information, even though they're in the same building.
     
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