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NASCAR News - Sports News | November 13, 2008
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JJ's 106-point Chase lead still a mountain to climb for Edwards
By Terry Blount, ESPN.com
November 11, 2008
Carl Edwards is winning and making up ground, but history is against him in his quest to catch Jimmie Johnson.
No driver has come back to win the Cup title from the spot where Carl Edwards sits today -- 106 points down with two races to go.
The late Alan Kulwicki has the comeback record for the final two events, making up 85 points to top Bill Elliott and Davey Allison for the 1992 crown.
Kulwicki was 144 points back with four races to go, compared to a 198-point deficit Edwards had with four remaining. So in the past two races, Edwards has made up 92 points. Duplicate that in the last two and he's the champ.
Kulwicki wasn't involved in a Chase playoff, but the basic point structure was the same.
Edwards does have one bonus that wasn't around 16 years ago. A driver today receives 10 more points for winning than the victor earned during Kulwicki's comeback.
Dale Earnhardt made up 97 points on Rusty Wallace in the final two races of 1989, but Wallace held on to win the championship by 12 markers.
As for the Chase, no points leader has lost the lead with two races to go since the playoff started in 2004. But this isn't an impossible task.
Two more races with the same outcome as Texas -- an Edwards win and a 15th-place showing by Johnson -- would get it done. Edwards now is well within the 161 points a driver can make up in one event.
But it's still a tall task, one that no other driver ever has accomplished.
One interesting side note: Edwards will end the season with more top-5s and more top-10s than Johnson. He also will end the year with more victories unless Johnson wins the last two events.
No Busch or Earnhardt at awards banquet?
Kyle Busch, the man who dominated the regular season and has eight Cup victories, may not make it to the season-ending awards banquet in New York City.
And the same fate could befall Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Only the top 10 drivers in the standings get to walk on stage in their tuxedos at the Waldorf-Astoria. The Chase drivers who finish 11th and 12th are left out.
Three men are battling to avoid those last two spots. Busch is 10th, but he's only one point ahead of Earnhardt in 11th. And Denny Hamlin is only two points behind Earnhardt in the final Chase spot.
Tony Stewart and Matt Kenseth aren't safe, either. Kenseth is eighth, 36 points ahead of Earnhardt. Stewart is only 25 points ahead of the 11th spot.
But the worst-case scenario for NASCAR is Busch and Earnhardt falling short. No Earnhardt would be the second consecutive year NASCAR's glittering season-ending show wouldn't have its most popular driver.
And love him or hate him, Busch deserves to take the stage for what he has accomplished this season.
F1 gets the point
Maybe NASCAR should adopt the Formula One points format. The championship was decided by one point for the second consecutive year.
Lewis Hamilton won the title by making a last-lap pass for fifth in the final event. Felipe Massa, the man who fell one point short, won the race.
Anything close to that would be a dream come true for NASCAR officials.
F1 has a 10-point system where only the top eight finishers earn points in a race.
Saluting 'The Sarge'
Tony Schumacher, a leading candidate for Driver of the Year, clinched his fifth consecutive NHRA Top Fuel title (and sixth overall) in Las Vegas on Sunday with a remarkable 15th victory this season.
But the Funny Car battle still has five drivers with a mathematical shot at the championship heading to the final race at Pomona, Calif., in two weeks.
Cruz Pedregon holds a 12-point lead over Tim Wilkerson. If Pedregon wins it, he will equal John Force's record for number of years (16) between his first title and his most recent championship.
However, Pedregon easily would hold the NHRA record for number of years between a driver's first title to his second.
Keselowski vs. Logano
Brad Keselowski, who will race in the Nationwide Series again next year for JR Motorsports in the No. 88 Chevy, made his Cup debut at Texas and finished an impressive 19th in a fifth car for Hendrick Motorsports.
Joey Logano, who will replace Tony Stewart next year in the No. 20 Toyota, finished 40th at Texas in his third Cup start while driving a fourth entry for Joe Gibbs Racing. Logano was the first driver to go a lap down when Clint Bowyer passed him on Lap 28.
Hmmm. Now who is supposed to be the "Sliced Bread" phenom?
Granted, this was just one race, and Logano had a bad car. But JGR officials could be getting a little nervous about their 18-year-old superstar-in-the-making, wondering whether he's ready to compete with the Cup veterans next season.
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Johnson's third title would place him among the greats
By Jeff Owens, NASCAR Scene
November 11, 2008
A lot will be written in the next few days and weeks about Jimmie Johnson tying Cale Yarborough's record of three straight NASCAR Cup championships.
Reporters and media pundits will go out of their way to compare the two stars from different eras.
But really, there is no comparison.
Jeff Owens (NASCAR Scene)
Johnson's third straight title is much more significant. In fact, it is one of the most significant accomplishments in NASCAR history.
Richard Petty, who has a record seven Cup championships, never won three in a row. Dale Earnhardt, the other seven-time champion, didn't either.
Nor did Jeff Gordon, the four-time champion who has emerged as the greatest driver of the current era.
David Pearson, Darrell Waltrip, Bobby Allison. All were great champions and are legends of the sport. But none accomplished what Johnson will do when he seals his third straight title at Homestead this week.
Only Yarborough, the legendary tough man, accomplished the feat, and it had been grossly overlooked until Johnson came along to match him.
Yarborough turned the trick from 1976 to 1978, dominating part of the decade that most consider NASCAR's glory years.
For more news from the track and the shop, check out our NASCAR Scene headlines page.
But Yarborough won his titles at a time when winning the series championship wasn't such a huge deal. Back then, winning big races — the Daytona 500, the World 600 and the Southern 500 — were how the greats were measured.
Now, during Johnson's reign, winning the Chase and the series championship means everything. It's what puts the best head and shoulders above the rest.
Johnson's three straight titles are one of the most impressive accomplishments in NASCAR history because it comes in the sport's most competitive era. His streak, in fact, may be just as significant as Petty's career total of seven because of the competition he has faced and the drivers and teams he has beaten.
When Yarborough won three straight titles, he had to beat only a handful of elite drivers. Though he outran such legends as Petty, Allison, Waltrip and Benny Parsons in the championship race, the list of drivers and teams capable of winning races back then was a short one.
Only eight drivers won races in 1976. Only seven won in 1977 and again in '78.
By comparison, there were 16 different winners when Johnson won his second title last year. There were 13 in 2006 and 12 have won so far this season.
When Yarborough won his three titles for Junior Johnson, there were only 11 to 14 teams that ran the entire Cup schedule in order to contend for the championship. It wasn't until 1976 that series sponsor R.J. Reynolds began offering teams and drivers bonus money and other incentives to run every race. Until then, only a handful of teams ran every race, with only a few running enough events to contend for the title.
Yarborough and his team took advantage of the changing series to win the first three titles under NASCAR's new incentive program.
Thirty years later, more than half the 43-car field starts each season with their eyes on the championship or at least making NASCAR's championship playoffs.
Johnson not only has more potential race winners to contend with each week, but he has had to beat nine to 11 teams in the Chase the past three years.
Like it or not, it is much more difficult to win a Cup title under NASCAR's current playoff format than it was during NASCAR's old points system, which awarded consistency over the course of an entire season.
That fact that he has won three straight in the Chase adds even more significance to his accomplishment.
Yarborough was indeed one of NASCAR's greatest drivers. His 83 career victories and three straight championships put him among the top five drivers of all-time.
But in just seven years, Johnson has also cemented his status as one of the greatest ever.
He is one of just eight drivers to win three titles, joining Petty, Pearson, Yarborough, Earnhardt, Waltrip and Gordon.
With three titles and 40 career victories, he is at least among the top 10 drivers of all time and headed toward an even greater standing.
At age 33, he could easily double his victory total and no doubt has more championships ahead of him. One more and he will tie Gordon, who is generally regarded as one of the top five of all time.
On the cusp of a record-tying third straight title, Johnson has already achieved greatness. The question now is, how high can he go?
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