All Purpose NASCAR Thread

AP now says an Evernham mole has confirmed that Elliott Sadler will drive the 19, starting this week.

 

Jenna Fryer has an interesting piece on the Mayfield / Evernham split on thatsracin.com.

 

Bob Pockrass of NASCAR Scene has a much more detailed one:

http://www.scenedaily.com/stories/2006/08/14/scene_daily32.html

 

Only read the first sentence. Oh boy.

EDIT: If this is in court documents that are public record, then the writer should face no backlash in the garage, I would think.

 

Way to go, Bob. Nice work, nice job.

 

So now that the much-debated can of whoopass has been opened -- and someone actually went to the courthouse and got the documents -- how big of a story does this become? If it's in court documents, it's Kosher to report, even if Evernham's response is a no comment.

And Jeff Gluck, your boy Gilliland is making a mistake, I'm afraid to say. RYR is a shell of its former self, and I think Gilliland would've been best served running a full year in the Busch or Truck Series next.

 

Damn. That was good stuff there by NASCAR Scene -- and I'm not a NASCAR-first kind of guy.

That's one case I wish would go to court.

 

From Pockrass' story...

Though I don't deal with him too often, Kahne was pretty candid about shifting Francis, et al. to the 9. He was asked if he had sensed such animosty building up in Mayfield today in DC.

"I sensed it about halfway through this year, yeah. You know, the end of last year he wanted a different team, and the beginning of this year, he thought his new team was the best he'd ever been with. I think all of that was definitely the right changes to put Kenny Francis and all them on my team and get Jeremy a new team. That's what he wanted. I've read things now where I stole his team. He didn't want that team - how did I steal it? Now he says that, it's because we ran so good and he didn't, you know?

"Me and Jeremy have a good relationship, we're fine. But I just don't like people saying I stole his team when he didn't want them. Shit yeah, I'll take them."

 

Everyone was waiting for Brooke to take Jeff to the cleaners in court. Of course, they settled out of court.

I don't think the France mafia ever would permit any case potentially involving Evernham and his close personal relations to see the pretrial motion phase. They know it could sully the sport's image. Bill France opens his wallet, pays a bunch of people to go away, and it'll be like this never happened. Wouldn't be surprised if he helped arrange the Gordon divorce settlement, either.

 

If I were Gilliland, I'd be doing the same thing he's doing now.

He's 30 now, so if he goes into Busch for a year, he's 32 by the time he starts Cup. Gilliland has a family with two little kids. what happens if he runs like Kleuver in Busch next year and someone decides not to give him a Cup ride...then he's screwed.

Take the Cup money now, get a Cup ride, establish yourself as a Cup driver...look, even Scott Wimmer gets to stay in Cup, and he's done nothing. He's probably not ready necessarily (only 10 career Busch races, one Cup race in a crap car), but I'd still do it.