In today's column, Ed Hinton makes the analogy that the driver is the quarterback of the team, and that players in other sports can be substituted when they are hurt without affecting their chance for a championship.
I don't pay attention to NASCAR's team championship race but I assume that Hendrick gets to count all four cars. That's the way the manufacturer championship works. Now it used to be that the driver built his own car, so the driver championship encompassed more of the team concept. Even with hired drivers, teams mostly just had one car for the majority of races. Now of course, a team is up to four cars, with several satellites in some cases.
Few pay attention to anything other than the driver championship. Behind each winning driver is his engineers and pit crew that get little credit. There's also the current issue of drivers playing hurt in order to secure the championship. Why DON'T we replace the current driver and team championships with a real one for teams of one car?
Is it because ofKiekhaefer all the way back in the Fifties? It would certainly hurt job security for a driver if owners swapped people in and out depending on the track.But you could set a maximum number of drivers or swaps for the year. And it would encourage more drivers to start their own teams; the way it used to be.
updated by @andy-denardi: 12/05/16 04:04:08PM