Most underrated driver in any NASCAR series?

I thought "hazing" tires overheated them ... leading to death.
 
Oh, I forgot Ryan Sieg as well.

Give him some of the seats that the ride buyers have, he would have been a champion by now.
 
I guess ole Richmond was just too dumb to know that!. :) We sat on the pole at the Springfield dirt mile with an underpowered old car and a driver that had never run dirt before. He didn't know what he didn't know. He was running fifth when an axle broke with about five to go.
 
RICK ROSS!!!! HE NEEDS A TOP RIDE ASAP!!
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LewTheShoe said:
Except that Suarez had no money, no family fortune, no connections in racing. He got his sponsorship the old fashioned way... by earning it on the race track, starting in a friend's go kart. I don't know why so many people make up stuff about Suarez. I guess some folks really believe God made Nascar just for white Southern good ol' boys.
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Yeah my wording was sloppy I was referring to the Carlos Slim deal with Suarez
 
Charlie Spencer said:
For some reason, I don't put Denny in Mark's league (yet?). I mentally rank him down a tier.
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Actually, I would say Mark had four title runs. I would exclude 1994 from the list. Yes, he finished 2nd in points that year, but for the first two-thirds of that year the championship battle was between Dale and Ernie Irvan, then when Ernie got hurt it was Dale vs. Rusty for most of the rest of that year. Rusty had a bad last 4 races and Mark kind of slipped into 2nd in points at the last minute.
 
Kiante said:
Michael McDowell is very underrated in Cup. I'm also surprised no one mentioned Cole Whitt because he was touted as the next big thing for Red Bull along side Kahne and Elliott. A lot of times, especially on short tracks that Whitt was really quick even and had some nice runs for Tri-Star Motorsports this year.

Ross Chastain has been outperforming his JD equipment since his rookie season, he kept Cassill honest that '15 season. Jeremy Clements proved how good he is and Blake Koch has always been a solid driver in half-assed equipment.

Austin Hill is so underrated in the truck series, its not even funny. That young man can freakin' wheel it, I wish Ford still supported the series because he really had some great runs with his family team.
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Blake Koch is in an RCR car basically.
 
LJ7201 said:
Yeah my wording was sloppy I was referring to the Carlos Slim deal with Suarez
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The "Carlos Slim deal with Suarez" is really no different from the Lowes deal with a young Jimmie Johnson, or many other examples one could name. Even Erik Jones - with his tiny family-owned SLM team - had far more family support than Daniel Suarez or Jimmie Johnson.
 
This is not a dig at Suarez, please don't take it as one, but Lowes signed on with Johnson AFTER he had already been signed to his Cup deal. I think it's fairly safe to say that Suarez wouldn't be in a Gibbs Cup car right now if not for the Carlos Slim connection, maybe not in the US at all.
 
Formerjackman said:
I think it's fairly safe to say that Suarez wouldn't be in a Gibbs Cup car right now if not for the Carlos Slim connection
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Respectfully, very much an understatement. Matt Kenseth would be in a Cup car right now with a Carlos Slim connection.
 
Kiante said:
I like Suarez quite a bit and he did well his first season because both Suarez and Jones were neck-to-neck comparison wise.

I know no one is discrediting him, but the man can drive a racecar very well. That's all that really matters.
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I agree. I like EJ a lot, and really only hoped that Daniel could avoid losing respect when he was forced into the Cup ride after Carl quit. I was flat ass wrong. Daniel was very much the equal of EJ only in a different non-flashy kind of way. Love this kid. He might make EJ and Chase look kind of silly if he gets his first win before theirs....that would be cool IMO.
 
Formerjackman said:
This is not a dig at Suarez, please don't take it as one, but Lowes signed on with Johnson AFTER he had already been signed to his Cup deal. I think it's fairly safe to say that Suarez wouldn't be in a Gibbs Cup car right now if not for the Carlos Slim connection, maybe not in the US at all.
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Both Rick Hendrick and Jimmie Johnson have described the meeting with Lowes seeking their approval of JJ as the driver for Hendrick's new expansion to a fourth cup team. According to them, there was no cup deal for Johnson without Lowes approval. It is my understanding that Hendrick had Lowes on board for the fourth car, but no driver yet. And then Hendrick advocated for Johnson, and Lowes agreed... and it worked out OK.

Suarez earned the support from Carlos Slim based on his on-track performance in Mexico, before Gibbs. Slim helped him move up, as Slim has done with other racers before. For sure, it is safe to say Gibbs wouldn't have signed him had he not earned Slim's support. But so what? Are we to recast what goes on, based on various what-if scenarios? There is nothing dirty, nothing undeserved about Slim's support.
 
In the Cup Series I would definitely say that McDowell has been getting the job done for Leavine.

As mediocre as he was at Roush / JGR & MWR in 2015, David Ragan ended up with 3 top 10's and a 24.9 AVG finish (Buescher's average was 26.1 in the same car) to finish 30th in points for Front Row Motorsports.
 
LewTheShoe said:
Both Rick Hendrick and Jimmie Johnson have described the meeting with Lowes seeking their approval of JJ as the driver for Hendrick's new expansion to a fourth cup team. According to them, there was no cup deal for Johnson without Lowes approval. It is my understanding that Hendrick had Lowes on board for the fourth car, but no driver yet. And then Hendrick advocated for Johnson, and Lowes agreed... and it worked out OK.
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I didn't remember it quite that way, so I did a little digging. We all know the story of how Jimmie first talked to Jeff at the August 2000 Michigan Busch Race. (By coincidences of all time coincidences, I was there that day, in a guest capacity, and stood on pit road next to Jeff and Brooke before the race started). The story I found (told from the Lowes side of the story) is that they were having trouble finding ANYBODY they wanted to sponsor at the time, and they didn't want Jimmie either. It was not until a May 2001 meeting with HMS and Jimmie that they were convinced to take a chance on him, and then ONLY if Jeff was part of the sponsorship deal too, in case Jimmie flamed out. Most don't remember it now, but in 2002, Jeff's car carried Lowes decals as an associate sponsor, you could get a Lowes Card that year with either Jimmie or Jeff on it, both appeared in advertising for Lowes, and both did appearances for Lowes. As soon as Jimmie started winning, Gordon was slowly phased out of the deal. I could be totally off on this, but I don't remember ever seeing or hearing anything about Lowes already being on board with HMS, or that Johnson's employment being contingent getting Lowes to agree. What would have happened if Lowes had said no is open to speculation. Johnson had long since been named to drive the new car, time was starting to run down on finding a sponsor, especially if they wanted that sponsor to do Johnson's five "pre-rookie season" races in the fall of 2001. .
 
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AuzGrams said:
In the Cup Series I would definitely say that McDowell has been getting the job done for Leavine.

As mediocre as he was at Roush / JGR & MWR in 2015, David Ragan ended up with 3 top 10's and a 24.9 AVG finish (Buescher's average was 26.1 in the same car) to finish 30th in points for Front Row Motorsports.
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Regan is quite talented IMHO. He was quite the driver in the 38 last year. He just seemed to look comfortable back with FRM last year. He absolutely crushed Cassill.

There was some instances where he would be in the top 15 off of pace, its crazy.
 
Formerjackman said:
I didn't remember it quite that way, so I did a little digging. We all know the story of how Jimmie first talked to Jeff at the August 2000 Michigan Busch Race. (By coincidences of all time coincidences, I was there that day, in a guest capacity, and stood on pit road next to Jeff and Brooke before the race started). The story I found (told from the Lowes side of the story) is that they were having trouble finding ANYBODY they wanted to sponsor at the time, and they didn't want Jimmie either. It was not until a May 2001 meeting with HMS and Jimmie that they were convinced to take a chance on him, and then ONLY if Jeff was part of the sponsorship deal too, in case Jimmie flamed out. Most don't remember it now, but in 2002, Jeff's car carried Lowes decals as an associate sponsor, you could get a Lowes Card that year with either Jimmie or Jeff on it, both appeared in advertising for Lowes, and both did appearances for Lowes. As soon as Jimmie started winning, Gordon was slowly phased out of the deal. I could be totally off on this, but I don't remember ever seeing or hearing anything about Lowes already being on board with HMS, or that Johnson's employment being contingent getting Lowes to agree. What would have happened if Lowes had said no is open to speculation. Johnson had long since been named to drive the new car, time was starting to run down on finding a sponsor, especially if they wanted that sponsor to do Johnson's five "pre-rookie season" races in the fall of 2001. .
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Thanks....... I'm always interested in learning history....... little things that I didn't know that accumulate to big things..... ;)
 
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