buckaroo
Here kitty, kitty, kitty
Just read an article at Scene Daily by Jeff Gluck about why are the Cup drivers allowed to race in the Nationwide series. Jeff admits that he is fairly new to the sport, but has always wondered why the lower tiered series allows Cup drivers to participate. This is an old subject and we've gone over it time and time again, but I just wanted to comment that it really wasn't all that long ago that the main challengers were not Cup drivers and a nice rivalry began, though it isn't so much now. Remember when the top driver in the Busch Series was Earnhardt Jr. and his main rival was Matt Kenseth? That was a good rivalry and many of us thought the rivalry would continue and for a while it did. Then Matt won his Cup title and it seems that since that time, that rivalry just wasn't what it was.
As Gluck writes, these days, that sort of rivalry just will never materialize because the top drivers in that series are the top drivers in the Cup series. The rivalries have already been established. Another thing that Gluck writes is that because the Cup drivers now dominate the lower series, those up and coming youngsters are having a hard time getting sponsorship, or even a ride. Last year's ROY hasn't even been in one race this year. Granted, sponsors want a known driver over an unknown, but those unknowns could become known if they were the ones on the track, making names for themselves.
Many of Gluck's readers have commented, and rightly so, that without those big time Cup drivers, the audience would wane, and of course, NASCAR and the media don't want that. But I say that it's a product of what NASCAR has sown. Some of those readers have made differing suggestions as to how to remedy this problem, yet it's clear to me that those who have commented really don't understand it all. Not one of the responders mentioned that the drivers use the Nationwide race to help them on Sunday.
I've said this time and time again that in order to make a sport of any kind popular, it has to be able to be seen and not just by a few, but in a venue that allows the most people to see it. As an argument, I know that if the NFL was only seen by people on a pay-per-view basis or in person, AND if the networks began to show the top high school teams (same top teams each week) play weekly, the popularity of the NFL would begin to wane and the popularity of those high school teams would grow nationally. The same for NASCAR. The Truck series grew somewhat when they were only on Speed, but that audience was very limited and that series has waned in the past couple of years. ESPN has a bigger audience and so the Nationwide Series at least has a larger population in which to garner fans, but it would be even better (for NASCAR to build a bigger fan base) if it were shown on one of the four networks. But of course, NASCAR requires an un-Godly amount of money to telecast their races and with lesser known drivers, it's a must for the networks to have drivers that are known, thus Cuppers. This has now become a Catch 22 situation.
As Gluck writes, these days, that sort of rivalry just will never materialize because the top drivers in that series are the top drivers in the Cup series. The rivalries have already been established. Another thing that Gluck writes is that because the Cup drivers now dominate the lower series, those up and coming youngsters are having a hard time getting sponsorship, or even a ride. Last year's ROY hasn't even been in one race this year. Granted, sponsors want a known driver over an unknown, but those unknowns could become known if they were the ones on the track, making names for themselves.
Many of Gluck's readers have commented, and rightly so, that without those big time Cup drivers, the audience would wane, and of course, NASCAR and the media don't want that. But I say that it's a product of what NASCAR has sown. Some of those readers have made differing suggestions as to how to remedy this problem, yet it's clear to me that those who have commented really don't understand it all. Not one of the responders mentioned that the drivers use the Nationwide race to help them on Sunday.
I've said this time and time again that in order to make a sport of any kind popular, it has to be able to be seen and not just by a few, but in a venue that allows the most people to see it. As an argument, I know that if the NFL was only seen by people on a pay-per-view basis or in person, AND if the networks began to show the top high school teams (same top teams each week) play weekly, the popularity of the NFL would begin to wane and the popularity of those high school teams would grow nationally. The same for NASCAR. The Truck series grew somewhat when they were only on Speed, but that audience was very limited and that series has waned in the past couple of years. ESPN has a bigger audience and so the Nationwide Series at least has a larger population in which to garner fans, but it would be even better (for NASCAR to build a bigger fan base) if it were shown on one of the four networks. But of course, NASCAR requires an un-Godly amount of money to telecast their races and with lesser known drivers, it's a must for the networks to have drivers that are known, thus Cuppers. This has now become a Catch 22 situation.
