Grades are in for season's first half
By Dave Rodman, Turner Sports Interactive July 16, 2004
8:33 PM EDT (0033 GMT)
There's certainly something to be said for analyzing a half-season of racing in the Nextel Cup Series, rather than analyzing a quarter.
Dave Rodman
To a large degree, the numbers don't lie, and at the two-thirds point to the cutoff for the Chase for the Nextel Cup, drivers and teams have very little in the way of gray area in which to quibble about lack of performance.
While the standings and statistics are a black-and-white display, what follows is one man's interpretation and subjective rating of the first half of the Nextel Cup season.
Head and shoulders above the mob
Jimmie Johnson continues to amaze everyone with his patience, resilience, competitiveness and dogged determination. But the sincere hope is that just as much credit for the No. 48 Lowe's Chevrolet team's success if applied to Johnson's crew chief, Chad Knaus.
Through the first half of the 2004 season, Jimmie Johnson appears to be the man to beat. Johnson and Knaus have set the Nextel Cup Series on its collective ear, with league leading totals in top-five finishes (13), top-10s (14), miles led and laps led -- along with three victories and a Bud Pole for good measure.
The only bad thing that's apt to happen to Johnson in the near future is that his currently dominant points lead is going to vaporize after race 26, when the Chase for the Nextel Cup truly begins. But for his first half performance Johnson and company earn a grade of A+.
Different ends of the same spectrum
For Jeff Gordon and his No. 24 DuPont Chevrolet team, 2004 has been the return to the "same old, same old" performance that legions of Gordon lovers -- and haters -- have come to expect. But for Dale Earnhardt Jr., 2004 has been a revelation.
Jeff Gordon is coming on strong as of late. Credit: Autostock
As impressive as his off-track impact has been on the sport, Earnhardt continues to impress with his on-track maturity and his garage-area demeanor. He's led in 11 of the 18 races in the first half, has three wins, nine top-fives and 12 top-10s.
He had one absolutely pathetic race, at Las Vegas, but otherwise, even when he and the team are not good, as at California and Michigan, they don't end up any worse than 21st -- which is the sign of a sure championship contender.
Gordon and crew chief Robbie Loomis have got their train pointed straight at the front of the standings. Two accidents and an engine failure have knocked them back to third in the standings, but he's led in all but five races, has a league-leading four wins and 13 top-10s.
For their first half of work, Earnhardt and Gordon earn grades of A.
Just poking -- or breaking through
If Tony Stewart has been a little less than scintillating in the first half of 2004, the rest of the competition had better watch out if he and the Home Depot crew ever get their act completely together -- which typically happens later in the season.
Historically, Tony Stewart cimes on strong late in the season. Credit: Autostock
Stewart has been off-and-on during the first half, but even after three " off" days at Pocono, Michigan and Infineon, Stewart bounced back to be a front-runner at Daytona and a winner at Chicagoland.
Casey Mears, on the other hand, was expected by virtually no one to achieve what he has in the first half of 2004. He would not have been cast as a possibility for the Chase for the Nextel Cup when the season started, yet he and his Target Dodge team, led by Jimmy Elledge, are sitting 16th in the standings.
Mears has been a top-10 contender at most venues so far this season, and for that alone, the Ganassi Racing youngster is to be commended. His seven top-10 finishes are as unpredictable as they are highly commendable.
For their efforts, Stewart and Mears get grades of A-.
Overachieving and overreaching
Kasey Kahne, Matt Kenseth, Elliott Sadler and Ryan Newman are a quartet brought together in this report by differing circumstances.
Kasey Kahne success may be the surprise of the 2004 season's first half.
In many respects, Kahne's season has been mind-boggling in that, despite high expectations raised by Bill Elliott's performance in the No. 9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Intrepid last season, no one expected Kahne to notch four Bud Poles, four runner-up finishes and the fourth position on the lap leader chart.
Kenseth won twice early in the season in his No. 17 DeWalt Ford, raising expectations for a more aggressive campaign for the defending Cup champion, but since then production has lagged just a little bit. Despite that, Kenseth has 10 top-10 finishes and is fifth in the standings.
Sadler, in building even more of an affinity with M&M's Ford crew chief Todd Parrott, has raised his performance level to what most people expected when he joined Robert Yates Racing. He is solidly in the top 10 with seven top-10 finishes.
In many camps, Newman was forecast as a sure championship contender in 2004, and with the scenario presented by the Chase for the Nextel Cup that may yet happen. But luck (mostly bad), cut tires and an engine failure at Lowe's Motor Speedway have doomed Newman -- who maintains the best average starting position in the series -- to the bottom of the top-10 in the standings.
For their efforts in the first half Kahne, Kenseth, Sadler and Newman get grades of B+.
Hanging on the edge
It's not easy to exactly lay a finger on what's gone on to put Bobby Labonte, Kevin Harvick, Kurt Busch, Jeremy Mayfield, Dale Jarrett and Mark Martin in the position they're in.
Kevin Harvick has yet to visit Victory Lane in 2004. Credit: Autostock
Labonte is the one most poised to make a move as the second half begins as, after a solid -- if winless -- first half resulted in Interstate Batteries crew chief Michael McSwain being fired. Thing is, whether the move is up or down remains to be seen.
Harvick -- currently eighth in the Nextel Cup standings -- has seemed to be on the verge of superstardom since his rookie season three years ago. The next eight races will determine whether or not the Chase is the next exceptional chapter in his career.
Busch is another superb driver who can't avoid potholes and barriers not of his own making. After falling to ninth in the standings, the next stretch is critical for the Sharpie/IRWIN Ford's season, as well.
Jarrett and Martin are a pair of highly-valued veterans that may be putting the pieces together. The best could be yet to come for both, this season as they scramble to get into the top-10.
This group earns a grade of B for the first half.
Is this making it, or not?
If you don't make the Chase for the Nextel Cup, will the season be deemed a failure? That's a question that drivers in this group may be forced to answer.
The pure successes have been limited, marked in large part by Rusty Wallace's first win in more than 100 races and a career first Bud Pole for rookie candidate Brian Vickers.
But so much more was expected of both of them, not to mention two-time Daytona 500 winner Michael Waltrip, Sterling Marlin, Terry Labonte, Robby Gordon, Greg Biffle and Joe Nemechek.
While different details have led to their many setbacks, this group earns a grade of C for the first half.
Floating, like porpoises
That is, they rarely break the surface of the water, even though you know they're there -- and then Wham! They soar into the sunlight.
Again, for a variety of reasons Jeff Burton, Ward Burton, Scott Wimmer, Ricky Rudd, Brendan Gaughan and Scott Riggs fall into this category.
Unfortunately, the sunbeams have been weighted by a million black pebbles that threaten to sink them to the bottom of the Nextel Cup ocean, so this group rates a grade of C-.
Floating, barely
The last group is saved by one subjective qualification: If you're trying as mightily as you possibly can, you can't be rated a failure.
That being said, it shows just how tough Nextel Cup racing is. You can have teams of competent individuals, backed by successful sponsors, for whom the struggle seems maddeningly overwhelming.
Ricky Craven's team is an independent group that's swimming in a sea that filled with multi-car teams that might as well be sharks.
Ken Schrader's team is another single-car operation that has qualified fairly well, but has struggled to convert it into consistent results.
Kyle Petty and Jeff Green have cars to draw from but have struggled with engine woes. While they have shown slight improvement, it hasn't been detected much in the standings.
Morgan-McClure Motorsports has struggled all season with its once vaunted No. 4 Chevrolets, currently driven by Jimmy Spencer, and the group is battling to stay afloat with minimal sponsorship.
Richard Childress Racing is another team that has plenty of sponsorship on its star-crossed No. 30 America Online Chevrolet, but the team has battled to keep a driver in the car while keeping it as productive as it should be.
For its efforts, but mostly for a general lack of credible results, this group earns a first-half grade of D.
Incomplete
In 2004, the bottom of the Nextel Cup standings, as well as most every starting lineup this season, has been sprinkled with teams and drivers trying to make a start or establish a presence in the series.
Owner/drivers Morgan Shepherd, Hermie Sadler and Kirk Shelmerdine; owners Don Arnold, James Finch, Dave Watson and Stan Hover and drivers Derrike Cope, Kevin Lepage, John Andretti, Todd Bodine, P.J. Jones, Stanton Barrett, Bobby Hamilton Jr., Johnny Benson and Andy Hillenburg have all made at least four starts, which rate a grade of Incomplete -- but definitely an A for effort.
Dave Rodman is a senior writer for NASCAR.com. To provide feedback to Dave, email him at [email protected]
By Dave Rodman, Turner Sports Interactive July 16, 2004
8:33 PM EDT (0033 GMT)
There's certainly something to be said for analyzing a half-season of racing in the Nextel Cup Series, rather than analyzing a quarter.
Dave Rodman
To a large degree, the numbers don't lie, and at the two-thirds point to the cutoff for the Chase for the Nextel Cup, drivers and teams have very little in the way of gray area in which to quibble about lack of performance.
While the standings and statistics are a black-and-white display, what follows is one man's interpretation and subjective rating of the first half of the Nextel Cup season.
Head and shoulders above the mob
Jimmie Johnson continues to amaze everyone with his patience, resilience, competitiveness and dogged determination. But the sincere hope is that just as much credit for the No. 48 Lowe's Chevrolet team's success if applied to Johnson's crew chief, Chad Knaus.
Through the first half of the 2004 season, Jimmie Johnson appears to be the man to beat. Johnson and Knaus have set the Nextel Cup Series on its collective ear, with league leading totals in top-five finishes (13), top-10s (14), miles led and laps led -- along with three victories and a Bud Pole for good measure.
The only bad thing that's apt to happen to Johnson in the near future is that his currently dominant points lead is going to vaporize after race 26, when the Chase for the Nextel Cup truly begins. But for his first half performance Johnson and company earn a grade of A+.
Different ends of the same spectrum
For Jeff Gordon and his No. 24 DuPont Chevrolet team, 2004 has been the return to the "same old, same old" performance that legions of Gordon lovers -- and haters -- have come to expect. But for Dale Earnhardt Jr., 2004 has been a revelation.
Jeff Gordon is coming on strong as of late. Credit: Autostock
As impressive as his off-track impact has been on the sport, Earnhardt continues to impress with his on-track maturity and his garage-area demeanor. He's led in 11 of the 18 races in the first half, has three wins, nine top-fives and 12 top-10s.
He had one absolutely pathetic race, at Las Vegas, but otherwise, even when he and the team are not good, as at California and Michigan, they don't end up any worse than 21st -- which is the sign of a sure championship contender.
Gordon and crew chief Robbie Loomis have got their train pointed straight at the front of the standings. Two accidents and an engine failure have knocked them back to third in the standings, but he's led in all but five races, has a league-leading four wins and 13 top-10s.
For their first half of work, Earnhardt and Gordon earn grades of A.
Just poking -- or breaking through
If Tony Stewart has been a little less than scintillating in the first half of 2004, the rest of the competition had better watch out if he and the Home Depot crew ever get their act completely together -- which typically happens later in the season.
Historically, Tony Stewart cimes on strong late in the season. Credit: Autostock
Stewart has been off-and-on during the first half, but even after three " off" days at Pocono, Michigan and Infineon, Stewart bounced back to be a front-runner at Daytona and a winner at Chicagoland.
Casey Mears, on the other hand, was expected by virtually no one to achieve what he has in the first half of 2004. He would not have been cast as a possibility for the Chase for the Nextel Cup when the season started, yet he and his Target Dodge team, led by Jimmy Elledge, are sitting 16th in the standings.
Mears has been a top-10 contender at most venues so far this season, and for that alone, the Ganassi Racing youngster is to be commended. His seven top-10 finishes are as unpredictable as they are highly commendable.
For their efforts, Stewart and Mears get grades of A-.
Overachieving and overreaching
Kasey Kahne, Matt Kenseth, Elliott Sadler and Ryan Newman are a quartet brought together in this report by differing circumstances.
Kasey Kahne success may be the surprise of the 2004 season's first half.
In many respects, Kahne's season has been mind-boggling in that, despite high expectations raised by Bill Elliott's performance in the No. 9 Dodge Dealers/UAW Intrepid last season, no one expected Kahne to notch four Bud Poles, four runner-up finishes and the fourth position on the lap leader chart.
Kenseth won twice early in the season in his No. 17 DeWalt Ford, raising expectations for a more aggressive campaign for the defending Cup champion, but since then production has lagged just a little bit. Despite that, Kenseth has 10 top-10 finishes and is fifth in the standings.
Sadler, in building even more of an affinity with M&M's Ford crew chief Todd Parrott, has raised his performance level to what most people expected when he joined Robert Yates Racing. He is solidly in the top 10 with seven top-10 finishes.
In many camps, Newman was forecast as a sure championship contender in 2004, and with the scenario presented by the Chase for the Nextel Cup that may yet happen. But luck (mostly bad), cut tires and an engine failure at Lowe's Motor Speedway have doomed Newman -- who maintains the best average starting position in the series -- to the bottom of the top-10 in the standings.
For their efforts in the first half Kahne, Kenseth, Sadler and Newman get grades of B+.
Hanging on the edge
It's not easy to exactly lay a finger on what's gone on to put Bobby Labonte, Kevin Harvick, Kurt Busch, Jeremy Mayfield, Dale Jarrett and Mark Martin in the position they're in.
Kevin Harvick has yet to visit Victory Lane in 2004. Credit: Autostock
Labonte is the one most poised to make a move as the second half begins as, after a solid -- if winless -- first half resulted in Interstate Batteries crew chief Michael McSwain being fired. Thing is, whether the move is up or down remains to be seen.
Harvick -- currently eighth in the Nextel Cup standings -- has seemed to be on the verge of superstardom since his rookie season three years ago. The next eight races will determine whether or not the Chase is the next exceptional chapter in his career.
Busch is another superb driver who can't avoid potholes and barriers not of his own making. After falling to ninth in the standings, the next stretch is critical for the Sharpie/IRWIN Ford's season, as well.
Jarrett and Martin are a pair of highly-valued veterans that may be putting the pieces together. The best could be yet to come for both, this season as they scramble to get into the top-10.
This group earns a grade of B for the first half.
Is this making it, or not?
If you don't make the Chase for the Nextel Cup, will the season be deemed a failure? That's a question that drivers in this group may be forced to answer.
The pure successes have been limited, marked in large part by Rusty Wallace's first win in more than 100 races and a career first Bud Pole for rookie candidate Brian Vickers.
But so much more was expected of both of them, not to mention two-time Daytona 500 winner Michael Waltrip, Sterling Marlin, Terry Labonte, Robby Gordon, Greg Biffle and Joe Nemechek.
While different details have led to their many setbacks, this group earns a grade of C for the first half.
Floating, like porpoises
That is, they rarely break the surface of the water, even though you know they're there -- and then Wham! They soar into the sunlight.
Again, for a variety of reasons Jeff Burton, Ward Burton, Scott Wimmer, Ricky Rudd, Brendan Gaughan and Scott Riggs fall into this category.
Unfortunately, the sunbeams have been weighted by a million black pebbles that threaten to sink them to the bottom of the Nextel Cup ocean, so this group rates a grade of C-.
Floating, barely
The last group is saved by one subjective qualification: If you're trying as mightily as you possibly can, you can't be rated a failure.
That being said, it shows just how tough Nextel Cup racing is. You can have teams of competent individuals, backed by successful sponsors, for whom the struggle seems maddeningly overwhelming.
Ricky Craven's team is an independent group that's swimming in a sea that filled with multi-car teams that might as well be sharks.
Ken Schrader's team is another single-car operation that has qualified fairly well, but has struggled to convert it into consistent results.
Kyle Petty and Jeff Green have cars to draw from but have struggled with engine woes. While they have shown slight improvement, it hasn't been detected much in the standings.
Morgan-McClure Motorsports has struggled all season with its once vaunted No. 4 Chevrolets, currently driven by Jimmy Spencer, and the group is battling to stay afloat with minimal sponsorship.
Richard Childress Racing is another team that has plenty of sponsorship on its star-crossed No. 30 America Online Chevrolet, but the team has battled to keep a driver in the car while keeping it as productive as it should be.
For its efforts, but mostly for a general lack of credible results, this group earns a first-half grade of D.
Incomplete
In 2004, the bottom of the Nextel Cup standings, as well as most every starting lineup this season, has been sprinkled with teams and drivers trying to make a start or establish a presence in the series.
Owner/drivers Morgan Shepherd, Hermie Sadler and Kirk Shelmerdine; owners Don Arnold, James Finch, Dave Watson and Stan Hover and drivers Derrike Cope, Kevin Lepage, John Andretti, Todd Bodine, P.J. Jones, Stanton Barrett, Bobby Hamilton Jr., Johnny Benson and Andy Hillenburg have all made at least four starts, which rate a grade of Incomplete -- but definitely an A for effort.
Dave Rodman is a senior writer for NASCAR.com. To provide feedback to Dave, email him at [email protected]