Rating and breaking down the top 12 Cup teams from 2012.

Greg

Greg

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Rating and breaking down the top 12 Cup teams.

http://m.espn.go.com/rpm/story?storyId=8706917

Click the link to read the entire Terry Blount piece.
A summary or paraphrased highlights

1- Hendricks: Still the top dog/ all 4 drivers win and make chase/Johnson's title bid.
2. Penske: Keselowski and his title
3. MWR: Easily the most improved/ Bowyer strong with new team.
4. Rousch: 2 of 3 cars win/make chase
5. JGR: Fast but Hamlin stumbles in chase, Kyle doesn't make chase
6. SHR: No chase wins for Stewart/ No chase for Newman. The next big organizational improvement may not occur until Harvick arrives in 2014.
7. RCR: if MWR was the most improved, RCR was the counter, Bowyer and Miller were big losses.
Harvick makes the chase, but only one win at the next to last race of the year.
In 2013 Gannassi will not be using RCR engines a finical loss of millions and more evidence of decline.
Harvick doesn't leave until 2014, but the lame duck status is another new obstacle.
8. RPM: In spite of an Ambrose win they are clearly Fords 3rd string, and not enough to interest Dodge.
9. Furniture Row: A strong finish with Kurt, and 2013 potential.
10. EGR: Underachievers: Will use Hendricks motors in 2013. But no wins for Montoya or McMurray in two years, no 2012 top 5s. Much improvement needed.
11. JTG Daugherty: Modest outfit & improvement 2012 up to 23rd from 29th in points.
12. Finch: Big effort but Bare bones outfit 27th in owner points.
Rating and breaking down the top 12 Cup teams
 
OK

Hendrick.

Other than Kahne being slow out of the gate and Gordon's run of "bad luck", no real surprises there. The #5 will be a serious contender next year - mark it.

Penske.

Story of the season with Keselowski doing what Russell Wallace was never able to achieve. It will be interesting to see if Keselowski's head is still able to fit in the car next year and how well they do.

MWR.

Strong runner up for story of the year. However, if Truex don't get his butt in gear there may be some changes in 2014.

Roush.

Kenseth leaving is a bit of a shocker but you can't blame him when one of the top 5 drivers in Nascar is running races unsponsered. The writing was on the wall and he seen it. Edwards will likely have a comeback season and although some here try to make him the greatest villain of all time, he's one the better drivers and will be in contention come November, 2013.

JGR.

No excuses now. He's got 3 of the best drivers in Nascar so one of them needs to step up and take the title. The only question in the Gibbs camp is whether or not Kenseth can bring some stability to the egocentric bunch he's now part of.

SHR.

Danica.

RCR.

Old man Childress has got to be grinding his teeth over the lack of performance of his under powered cars. I expect that to change in 2013.

I'll do the rest later :)
 
#17D500winner said:
OK

Edwards will likely have a comeback season and although some here try to make him the greatest villain of all time, he's one the better drivers and will be in contention come November, 2013.
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meaning:

He's been in contention for a trophy twice.

BUT:

He's inconsistent and lacks communication skills.

Not to mention he's not as available as other drivers are to the race company.
 
He's inconsistent and lacks communication skills.
Click to expand...

Really? To each their own but I enjoy listening to Carl;

Not to mention he's not as available as other drivers are to the race company.
Click to expand...

Again, my opinion... I find Carl very accessible. Instead of going home when he has had a DNF he has gone to the booth and made himself available.
 
Smoke14 said:
Really? To each their own but I enjoy listening to Carl;



Again, my opinion... I find Carl very accessible. Instead of going home when he has had a DNF he has gone to the booth and made himself available.
Click to expand...

:bsflag:
 
Smoke14 said:
I am not allowed an opinion? Now I see how this works so carry on. :rolleyes:
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U suck too. I made a comment and you deliberately took it a different direction and made it all about the fan. congrats.

We were having a convo about racing, and now carls available to you? really?
 
Smoke14 said:
Really? To each their own but I enjoy listening to Carl;



Again, my opinion... I find Carl very accessible. Instead of going home when he has had a DNF he has gone to the booth and made himself available.
Click to expand...

What does that have to do with anything? If Carl is making adjustments from the booth, your comment would make sense.
 
MOEJOE said:
meaning:

He's been in contention for a trophy twice.

BUT:

He's inconsistent and lacks communication skills.

Not to mention he's not as available as other drivers are to the race company.
Click to expand...

Meaning that his record speaks for itself and that it's only how an indivdual interprets the stats that make a difference to them perosnally. I have no interest in condemning him as the great evil of Nascar nor do I care to defend him as the Mr. nice guy he tries to portray. His actions and record says it all and the same goes for every other driver.
 
I seriously can't believe that Carl and his THREE top fives almost edged it out over Clint.

Amazing.
 
#17D500winner said:
Meaning that his record speaks for itself and that it's only how an indivdual interprets the stats that make a difference to them perosnally. I have no interest in condemning him as the great evil of Nascar nor do I care to defend him as the Mr. nice guy he tries to portray. His actions and record says it all and the same goes for every other driver.
Click to expand...

That is fairly close to my thoughts. I think we all have a dark side, some more than others. No doubt Carl has has a hot temper and he has gone over the top with the retaliation. A serious issue that deserved serious critique.

But I don't think he is a forever tainted, he is capable of learning from those mistakes, and like him or not he is no slouch behind the wheel.

Neither is 2012 completely representative of his resume, in 92 Earnhardt by his usual standard of that era had a bad year. In 78 Petty won no as in zero cup (GN) races and hit the breaking point to leave Chrysler. Only to return in 79 with a 500 win and the title, in both cases Dale and Petty were past their 40th birthday and questions about being past their prime years was legit during those slumps.

Terry Labonte is another good example, he won the title in 1984 with CC Dale Inman. Then he went through some down years, when he finished up driving for Jr Johnson, Johnson was critical of Labonte's driving. Johnson with his two previous drivers had won three titles apiece, so the criticism seemed just or fitting at the time.
Still the same Labonte rebounded in the 90s to win another title (note Johnsons last title was 85, Terry's in 96)

I don't know if Edwards will ever win a title but I am sure he is going to get some more years with multiple wins in spite of the Eddie Haskel analogies, or the Jeckel and Hyde comparisons.
 
Greg said:
I don't know if Edwards will ever win a title but I am sure he is going to get some more years with multiple wins in spite of the Eddie Haskel analogies, or the Jeckel and Hyde comparisons.
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I feel Edwards lost to Stewart last year through worrying about what Stewart was doing instead of what he was doing.
Well done Stewart.
 
It all comes down to how hard it is to win these races. Any driver out there will tell you that the best car or best driver seldom wins on a given day. They all talk about the racing luck, a combination of circumstances that puts a Wood Bros. car with a rookie driver at the front of the field on the last lap at Daytona.When Stewart put that drive together to win the cup, I don't think anyone was more surprised than he was . Just racing luck.Edwards could pull of five or six wins easy this year , we all know he is a talented driver in pretty good equipment.
 
ted@economy said:
Any driver out there will tell you that the best car or best driver seldom wins on a given day.
Click to expand...
Numbers tend to disagree with this. Most often the best car does win the race. You can easily do homework @ racing-reference.info to find out the stats that back this up. When it's not the best car wining the race it's usually one of the top five on the track on that given day. Sure, there will always be exceptions. Daytona & Talladega are both a crap shoot when it comes to winning a race. The cars are pretty much on equal footing on those two tracks making it anyone's game. Personally I think luck plays a bigger role in losing a race more than it does winning one. Sure there is the occasional rain shortened race that can benefit an otherwise noncompetitive car greatly but those days are few and far between. It's easy to find finishes where the best car doesn't win but more often that not, it does win.

As far as the original idea behind this thread. Take all the teams that were in the top 15 at the end of the season. Write each of their car numbers on a piece of paper and place them folded in a cup. Pick a random person on the a street corner and have him/her pull the numbers out one by one. Write down the numbers of the first 12 pieces of paper pulled from the cup. That could easily be the top 12 teams heading into the 2013 Chase competing for the 2013 championship title. It's that close IMO.
 
ted@economy said:
It all comes down to how hard it is to win these races. Any driver out there will tell you that the best car or best driver seldom wins on a given day. They all talk about the racing luck, a combination of circumstances that puts a Wood Bros. car with a rookie driver at the front of the field on the last lap at Daytona.When Stewart put that drive together to win the cup, I don't think anyone was more surprised than he was . Just racing luck.Edwards could pull of five or six wins easy this year , we all know he is a talented driver in pretty good equipment.
Click to expand...

Luck for Stewart? His name is Grubb, darian Grubb.
 
ozz said:
I feel Edwards lost to Stewart last year through worrying about what Stewart was doing instead of what he was doing.
Well done Stewart.
Click to expand...

After he had Carl spending time in his motorhome before the last race practicing to be the best loser ever, you know Stewart did a number on Eddie's head.
 
Phing 5 of 10 and you let him go. SHR management was smoking their own tainted crack there. MORONS.
 
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