Danica

  Oh freaking boy, Danica Patrick won the pole for the Daytona 500.  The world is going nuts, ESPN is talking about Nascar, what everyone wanted.  The nation's 2nd most popular sport is finally being recognized by the morning talk shows and being talked about outside of Charlotte, North Carolina.  This is gonna create a lot of buzz, and now the debate begins is she talented or just pretty.  Couple other questions get brought up, was this fixed by Nascar, as a media ploy, or is this something to show what her future can be.

I have a big opinion about Danica, I'm not her biggest fan, I used to like her in her Indy days but then she decided printing money was more important than being a good race car driver.  She's had 9 years on major racing circuits and has 1 win, 1 win in 9 years, pretty sure you lose your job if you win once every 9 years.  My stance on this has been posted in the past, I've written about Dale Jr. in the same light, and I've admitted this, Nascar or even racing in general isn't about performance it's about dollars.  You can be the most talented driver in the world but if you don't bring money to the table you don't get the ride.  I was watching Mike and Mike this morning with 2 guest hosts and one guy aseked the other, do you think she's one of the top 42 drivers in Nascar, I thought to myself no, there is no way, my favorite team Joe Gibbs Racing has 5 drivers on it's roster that all better than her, and 2 of them are racing full-time in the Nationwide series.  I'd put Danica on par with a decent Nationwide or elite Truck driver, last year in elite equipments she didn't win a race in the Nationwide, let alone average finish of 28th in the 10 Sprint Cup races she ran.  This is where Nascar differs from every other sport, money pushes the talent, not talent pushing the money.  A-Rod makes ass loads of money, he has 1 ring and people kill the guy, we killed LeBron for years b/c he didn't win a championship, yet in Nascar our "favorites" are always the guys who don't win.  Most hated drivers Kyle Busch over 200 wins in all three series combined, Kurt Busch Cup Champion, Tony Stewart 3-time cup champion.  Jimmie Johnson 5-time champion probably the 3rd most popular driver on his own team behind Dale Jr. and Jeff Gordon.  If anyone won 5 in a row in another sport that guy would be huge.  Yet, the sports favorites Dale Jr. 1 win in 5 years, Carl Edwards 0 wins last year, and now Danica Q-rating of 76, 0 wins in Nascar in 2 years of full-time driving, went from not driving a stock car to having a premiere cup ride in 3 years.

Danica did this herself, she had a choice, make money and gurantee myself a ride forever or become a better driver and earn myself a ride.  She's not the only person to do this, Paul Menard for one has sponsorship from his dad pretty well guarantees him a ride as long as he wants one, he's won a race, but he wouldn't of been in that car had his name not been Menard.  Don't get me wrong these people are obviously great drivers, you don't got faster than everyone if your a mediocre driver, I'm not saying Danica can't drive stock cars, but I'm saying she didn't earn her ride, didn't take her lumps, didn't have to impress scouts to get where she is, instead she smiled, grew her hair long, and basically let the fact she's a women in a man dominated sport sell stuff for her.  I don't even find her all that attractive, I've always said she's "athlete hot", in a room full of dudes, she's cute but in normal circumstances she's not overly good looking.  I understand she has to get hers but doesn't mean I have to agree with how she got there.  I think the Nascar world needs to take a step back and not hate her bc she's a woman but hate her b/c she isn't all that great of a driver, and if your a Danica fan realize I'm not hating b/c she's a woman it's b/c she's not an elite driver yet has an elite ride.

Onto the question of did Nascar rig qualifying yesterday.  They might have, but are you trying to tell me that competators are gonna just let the sport put her up front.  These compete all the time, they don't care what it is they want to win, and I know a few of them (Kevin Harvick) are tired of hearing about her, so why would they let the sport do this.  Her teammates Tony Stewart and Ryan Newman each ran top 5 times yesterday, and the motors they run had 5 of the top 6 times.  Ryan Newman is probably the best qualifier in the whole sport in the last 15 years, he might of helped her out a little.  Did Stewart-Haas maybe give her the best car they got, I don't have all the answers but I highly doubt they fixed this.

Is this a sign of things to come, HA, no freaking way.  Read above her cars were fast yesterday as a team, you don't get points for winning the pole.  You get points for winning, it's not how you start it's how you finish.  She can have this week but it's gonna be a long year for her, there is a ton of talent in Sprint Cup racing and I can name 15 guys I would think that will win races this year instead of her, will she get lucky and get a fuel mileage win, maybe but heres the thing about that, you gotta be on the lead lap to win a fuel mileage race and she has a hard time with that.  I think Danica needs to go back to Nationwide full time, win a race, then make this jump, it's too early for her, she's been racing stock cars for 3 years, most of these guys have been doing it their whole lives.  She has talent, she can win, but this isn't her time.  If your going crazy b/c she got the pole settle down and relax she hasn't won anything yet.

That's all for this week, see ya next week, in the meantime follow me on twitter @derekbredeson.