Fan's Eye View ~ The Sixteen-Driver Conspiracy
04/03/2014
Jim Fitzgerald
As the sixth race of this still young 2014 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season concluded, Kurt Busch became the sixth driver to record a win and essentially guarantee himself a spot in the Chase for the Championship. Busch passed Jimmie Johnson to take the lead, and then had to pass him again in the closing laps to secure the win as Johnson gouged his way past the eventual winner after surrendering the lead a few laps prior. The move by Busch not only led to the Nevada driver’s first trip to victory lane in more than eighty races, but it continued an interesting streak of denials of victory for Johnson, the six time series Champion.
Looking at history, specifically that of Jimmie Johnson and the wins he has scored in a twelve year career, only five times has he not scored a win in the first six races of the season. Those seasons would be:
2002: He scored his first career win at Fontana.
2003: He won in his twelfth attempt, when Charlotte first became “Jimmie’s House.”
2008: He scored his first win of the year in the eighth event at Phoenix.
2011: The eighth race, this one at Talladega was Johnson’s first of the season.
2012: Darlington, the eleventh race that year, was not “Too Tough To Tame” for Johnson.
Looking at those seasons in detail, at the end of only one of them, the 2008 season, would Johnson win the Sprint Cup Series Championship. In his remaining Championship seasons, Johnson went more than three races into the season before scoring his first win only once, in 2009, when his first win came six races in.
So, the recipe seems simple for the opposition: Keep Johnson from winning early and the chances of losing a Championship to him decrease dramatically. Now, however, with the new rules in place which determine the sixteen-driver Chase field we will have once the fall event at Richmond has ended, perhaps the recipe changes. Since a win all but guarantees a driver a position in the Chase, the rule is simplified, but much more difficult. It’s no longer “keep Johnson from winning early.” Now, it is “Keep Johnson from winning, period.”
Friends, do not be misled. The probability, or even possibility, is extremely rare for an occurrence of a dark, smoky basement meeting where the best drivers in the world, save one, have a meeting. The purpose is to conspire against the missing, where they would band together and ensure that each would win one or more races in the first twenty-six events, and ensuring that at least sixteen individual winners were crowned. The goal? Keep Jimmie Johnson out of the Chase. You have to be in it to win it, so Johnson can’t win it, unless he’s in it. The way to keep him out is not to let him win.
For those who are not fans of Jimmie Johnson, a glimmer of the hope of a perfect Chase just entered their collective minds. A year where Jimmie Johnson, a six-time series Champion, is eliminated from Championship contention in September? Unheard of! But we like it. Keep the scourge of the series out, and give him no chance to tie either one of our Kings.
Yes, highly unlikely, and the target of the “conspiracy” is not just one, but many. The more races a driver wins, the more likely his chances are of definitely securing a Chase position. Therefore, it should be considered that the more races a driver wins, the lesser the opportunity for another driver to secure a Chase spot would be. And, in this still young season, there have been six drivers who believe they have etched their names into the Chase wall. There are another, conservatively, twenty drivers who are hoping to do the same, and one of them is the six-time Champion.
While the best way to win the Sprint Cup Championship may be to completely exclude the driver who has dominated the process for six of the last eight years, the possibility of accomplishing that, conspiracy or not, is going to be a challenge. The challenge lies within the ability to keep that driver, who has won a race in every year in which he has competed in the Sprint Cup level, from doing just that.
Take heart though, fans of Mr. Johnson, should this “dream conspiracy” even come close to reality, all is not lost. Remember that our new Championship eligibility system has a back door, with which Johnson is in no way unfamiliar. All Johnson would need to do to thwart this conspiracy is to finish the regular season, to come out of the fall Richmond race, as the point leader. Then, not only would Johnson make the Chase, there would also be the satisfaction that in the process of entering the Chase, Johnson would be ousting one of his “conspirators” as well.
And Dover is coming up in June, too.
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