madmark1974 wrote:I don't know what Cynon will have to say about this, but in my opinion when a motorsport has to rely on incidents and accidents and not-knowing-who-will-win-until-the-last-corner
for the 'fans' to remain interested, it says more that there's something wrong with the fanbase than the sport itself. This is Nascar, not WWE.
Bruton Smith is a bathplugging tard. End of story. Kevin Harvick was asked about Smith's IDIOTIC comments and all he said was; "Same guy who ruined Bristol."
NASCAR has to rely on incidents at the moment because there is so little passing on track. However the problem is that unlike last year, the NASCAR drivers aren't acting like dickheads on-track. Part of that may be down to the worst tire compounds ever seen (Pirelli PLEASE come to NASCAR!!! These Goodyear tires wear even less than Bridgestone softs!!), and the cars are... well, spec cars (thanks a lot Toyota), and the fact that Hendrick chassis/engine pairs make up 1/4 of the field makes it...
... well, dull.
Bruton Smith's comments were shot down even by NASCAR, and were laughed at on a few other NASCAR forums I visit. Shows how much his opinion is valued...
...but artificial cautions happen anyway, they're just called debris yellows. Usually done to get some commercials in or to make sure Dale Jr. or Jimmie Johnson doesn't go a lap down.
madmark1974 wrote:Much like F1, it's all to do with the advances in technology and professionalism, everything is more efficient and safer, drivers are more 'sanitised' - anyone behaving like Dale Earnhardt
Sr. these days would be penalised after nearly every race - so it follows that there will be less incidents.
True fans will still follow the sport, casuals might have to find something else to watch if they get bored.
If Nascar isn't able to sustain itself if viewing and attendance figures drop, then maybe they need to look at their business model.
Five years ago, anyone who did half the crap Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch did last year would get a drive through for rough driving. Now? Doubtful that they'll get anything because having one person be a dick on track is enough of a news item to carry into next week.
Maybe I'm a bit grouchy because I've been watching the sport since 1993/1994, but the on-track product is relatively lackluster (except Bristol and Sonoma, both of which were fantastic races, it's a shame that the Sonoma coverage missed four spins on-track), some of the best NASCAR racing ever was from 1990-or-so (maybe a bit earlier) to around 2004-2005.
I take issue with slamming the not-knowing-who-will-win-until-the-last-corner kind of racing, because it happens at tracks where that kind of finish isn't manufactured. See: Bobby Labonte vs. Jimmie Johnson in the Coke 600 some years back. If you're talking Daytona and Talladega, then it doesn't take much to win at either of those tracks, and hasn't really taken talent to win either race since Earnhardt won the Daytona 500. Michael Waltrip's talentless ass won the Daytona 500 twice and he's been driving like a noob in good cars since I started watching NASCAR. -_-
But at the same time, those kinds of races are a little bit refreshing because it literally is a wide open field. There's about 10 cars that could win on any given weekend, but at a superspeedway that number increases to about 30. See what the draw is to those kinds of races? Even Joe Ruttman said as much after being part of
that wreck in the 2002 NASCAR Busch series event at Talladega (it wiped out all but 10 cars because Shane Hmiel was being...well, Shane Hmiel).
There's only 4 of those races a year in Cup, 3 in Nationwide, and only twice in the trucks. Thankfully.
