Title is Still no Sure Thing For Jimmie Johnson
It’s happening again. The same feeling I had the last three years has once again raised its ugly head.
Sure, I’ve been saying for the last five or six weeks that the Sprint Cup championship is Jimmie Johnson’s, lock, stock and barrel.
But just like the past three years, as we leave Phoenix and head to the season finale at Homestead next Sunday, I’m starting to get a sick feeling in my stomach.
Johnson has managed to avoid trouble and earn enough points in each of the last three years to win the championship each time in the season finale at Homestead. And with a 108-point lead over Mark Martin after his win Sunday at Phoenix, it’s very unlikely Johnson will not win title No. 4.
But last Sunday’s outcome at Texas, when Johnson gave back 111 points after crashing early in the race is etched on my mind like cold steel on ice. And even though NASCAR’s statisticians say Johnson only has to finish 25th at Homestead to secure his fourth consecutive title, I keep wondering what if he has another Texas, so to speak?
What if he doesn’t finish 25th or higher? What if Mark Martin goes on to win at Homestead while Johnson suffers another wreck or perhaps mechanical failure? Then what?
Out the window goes JJ’s No. 4, that’s what. There’ll be no coming back, no rallying, no chance to get back what you lost in the next race – like he did at Phoenix – because there will be no other races left to get anything back.
Maybe I’m being a worry wart, or just a downright pessimist, but I feel more insecure now than I have the past three seasons as Johnson heads to Homestead.
Texas came out of nowhere. No one expected JJ to crash on the third lap or to finish as far down in the pack as he did. But Texas proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that if it can happen once, it could happen again. Lightning can strike twice.
I’m not saying it’s going to happen, of course, but there is certainly cause for concern. This is when the biggest “what if?” game of the season begins.
Remember 2004, the first year of the Chase format? Kurt Busch and Johnson, along with Jeff Gordon and a few others, all had a legitimate chance at the title heading into the season-ending race at Homestead. It was a matter of who would ultimately survive.
Busch overcame a number of issues, including a wheel incredulously coming off his car that almost sent him into a retaining wall, to rally and beat Johnson by a mere eight points.
Who’s to say Johnson couldn’t have a Texas-like or even a 2004 Busch-like malady strike his team? Martin suddenly becomes the man with the spotlight upon him for the rest of the Homestead race, whether he can earn enough points to overtake Johnson.
That is, provided, Martin doesn’t suffer problems of his own.
And then there’s the sentimental factor. Sure, Johnson is going for a fourth consecutive title, something no one has ever done in NASCAR – although Tony Schumacher just earned his fifth straight Top Fuel title Sunday in NHRA drag racing.
But what about Martin? If he loses to Johnson, it will mark the fifth time in his career that Martin was the bridesmaid but not the bride. How devastating can that be on someone’s psyche – regardless of what he says in media interviews – to know you’re a great race car driver … well, great enough to finish second five times, but not great enough to win even one Cup championship in your career?
After Sunday’s win at Phoenix, Johnson said something I found a little chilling. He said that he plans on attempting to qualify as high as he can and to stay in front for as much of the race as he can.
That struck me as odd, as he spent the last two Chases essentially racing in mid-pack, earning just enough points – and staying out of trouble – to clinch the title without much drama. Remember how opposing cars gave him so much room that you’d thought he had the swine flu and no one wanted to come close enough to catch it – or forever go down in history being known as the guy that cost Johnson the championship.
But if Johnson is telling us he’s going for the lead, and potentially the win right from the checkered flag, that could be a huge mistake, a veritable recipe for disaster, another potential Texas in the making.
Why is he going to race as if he has nothing to lose, when he actually has so very much to lose, including putting his name all alone in the NASCAR history and record books?
I don’t know about you, but I’m not going to feel very confidant about Johnson’s fourth title until I see him standing on the post-race podium.
If I see him on the post-race podium, that is. And right now, I’m feeling 50-50 at best that I will.
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