Danica Patrick has gotten a significant amount of bad press over the last week over Stewart-Haas Racing’s deal with Tommy Baldwin Racing that’ll ensure Patrick a starting spot in the Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway on Feb. 26.
Critics of the SHR-TBR deal compare the move to the much too common act in NASCAR of buying owner points. One team works out a deal with or purchases the assets of another team that finished out the previous season in the top-35 in owner points to make sure it has a guaranteed starting spot in the first five races of the Sprint Cup Series season. You see, at the start of a season, starting spots are guaranteed based on the previous season’s season-ending owner points through the first five events.
The Patrick deal is a little different, though, because Patrick will actually, officially be driving a Tommy Baldwin entry when it comes to her Sprint Cup Series efforts in 2012, driving a car that’ll actually be on the track all season with David Reutimann behind the wheel on weekends Patrick won’t be in the car. The critics see this as a plan to keep the car in the top-35 all year, meaning Patrick won’t have to worry about qualifying her way in for a single one of her 10 scheduled Sprint Cup starts this year.
Whether or not one views this situation as a case of points buying or Patrick simply driving for a different Sprint Cup team (TBR) than the one her actual contract is with (SHR), the move did, certainly, do one thing—it broght the act of “points buying” to the forefront.
The act of buying assets—or points—is nothing new. It’s been going on for years. Sure, it hasn’t garnered as much attention in the past as this SHR-TBR deal has—because the move typically involves some “also ran” with a name nowhere near as popular as Danica Patrick—but the act does happen a lot more often than many outsiders seem to think.
Is points buying right? Is it ethical? Well, you know what they say, “Money makes the world go around.” And these days, doesn’t everything seem to be about the money? And when you get right down to it, it’s not exactly wrong, becasue it’s not against the rules. Plus, for team owners, NASCAR is their business, and not getting into races is bad for business.
But still, isn’t points buying kind of a “slap in the face” of the spirit of competition? And doesn’t the competition start on Friday afternoon, or Saturday morning in some cases, with qualifying? I guess that all depends on your perspective—whether that’s the perspective of the car owner trying to get exposure for his/her sponsors on race day or the fan who is tuning in to see competition on qualifying day.
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Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/07 at 08:29 AM
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