Moosetang Posted June 30, 2012 Share Posted June 30, 2012 Also with Andretti building engines Petty may go back to dodge Penske sold his engine shop because he'll be using Roush-Yates engines like the rest of the Fords. If he were going to stay with/go back to Dodge he'd have kept the shop and sold a stake in it, not the whole thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moosetang Posted June 30, 2012 Share Posted June 30, 2012 I think Dodge has squandered every last dime of Petty's loyalty. And if you're Richard Petty, and you've been around the block a couple hundred thousand times (literally), do you trust the promises of people who were content to feed you scraps for years, taking advantage of your loyalty? You could get Petty back into Dodge, but Dodge would have to own up to and correct a lot of crap. If Petty goes "back" to Dodge it will essentially be Petty's Drivers and Petty's name with little else. Like I said back when Penske announced he was leaving, Petty lacks the resources to become the new flagship Dodge team, but if Dodge wants to patch together a bunch of big names to attract sponsors for a team they're essentially building from spare parts his is as good as any. I can see why Petty would do it, Dodge is probably dangling juicy deals right now in their panic to have a team next year and Ford might look pretty crowded with RFR and Penske as the 1-2 punch. But I still think it's a dumb idea. Ford's operation is strong while Dodge's was just gutted, and Petty could end up on the second tier of Dodge pretty easily if a bigger team defects from Chevy or Toyota. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SVT_MAN Posted June 30, 2012 Share Posted June 30, 2012 I would say that I am about 95% confident that Matt is going to be running Toyota's next year based on Jack Roush's comments. Jack Roush isn't going to call a Penske team the dark side since they run Blue Oval. (chromehorn already pointed this out, but I agree.) http://sports.yahoo.com/news/roush-surprised-kenseth-leaving-193010240--nascar.html I don't know. One way or the other, very sad news to me. If by some miracle Matt stays with Ford, I will probably still watch NASCAR. Otherwise, I guess I'll just move onto something else. As stupid as it sounds, it's one activity that my twin brother, me and my dad can watch and enjoy together - but it seems that none of us will have someone we really want to cheer on anymore. We all liked Carl pretty well until he started picking on Matt. The thing that is irritating to me is that Jack is such a lousy guy when it comes to personnel management. I know that is just his personality and he prefers looking at the technical - but that doesn't make him a leader. That makes him a technical genius who probably shouldn't be running a company. But why doesn't he have people who ARE good with people figure out the people side of the business? I mean, Matt seems pretty good at the people part. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZanatWork Posted June 30, 2012 Share Posted June 30, 2012 (edited) One thing that I just don't get: Roush can't get sponsorship despite winning Daytona (again), having 2 of 3 teams lead the points essentially all year, and even had to cut Trevor Bayne's car out of the Nationwide series. Meanwhile, behind the Roush cars, you see a ton of mid-and-back level cars that have sponsorship, are lucky to finish on the lead lap, and never reach championship contention. What the hell? I get that sponsoring a Roush Ford is likely more expensive than sponsoring a lot of other cars...but with so many sponsors doing partial season deals or even single race deals, how has Roush, leading one championship and defending another, failed to attract the needed capital? I just don't understand. Edited June 30, 2012 by ZanatWork Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichardJensen Posted June 30, 2012 Share Posted June 30, 2012 Frankly, if Ford wants to keep top drivers they need more teams. You can't expect Roush to keep everybody *and* develop new talent. But Ford has shown no interest in expanding their footprint in Nascar. I think they know full well that GM all but runs the series, that the marketing returns of Nascar success aren't what they once were (if they ever were what they used to be), and with that in mind, they have set clear limits to their involvement in the sport. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SVT_MAN Posted June 30, 2012 Share Posted June 30, 2012 I tend to agree with Richard. Adding Penske will no doubt help - Penske has the technical know how and expertise to be a top tier team like Roush. But GM still has Ford teams outnumbered. As far as sponsorship, Jack obviously demands more money for sponsorship, but I also think that Jack just isn't as good at luring potential sponsors as some teams anymore. I mean, if you look at MWR ... they are running pretty well now, but they have been horrible for years before this. But Michael Waltrip can sell a ketchup popsicle to a person wearing white gloves and sponsors love him because he gets attention to their sponsor by making a fool of himself. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZanatWork Posted July 2, 2012 Share Posted July 2, 2012 I think it's safe to say that Jack didn't "push Matt out"...but hell, you see pro athletes leave a good thing just to see what another team is like all the time. Matt knows his current team is underfunded/undersponsored, so he likely took a deal with firm sponsorship and with friends among the teammates. I hate it because he sort of succeeded Bill Elliott for me...but I cheer for all the Fords at every race and have been cheering for the Wood Brothers since David Pearson in the Purolator Mercury days. My dad worked for Purolator in the '70's, and we regularly had a painted and stickered #21 company car. I loved 'em, mom...not so much. In any case, Stenhouse is a good driver, Biffle and Edwards are also very good, and the Penske connection may end up being very good, very quickly. Just so Jimmie freakin' Johnson never wins a title again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Rosadini Posted July 2, 2012 Share Posted July 2, 2012 I don't think anyone has mentioned the "Fenway" piece of the equation. Just what say does John Henry have in the functioning of the team? I too hate to see Matt go. A great driver as proven by his stats and a nice guy. Is he the "personality" that Edwards is? No. Does "personality" matter when it comes to securing sponsor dollars? For sure. But apparently Gibbs doesn't see that as an issue when it comes to securing sponsorship bucks. Has to be more to this then what we are seeing/hearing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NLPRacing Posted July 2, 2012 Share Posted July 2, 2012 I don't think anyone has mentioned the "Fenway" piece of the equation. Just what say does John Henry have in the functioning of the team? I too hate to see Matt go. A great driver as proven by his stats and a nice guy. Is he the "personality" that Edwards is? No. Does "personality" matter when it comes to securing sponsor dollars? For sure. But apparently Gibbs doesn't see that as an issue when it comes to securing sponsorship bucks. Has to be more to this then what we are seeing/hearing. Jack controls 51% of RFR, so he has the final say. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Rosadini Posted July 2, 2012 Share Posted July 2, 2012 Jack controls 51% of RFR, so he has the final say. Thx- not aware of that number. Still, if Fenway has 49% (assuming no other stakeholders) that is still a big chunk-and you don't ignore your major partne'rs views. In any case, Jack was supposedly surprised and this entire thing was initiated by Matt??? If you look at the landscspe, seems to me there are more former Roush guys out there and surviving vs. former Gibbs or Hendrick or Childress stars who went say to Roush??? As I look at it, seems that Jack may be a bit more bottom line oriented than his fellow mega team owners and loyalty is of lesser importance to him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blksn8k2 Posted July 4, 2012 Share Posted July 4, 2012 (edited) Based on past history at Roush I don't understand why anyone would be surprised by any of this. Jack has a history of letting older drivers and/or non-productive drivers go at some point in their careers. Few of those drivers where at the end of their career and most of them found decent rides with other teams and some eventually moved down to one of the lesser series and were reasonably successful there. Look at the list: Ted Musgrave, Johnny Benson, Chad Little, Wally Dallenbach, Jeff Burton, Jamie McMurray, Kurt Busch, David Ragan and Mark Martin. Busch was probably the one anomaly but everyone knows he was more trouble than Jack wanted to deal with. I hated to see Mark Martin leave just as much if not more so than Kenseth. The point is Jack always has a younger driver waiting in the wings. Stenhouse may never completely fill Matt's shoes but who knows? He could end up being even better. He will certainly make less money than Matt and that should make getting and keeping sponsors a bit easier so long as he performs reasonably well. I think he was one reason why Edwards stopped running the Nationwide series. Carl didn't like being upstaged by Ricky any more than by Brad Keselowski and that showed at times on the track last year. I personally think Carl not running both series this year is a mistake and Edwards' 2012 Cup season might have been better if he had more seat time in Nationwide. I know there were plenty of other reasons like lack of sponsorship for more than one car in Nationwide but Carl does not seem to be as focused as previous years when he ran both series. The rumor about Andretti Autosport buying out Penski's Dodge operation might prove to be true but I wouldn't expect any decent results for at least a couple of years. Penske got out for a reason. As others have said, they have competitive power. I think it had more to do with developing the 2013 Charger body than anything else. Well, that and Ford apparently made Penski a better offer. When there is only one team that team has to do everything on their own with no one to share development costs or provide a different approach. I also think RPM will eventually be back in the Dodge camp but I doubt it will be in 2013. Edited July 4, 2012 by blksn8k2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SVT_MAN Posted August 26, 2012 Share Posted August 26, 2012 Well, we now know that Dodge is out of the sport entirely next year. So we know that Andretti isn't buying the Dodge teams. It still hasn't been announced that Matt is at JGR yet due to contractual clauses that prevent him from saying anything. But it's basically the worst kept secret in NASCAR. Sorry to see you go, Matt. It was a good ride. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bob Rosadini Posted August 27, 2012 Share Posted August 27, 2012 So howabout the Tony/Matt show last night? Looked to me like a typical short track "racing deal"- but Tony the ego served notice he was going to run Matt over every chance he gets for the rest of the season. Looks to me like chubby can dish it out but does not want to take it. Makes for good 'theater" I guess. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobbyd Posted August 27, 2012 Share Posted August 27, 2012 What about the Stewart tantrum at Bristol...if his helmet would have smashed Matt's windshield, would NASCAR penalize Stewart? He could have caused serious damage to him. As far as I know, NASCAR just let it go even though I think Stewart should have been reprimanded...at the least! Plus, his vocal threat to get Matt in a future race when he can...NASCAR says nothing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FordBuyer Posted August 27, 2012 Share Posted August 27, 2012 What about the Stewart tantrum at Bristol...if his helmet would have smashed Matt's windshield, would NASCAR penalize Stewart? He could have caused serious damage to him. As far as I know, NASCAR just let it go even though I think Stewart should have been reprimanded...at the least! Plus, his vocal threat to get Matt in a future race when he can...NASCAR says nothing! That is unbelievable that you can lose control like that and because you are big name only can skate free. Most of us would face far more serious consequences for far less. Kind of like all the Detroit Lion players getting into all kinds of off field trouble and basically only hand slaps that you or I would be paying for years for and then some. Then the authorities wonder why there are many "tremors" from the masses. Very tired of the BS. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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