Things Moving Fast At Robert Yates Racing
Wednesday, July 19th, 2006 11:19am EDT
By Luke, Thunder Lounge
Published on Thunder Lounge.
Where are we going, and why are we in this hand basket?
[thumb:185:r:s=1:l=x]According to reports on Nascar.com and Jayski, Elliot Sadler has informed Robert Yates Racing that he will be exercising his option and heading over to the #19 of Evernham Motorsports. Elliot’s been rumored to be unhappy in his current location for awhile, and this appears to be the culmination of an incredibly long thought process by Sadler. This information came from multiple sources close to Robert Yates Racing, according to Marty Smith.
Robert Yates now finds himself in need of at least two drivers for next year, when recent rumors floating around have mentioned that Yates could be looking into expanding to three full time teams.
According to Smith, his sources said that Sadler’s current sponsor M&M’s would not be following Sadler to Evernham.
Marty also brings up an interesting subplot to this. One that has to have Ford in panic mode one one level or another. Smith mentions that since 2000, 7 drivers have left the Ford stable. This includes 3 of their last 4 Cup Champions. Kurt Busch moved to replace Rusty Wallace at Penske, and Bill Elliot moved to Evernham, which both field Dodge’s. Rusty Wallace also ended up in a dodge. It should be noted that Rusty didn’t make the call, Penske switched manufacturers. Dale Jarrett, as we all know and are constantly reminded of as of late, will be moving to Michael Waltrip Racing in a Toyota next year. On top of this Ford has lost Ryan Newman in the Penske switch, Kasey Kahne to Evernham, and Ricky Rudd retired.
With Yates being the second largest Ford stable out there, next to Roush, the only Ford teams left are smaller single car operations. While the Wood Brothers are hoping to expand to a two car operation in 2007, nothing has yet to be confirmed on that yet. If I were at Ford, I would be busting my tail to help ensure the Wood Brothers had their second team for next season.
In return for losing all of these drivers, Ford has only one gain at the moment to speak of. Jamie McMurray in Roush’s #26.
On top of all this, their second largest team has been struggling for the better part of this decade. A slide that saw Ricky Rudd bolt to the Wood Brothers, which may have been an early warning sign of the debacle that is currently taking place.
Robert Yates must have an incredible antacid bill at the moment, and be on ticked off character to boot. Not surprising, as if you wouldn’t be if your entire empire began to crumble around you behind the walls which you thought were safe.
Adding to this probability of Yates being pissed, Jayski is hearing of an outside possibility that Yates could be putting another driver in the #38 as soon as this weekend at Pocono. While he admits it’s unlikely, it goes back to the old “where there’s smoke, there’s fire” routine.
In speculation, looking at this, one has to wonder if it isn’t quite possible that it could happen. When Dale Jarrett made his announcement back in May, the rumors were swarming that he wouldn’t make it to the Pepsi 400 at Daytona or very far past it in his current ride. The driver that would take over the duties has been rumored to be Ward Burton, although there hasn’t been any confirmation on it and Jarrett still sits in the seat. This could easily be summed up as UPS keeping their branding intact since they will be sticking with DJ in 2007.
So, since Yates is in an obvious bad mood, and M&M’s isn’t following Sadler, could it be possible that in the near future we see Sadler on the sidelines as M&M’s and Yates look to begin an early brand building campaign for 2007? Sadler isn’t going to make the chase, so the opportunity is there to begin working towards 2007 already, even with 17 races to go in 2006. Think it’s out of the question to already begin preparations for 2007? The Wood Brothers are doing it right now, as they have announced a big switch up of people and crew chiefs in preparation for 2007. Which they say is in an attempt to get a jump on building the relationships for next season. Of note, Michael McSwain (Fatback) is taking over as crew chief for Ken Schrader. In my opinion, since the Wood Brothers made it clear it was to build relationships for next season, it looks like Kenny’s job is safe.
In the end, this leaves a lot of people in damage control mode, sticking as may fingers in the dike as possible.
This is kind of funny though because this past weekend Sadler adamantly denied he had spoken to Ray Evernham. Ah, there’s the underlying the catch. He said he hadn’t spoken to Ray Evernham. Last I checked, there were a lot more people at Evernham than just Ray. Could this either be that Elliot wasn’t allowed to say anything, or could it have been a carefully selected statement? In theory, Elliot could very well have not spoken directly to Ray at the time. Which would leave the statement as true, and suppress the rumor-hungry press long enough to get past Loudon. Well, apparently he was talking to someone over there as I seriously doubt that he woke up yesterday morning and said to himself that he would wander on over to Evernham Motorsports and fill out a job application. On top of that, having it signed in time to inform Yates the following day. Things can happen quick in the garage, but realistically not that quick.
So as another domino falls in the 2006 “Sillier than ever” season, one has to think back to a comment Elliot Sadler made just this past weekend.
You’d be surprised at how many cars will open up next year.
I guess we’ll see what happens as things move forward in the world of Nascar.
Filed Under: Nascar, Nextel Cup
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