What a race and what a disgrace

Bob Henry

a.k.a. TR.com guy

I don’t find myself agreeing with people on television too often. It’s a very seldom thing actually.

Yelling at the TV during any 6 o’clock “newscast” has been banned at our place for years, and by mutual consent. Not that either of us formally acknowledge or always remain in compliance with any such ban, of course.

“This just in ... Jerks without jobs, or any wish or hope of such engagement with responsible society, have stalked, robbed and killed an elderly east Charlotte woman. ... Film at 11.”

"Public official who was elected to spend our tax dollars wisely is arrested in prostitution sting ... Here's Mandy with details! ... Right after this word from our sponsor."

That’s what we hear sometimes, whether that's what the news readers actually say or not, of course.

I’ve never tried to encourage or observe any such ban on yelling while watching sports on the tube either. Sports might even be fairer and easier game. And, yeah, I might actually mute the whole system whenever anyone tries to say anything like cootchity-cootchity-cootchity-coo when a race starts.

But that’s not just so I can save the wear and tear on my throat while yelling at our TV set.

All that said, I couldn’t have agreed any more with Dale Jarrett and whoever that other guy is who worked with him on ESPN2’s coverage of the NASCAR Nationwide Series race at Phoenix International Raceway on Friday.

I should probably acknowledge that it was Friday night, way late in the time zone I live, along with a lot of race fans. Sorry if that runs counter to what NASCAR might have told you lately about where most race fans are. No disrespect meant, of course, to fans elsewhere.

As the TV guys told those of us still watching and listening, Kyle Busch, Carl Edwards and Denny Hamlin did, indeed, put on a helluva show. And Edwards and Busch kept it going till the end.

I sure hope a lot of you, wherever you live, got to see it.

A lot of people – some of whom call themselves fans – seem to really like trashing NASCAR, and the drivers and teams who run in any of that company’s various series, for “points racing” and “boring racing.” And I’m here to tell you as frankly as I'm able that I totally missed that "boring" thing Friday night. And that, this time, the TV guys weren't exaggerating when they talked about what was going on.

Bore me some more, I say. Please.

This is not to say boring never happens. I watched the Texas races, too. And listened to those guys pretending it wasn't boring.

My old man used to say this about some football games, baseball games or women: “They can’t all be jewels.”

But this one, at least during the stretch I’m talking about – and including the race for the win when it really counted - was a jewel. Far more qualified people than I can determine whether it was a ruby, an opal or a diamond.

But I liked it a lot. I hope you got to see it and enjoyed it as much as I did. And hats off to the guys who called it the way it was.

Wow, man! Who’s driving?

I’m a guy who "came of age" in the late 1960s and early '70s, a guy who has never been a big fan of those who had the dadgum gall to demand that everyone who worked for them get tested.

The purpose, of course, being to determine what and when they might or might not be – or might or might not have been – abusing various substances, whether those substances were legal or illegal.

I’ve kind of gotten over a lot of that since many of my employers along the way have insisted on such things. And it’s been to my dismay that - in spite of really pro-active policies in the NFL, NBA and the Olympics, to name a few - so many of the people in the sports I really enjoy have still managed to be such jerks and idiots. Not necessarily in that order.

Race fans would certainly like to think that all such people participate in those “other sports,” the stick-and-ball games, you know. But certainly not in stock car racing.

Sorry, but no.

All the politics aside, isn’t it just a no-danged-brainer that people who work around – and certainly those who drive or are engaged in the tire-changing and fueling of those race cars - ought to really be on their toes? At least all of the time they’re at the track? And way a lot?

I can’t imagine it as a left-wing vs. right-wing thing that some accountability really ought to be demanded by NASCAR in this area. And that some accountability really ought to be demanded of NASCAR here.

It seems kind of shame, at the very least, and maybe even “a detriment to the sport,” that someone would tell a magazine he has used heroin before climbing into a race car and running a NASCAR race.

This guy, who has finally and rightfully been banned by NASCAR, did not say he had smoked a reefer or two, that he had a couple of beers or had taken something that would help pump him up from what he viewed as his meager frame.

He said he used heroin.

And he was never caught by a professional sports league in which 43 or so cars fly by fast enough to kill people, many of them innocent bystanders.

NASCAR is a league whose leaders and PR people will tell you in a Daytona Beach second that it is a leader – no the leader - among professional sports, too.

If this guy hadn’t been busted, while using heroin in the pre-dawn hours on the parking lot of a big theme park, we might still be watching him race in NASCAR events – trashed or not. And some of us might still be rooting for him to win.

At whatever cost to him and his competitors.

Who do you call the loser in this scenario?