Jimmy Johnson (Best of the Best???)

  OK from the title you should have guessed I'm gonna talk about Nascar but before I do I promised a friend that I would post a warning whenever I blogged about Nascar, Huntin, Fishin, or Country Music that my inner redneck may begin to surface, and my voice may begin to twang.  So here you go

                                        WARNING REDNECK CONTENT BELOW !!!

So is Jimmy Johnson the best of the best well in my humble opinion I'd have to say yes and no. The best chase driver yes, the chase itself seems to be custom made for Johnson seven of the ten tracks are historically Jimmy's best tracks and they run the same ten tracks every year.

  But here's the real problem I have is that Jimmy has never won a non-chase championship in fact he's never even been the points leader going into the chase Tony Stewart had a 200+  point lead this year over second place Jeff Gordon only to have it erased and end up starting behind Mark Martin and Johnson when the points reset, the same thing happened to Gordon in 2007, so without the chase Jimmy would probably have one championship making him good but far from being the best, but in all fairness every driver has to compete under the same rules and Johnson and crew chief Chad Knaus have made it work for them.

  But in my opinion some changes need to be made to the chase format, and no I'm not talking about Jimmy proofing the chase but in past years Nascars emphasis for winning championships was all about consistency we can site Matt Kenseths and Terry Labontes championship seasons as proof of that ofcourse people complained enough to prompt nascar to swing it's focus to winning races and installing the current chase format, Unfortunatly when they swung they swung for the fences and the focus has shifted to far the other way essentially making 26 weeks of hard work for nothing.

  Now I understand that it's a playoff format but the points leader after 26 weeks needs to be rewarded to some extent regardless of the number of wins he's had, I think a 25 point bonus would be appropriate another thing everyone who makes the chase starts with 5000 points and then the bonuses are awarded and the field is set this is stupid to say the least, your base points going into the chase should reflect your finishing position after 26 races and then add your win bonuses, it should look something like this.

 
  1st Tony Stewart   5000+20 win bonus + 25 leader bonus= 5045
 2nd Jeff Gordon     4990+ 10                                            = 5000
3rd  Jimmy Johnson 4985+30                                             = 5015
4th Kurt Busch        4980+20                                             = 5000
5th Denny Hamlin    4975+20                                             = 4975

And so on through the 12th position while this change most likely would not have effected the championship it does seem like a more logical and fair way to award points, in addition to this I would like to see some different tracks in the chase instead of all the cookie cutter mile and a halfs.

  Lets add Richmond and Bristol short track racing is more exciting anyway also get rid of the wildcard Talledega race and replace it with a road race preferably Sonoma these changes would make for a better more competitive chase and be a more acurate measure of a drivers skill, then if Jimmy wins four in a row I'll happily raise his hand in victory and declare him the greatest driver of all time.

  Until then I'd have to say it's a toss up between Gordon and Earnhardt, Senior not Junior.

P.S. Sorry but Petty is over rated even with the untouchable mark of 200 wins.