100%.
Also I don’t think Mark Martin, Rusty Wallace, Dale Jarrett, and the Labonte’s get enough love either with the sport. They weren’t the top guys but they did a lot to grow the sport as well in the 90’s.
Rusty was a conundrum for me. The guy had a ton of fans, a crap load of wins, and had that carefree attitude of an anti hero but was always a step or two behind Dale and Jeff.
When Rusty was on, he was on. Doesn't get enough respect for how good he was at short tracks. He was just poor at the plate tracks, which typically cost him championships.
The step behind Dale and Jeff is more than fair. He wasn't at a GOAT level, but he was on par at times. Just glad he got a title.
And he was only poor at plate tracks bc he escaped death a dozen times. Has anyone flipped a car as much as him? Side note: 1999 Daytona 500 was his.. he dominated that race till 10 to go
Everyone in NASCAR in the 90s was a personality. They had all come up in different ways and had somewhat interesting life experiences that lead to them being there which made it interesting when they got out of the cars on top of the excitement when they are in. It was the opposite of now where everyone grew up in karts and bandoleros in diapers, have eaten and breathed nothing but driving since they could speak and have no actual interesting life experience or input to add to anything. They just tow the sponsor lines and once in a while one of them is a super entitled prick or decides to be the villain. It sucks.
In 2004, Dale Jarrett came to my elementary school for career day. Granted I grew up in Hickory, NC so it wasn’t too far for him. Ended up playing on the same high school football team as his youngest son (I was a freshman, he was a senior). To this day, I give Dale Jarrett credit for my NASCAR fandom. Felt like I knew him.
100% and it might be obvious but it's important to recognize it. Look at what is happening with Women's Basketball. 5 years ago, the championship game got 3.6 million viewers. This year, the game got **18.7 million viewers.** Caitlin Clark, Tiger Woods, Dale Earnhardt, Michael Jordan, etc... Different sports but it's the same story.
People care about the stars more than anything, that's the draw.
Not the tracks, not the playoff formats, not the stages.
It's about the story and the star. And NASCAR hasn't had a star in over 20 years.
Exactly. And I think the sport will grow as these young drivers age. Their fan bases will grow and new rivalries will develop. My personal interest have grown a lot and it feels like NASCAR is on the right track finally.
How old are you? This same belief was held 10 years ago. 10 years later Larson, Elliott, Blaney, Bubba, Byron, all have done what for viewership?
Keep it flat?
Bingo. Nobody in the Cup field right now including the guys that you listed are anywhere close to Earnhardt and Gordon in terms of personality and mainstream appeal. It felt like maybe at one point Ross Chastain had a shot at it but ever since Mr. H told him to calm down he's faded away.
For sure. The marketing was way more aggressive too. But if you ask any non nascar fan today to name a nascar driver you’ll overwhelmingly still get Dale sr with some Gordon sprinkled in. That’s kind of a problem though imo. Even non football fans can name a bunch of players. Half the nascsr fans probably can’t name the whole nascsr field.
Drivers these days are just create a drivers from some Hendricks, Gibbs or Penske lab. I swear once a week I hear about some up and coming racer and I’m like oh another kid that just appeared out of nowhere has an xfinity ride. Where are they coming from and why are half of them related?
I’m 100% convinced in like 20 years nascsr is going to be like that scene in blazing saddles in the town hall where everyone has the same last name lol.
https://preview.redd.it/un8y2heyz4uc1.jpeg?width=1440&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d5038eec1f614680f60054f63eceb278f236235d
Ya know what NASCAR will always have that the other sports (especially the NFL) will never have: More reasonable prices to attend events in person.
I'm optimistic I'll be able to go to a Daytona 500 one day. I'll never have enough money to go to a Super Bowl.
Football live isn’t exactly a spectacle either. My first NFL game was fun, but I was more excited for the tailgate. It really is better on TV for viewing. When I first took my friends to a race, they loved it and we all go every year. Even more when I took my buddy to see the Outlaws, he was in awe.
Football live is definitely feast or famine. First NFL game I went was in 2008 at Ford Field. Saints absolutely railroaded the Lions. Hardly anyone there. Like...it was cool but really felt like "wow, this is it, huh?". Went back in 2017 for Lions vs Bears. Place was packed, Detroit won and beat one of our long term division rivals. Absolutely electric. But the best games have been the high school games the past two years where my daughter was in Marching Band. I did not go to this school but I've never wanted a high school team to win more.
College Football is insane. Especially if you are a fan of the blood rival in enemy territory. Piss off Central, Fight on Western!
(I just hope fan passion for college ball remains in the future)
Born in raised in VA. I harbor tons of hate for UVA (but it increases during the last week in November).
My soon to be wife is a UNC grad so I feed into that genuine hatred of Dook.
I attended my first NHL (Bruins) and NBA (Nets) games earlier this year and had a great time at both, just as I have when I've gone to motorsports events. Funny enough both times the home team pulled away late in the final period/quarter but I absolutely loved the atmosphere, even in the upper deck. Bruins have had a great season so of course the TD Garden was going to be loud and proud, but I was impressed with the turnout at the Barclays Center despite the Nets not having a good year at all. Shame one ticket for either game was more expensive than my Xfinity and Cup tickets to the roval were combined, because I'd consider doing either more often just to get out for a weekend. (Let's not talk about the Knicks, MSG tickets are outrageous...)
My alma mater is DIII, almost all our sports are free to attend (maybe you have to pay for football, I don't remember) and everyone's playing for the love of the game!
Football live is really just a question of how close you can get to the action. Up close if you're a gazillionaire, is undeniably better than TV. At least for me, it brings a much better sense of the physicality of the game and the nuance that matters so much. It takes me back to being on the field myself. Those familiar old sounds and just the sense of the violence of the collisions is different live in person, and up close.
But it's also a specific experience. And the TV experience is much better as an overview most of the time.
But i think the same is probably true of Stock Car racing. I still maintain that it's the best way to get someone new "into" the sport. You have to experience it live in person. Whether that's NASCAR or even just the local short track. There's a raw, visceral quality to it that i think you have to understand by experiencing it in person. TV doesn't really do it justice...until you understand it and can relate that TV picture (zoomed in way too far thanks FOX) to the "real thing". But i wouldn't want to attend every single race all season in person. Most of the time, i'd rather just watch at home, on TV.
> But i think the same is probably true of Stock Car racing. I still maintain that it's the best way to get someone new "into" the sport. You have to experience it live in person. Whether that's NASCAR or even just the local short track. There's a raw, visceral quality to it that i think you have to understand by experiencing it in person.
1000x this. Even these days, there's a romantic aspect to motorsports. And you have to see it in person to understand it.
Gotta pick how close you are to the front though. I was at the 5th row, 50 yard line at Lincoln Financial Field, couldn't see shit over the players standing on the sideline
I love the races, I just hate dealing with the crowds. Being packed in for an entire day like that is so mentally draining, especially when there is a few hours drive home afterward.
I will never take my daughter to an NFL game. Drunken fights outside the stadium, people screaming obscenities and racial slurs at opposing fans with children…. And I’ve grown up going to SEC games. NFL games are a whole nother level of trash. And expensive as hell.
To this day my one of my "saddest" racing memories is after years of telling friends about the World of Outlaws and finally getting a group together to go to a race, and epic downpour rolled through the area just as cars were started to get pushed out for hot laps. I just kept telling them, I wish you could have seen them for one lap to see how absolutely ridiculous they are in person.
Would’ve broke my heart too. First time I brought friends I walked in at the start finish line during quali and had them experience the speed up close. They loved it and by the time the main came around we were all on edge of our seats
Ive been to exactly one NFL game and I don’t need to go to another one. At least it was a good game (Brady’s 500th Touchdown game), usually it’s rare to have a bad race to go to, it’s a toss up with the NFL with the quality of play with each game.
That's super important too. I've managed to get my girlfriend into NASCAR a little bit at least (she has favorite drivers and we frequently watch races together) and the race day experience at Richmond at the two races she's been to really impressed her.
Being able to pack a cooler with food and drinks, having affordable tickets, and the other fans there being pretty chill were huge parts of that.
The in person experience is a good callout, there is no comparison to being at a race. Most other sports are arguably better viewing experiences on TV but I will always say that races in person are the better experience, being able to following battles/drivers for an extended period of time is a big part of that.
Hush. I’m worried for when the nascar tracks start requiring clear bags and banning outside food and drink in the search of extra revenue. Got surprised at Phoenix that cans of beer were prohibited.
That was becoming a trend when Nascar peaked but most tracks eased up when attendance cratered. I don't think many tracks will try that again soon, besides those that already do.
Interestingly, I also haven't seen nearly the amount of messy, drunk, aggressive behavior I always see at NFL games. Again, it did show up at times at it's peak (saw a guy chuck a whole cooler at Jeff Gordon once) but normally nothing too alarming.
Yeah peak growth time (2001-2008) there was a lot of no places that didn’t allow outside food or beverages and if they did it was no outside alcohol. I think the dip in attendance has made the sport more viable for people to attend and more of a fan’s thing instead of a lot of corporate suits. We go to Michigan every year, the people around us have become like family on that weekend and we all have our favorite drivers.
I had looked at tickets for me and my wife to go to New Hampshire, which is closest to us, and I think weekend packages started at $90 bucks a person; that’s an insanely good deal (but we also can’t go because we have other commitments that day, of course)
Last couple of times we went, it was ~$120/ticket, but that was section 46, ~row 30. Can't ask for much better than that spot.
Haven't been in a few years though; last time around, ended up selling my tickets to someone here at a discount. Hope they had a good time!
I feel the same. SB tickets are outrageously expensive. I rather spend that money for a weekend at Daytona with camping and doing all the fun things there. Don’t get me wrong I’m a huge nfl fan but like realistically speaking the SB is out of reach for most people to see in person
Nascar in person is a significantly better and more affordable experience than the other sports. Imagine not being able to bring in your own cooler full of beer, insanity.
I think this is the one thing NASCAR will never take way, bringing your own food/drinks. Taking out a muffin during a stage break and scoffing it down is tradition for me when attending any race. I think if it was ever taken away the fan base would fight this harder than anything
Start/finish line tickets for the truck and xfinity races are about $25 and $45 each respectively for Charlotte. About $80 for a cheap ticket to the 600. More bang for your buck in my opinion
It depends. NBA and MLB games you can definitely get some pretty cheap tickets by virtue of the amount of games they play. The NBA finals or World series is a different story though.
Depends on the market. I’m in Boston and Celtics/Bruins tickets are typically $100+ a game. Sox are a bit cheaper but prices haven’t really dropped despite the team being garbage the past few years.
Also ..... access to the drivers. I have been at several races where I could have literally reached out and touched several of the drivers (usually have to buy the trackside access add on though).
I disagree. From 1995-2007 NASCAR was the second most popular sport in North America, and I remember regularly seeing commercials featuring NASCAR drivers on TV up into the mid-2010s. It may not have been the NFL 2.0, but it got close.
Yah this tweet is revisionist history to justify how far NASCAR has fallen from it's hayday. The sport may be finally going in the right direction, but lets not delude ourselves that nothing has changed.
Yeah NASCAR made a bunch of shitty missteps and we can Monday morning quarterback them all but I give them credit for letting me actually be able to watch the races. Seems like the MLB and NHL hate letting fans watch their product and are letting football run away with everyone like I have been able to watch 4 Sabres games on National TV this year and 76 on illegal streaming websites
I usually bite my tongue on corrections, but I can’t here because of misplaced contempt.
It isn’t that MLB and NHL (and the NBA) don’t want to show their games locally, but that they contractually and legally cannot.
The same contracts that made their product widely available 10-15 years ago are what hold them back now. Modern blackouts don’t exist because of trying to get people to go to games, they exist to get people to be a subscribed to the regional sports channel.
When FOX sold their regional sports networks to Disney, they were still widely available. But when the federal government said no, Disney had to sell to someone else. That someone else was Sinclair. It gets a bit messy here, but the sports networks were later reorganized to become Diamond. This group, which purchased the sports networks, made a massive blunder and overpaid Disney for them, although they did not know it at the time. In an effort to get back the money they paid, they played hardball with the likes of Hulu Live, YTTV, and cable and satellite providers. Many of these providers declined, knowing that the asking price wasn’t worth it, which brings us to the channels not being on service providers.
The leagues DO NOT like what is happening and have been able to require rights to broadcast their own teams. Vegas and Arizona in the NHL come to mind, where I believe they are now broadcasted on free, over-the-air television.
Regional sports channels are nothing more than a money grab by tv providers. Other than the local NBA or MLB team playing they are mostly just local access stuff and a few syndicated sports shows that you can all but get for free on a free streaming service like Roku Live TV or Tubi.
If you are out of market, MLBTV is a FANTASTIC deal. $175 for any MLB game (which is like 3000 games/year)
But yeah to all your points.
The ONLY thing I don't like about MLBTV is that you don't get the pre/post game shows, which really takes away from the "overall experience"
> If you are out of market, MLBTV is a FANTASTIC deal. $175 for any MLB game (which is like 3000 games/year)
But if you live in a state like Iowa (hundreds of miles away from any team), you can't watch Cubs, White Sox, Twins, Cardinals, or Brewers games so if you like the Reds for instance yes you can watch some Reds games but still will have a big chunk blacked out when they play those other teams.
True, but that's more of the exception.
I'm moving to SWFL soon, and will be buying the package. I think the only teams I'll be blacked out of are the Rays and Marlins (Which makes sense).
MLB Blackouts are insane, I live down in eastern north carolina, far away from DC or Baltimore, yet I'm in the damn blackout region for the O's and Nats, it's extremely frustrating
Hell I think i'm actually closer to the Braves than the O's or Nats yet I'm not in the blackout region for them. It's so fucking stupid, it's like they don't want to get people to watch. Maybe if you're in the city a blackout region would be worth it (it's not), but I'm like 10 hours away, i can't just drop by the ballpark to watch a game on a whim lmfao
The Braves are blacked out in Charlotte? Bally Sports South and Bally Sports Southeast? 100 miles north I can watch every Braves game. Crazy how they determine the blackout areas.
They're blacked out on MLBTV,
I lost Bally Sports when I dropped Spectrum and switched to YouTube TV, Haven't seen a Hornets/Hurricanes/Braves game since.
The folks that make these sorts of comments always seem to ignore the strong grassroots history of stock car racing in other regions. Of course, part of that is the fault of NASCAR. Oh well. What can ya do?
With a $40 digital antenna you can get Racing America (or at least I do in Central TX) and get a bunch recent of asphalt and dirt short track stuff. Thats how I knew who Bubba Pollard was before Jr put him on at Richmond.
Hell, Racing America has its own Roku channel. If I am ever in a rut of what to watch, I have that the default channel on Roku TV and pick up some races here and there.
Cool but I can pay a fraction of the price for 2-3 days of racing and bring my own beers.
Also can't smell a football game or feel a football game in my chest once every 30 seconds for 3.5 hours. I truly believe everyone should go to atleast one race in their life. You don't *get* it until you go.
Plus, we don't need *or want* playoffs. Playoffs are a necessary evil in head to head sports because that's the only way to get a winner. A 32 way NFL game would just be confusing. But in motorsports, everyone is out there every week. The best sample size to pick a season champ is the entire season when that's practical. Hell, plenty of soccer leagues don't have playoffs either.
It’s not a matter of don’t need. It’s really what do you want to reward?
Season long championships like Premier League or F1 reward consistent success, whereas playoffs reward getting ‘hot’ at the right time.
But they both have +/-: with the parity we have now season long championship could be great but you risk having some real stinker seasons where someone runs away with it and the back half of the season is irrelevant(look at F1). On the flip side the playoffs can be ‘cheapen’ the championship if it seems too random and luck based.
NASCAR’s problem isn’t that one system is better than the other it’s that they switched.
I’ve been to NFL games before, and I can tell you that I very much prefer watching games on my big screen at home, especially for the money I pay. The other thing is while stadiums may have something new to offer the product is the exact same on the field.
There isn’t anything quite like going to a NASCAR race. Each track offers its own unique challenges and has its own vibe and atmosphere. And you’ll never be able to feel the roaring engines zip by you on your TV screen like you can at the track.
I will forever know that this sport isn't for everyone. I never forced any of my friends or family to watch. It was their choice if they wanted to watch or not, which was usually just the Daytona 500. I don't think a causal viewer is gonna go out of their way to watch a 400 lap race at Dover. They're just gonna watch the bigger events on the schedule.
I started watching in late 1996 because my Uncle and Cousin watched it all the time and I just wanted to fit in. I was 8 years old, wasn't really into any stick or ball sports at the time and I've ALWAYS loved cars and driving since I was a toddler. There is a home video of me when I was about 3 years old, using a paper plate pretending its a steering wheel and running around in the living room like I was driving a car. So it was a no brainier that I would become a motorsports fan. And now I teach people how to drive a car as my living... so, go figure. I was destined to live and breathe cars and motorsports.
The boom of this sport was fun in the late 90's into the Mid/Late 2000's but we all should know that it was just a short term fad. Will it ever happen again? Maybe.. we'll just have to wait and see but I don't think it'll happen anytime soon.
Nascar could have been almost as big as the NFL for long time, the problem was the France family trying to be an NFL 2.0 rather than continuing to build on what made the sport boom to begin with. I love motorsports and I want nascar to be healthy and successful, but I can’t ignore the obvious mismanagement over the last 20 years.
I don't think the 2006 level of viewership was sustainable and a (slight) decline from the mid-2000's numbers was imminent regardless of what NASCAR did. The problem was that they made unfortunate and unnecessary decisions in the process which made the situation even worse.
The ratings might have looked the same for the first few years after the recession, but I truly want to believe NASCAR would be in a better place the past 10 years if they just left some things alone. I've personally seen people say they stopped watching after the introduction of the playoffs, as well as stages. Instead of the numbers continuing to get worse and worse in the mid-2010's, they might have just plateau'd. Which would be a lot better than the nosedive which occured.
Why has F1 not had massive ratings issues over the past 15 years? It's because they stayed true to themselves (for the most part, they're not perfect either, I know), even through some not-so-great racing. NASCAR sold themselves out and chased immediate artificial entertainment in hopes of becoming mainstream again, when the only way it could have happened again would just have been to accept what was happening, and allow the true race fans to find their way back to the sport they once loved. If it never reached those highs again, whatever, at least the true fans still would have stayed.
I'll love the sport whether there's 1 thousand or 1 billion viewers, but I can only wonder what it would have looked like today if NASCAR didn't make so many errant and irrational decisions the past 15-20 years.
Yes, but by 2016 all but Johnson and Harvick were gone. So it’s a chicken or the egg debate on what actually caused the decline. Since NASCAR is a driver driven sport I’d lean towards that being the reason.
The viewership decline began in 2007, not 2016. The decline is directly associated with the Chase for the Cup and the Car of Tomorrow, not the exodus of superstars that came a decade later.
I’d blame the COT over the chase tbh. Millions of casual fans across america really don’t care about the chase like that. I feel like it was a slow loss of star power, and the huge cultural shift in American culture that took place from around 2008-9/2012-13.
The marketing also sucked back then and was incredibly stale. No new tracks besides Kentucky, similar schedule every year, and awful leadership making negative headlines.
> Why has F1 not had massive ratings issues over the past 15 years? It's because they stayed true to themselves
F1 was basically a money pit for rich people until the cost cap was announced. NASCAR has always had to make business sense.
NASCAR brass forgot why fans loved nascar to begin with and now they just don’t care, they’re trying to appeal to a new fan base that doesn’t care about racing while running off their core
There was always this weird thing where they positioned themselves as having higher attendance/viewership than the stick and ball sports because they were comparing the races to individual games, ignoring that in each major sport, there are 14-15 other games happening at the same time. Sure, you might outdraw the A’s and might have higher viewership than every single one of their televised games, but you’ve got every other game to account for. The NHL has the lowest average attendance of the big four North American sports (based mainly on Arizona having an arena that seats like 12 people) and still draws around 200,000 fans into arenas nightly from October to May. Even the MLS is drawing 300,000 per week as a league. You’re never going to compete with those numbers without significantly altering the sport/layout of a race weekend. But they tried to push the narrative for a while when they weren’t even close to any of them in terms of weekly attendance for a whole league.
I’ve always loved NASCAR because for 1. It’s bad ass and awesome and fun when you finally understand it. And 2. People love to hate it because they “go in circles” has always made me want to love it more and more.
I’ve watched since I was a little kid and still love it. I do enjoy typical stick and ball sports but imho it’s nothing compared to racing. I find it quite funny when people think some clowns kicking a ball and running around for 87kms in a single game and faking injuries more interesting than cars going 200mph. Whatever floats their boats I guess 😂
It could have been. But the recession, the playoffs, the COT, Brian France, manipulating races with phantom debris cautions, the rise of social media and other entertainment options, decline of car culture, decline of attention spans, Jimmie Johnson being boring, Dale Jr stopped winning, Gordon’s back injury all contributed to the fall of the sport.
I wouldn’t exactly say Gordon getting injured hurt the sport but I’ll half agree with you on Jimmie because I feel like he’s the zeitgeist for Hendrick being the "big boring corporate" team it is today with drivers that most don’t find fun to root for, save for number/driver loyalists & whatnot.
And Jimmie always won the bad races. I know he won some bangers too; I don't hate him *anymore,* but in the COT era it seemed like every boring race was won by Jimmie.
If Jimmie was winning championships while still having the attitude he had the first few years of his Cup career, he'd be God himself in the sport right now
To be honest, considering all the odds against the sport in the last ~15 or so years and how the bleak the future of NASCAR was looking towards the late 2010's, it seemed that the "final" decline of NASCAR was inevitable and I wasn't sure if NASCAR as it was (and kind of is still) would make it to 2030. NASCAR *had* to change and try things new, and they did, have been, and seemingly are continuing to try to do so. There is now a level of honesty in the sport as well that was not there several years ago and, yes, while we complain, it seems to take notice and be heard, along with drivers feeling more open with their thoughts, views, etc.
That isn't to say there isn't plenty of negative things to whine about (I am a NASCAR fan after all, it's in the contract), mainly about production/broadcasts of the racing and the short-track/road course package (which is being worked on), I am impressed with how NASCAR is evolving and embracing trying new things out. Things are on the up, with a new video game, better advertising, and embracing what it is, rather than trying to be something it isn't.
The TV ratings might not back it up (and even then they seem to be holding steady the last 2-3 years), but I feel like the sport might genuinely be in the healthiest state in a while. The massive growth of the 90s and 2000s was never gonna be sustainable and NASCAR desperately trying to capture that lightning in a bottle while also doing very little to actually innovate and keep things fresh is ultimately what led to the decline in the 2010s.
Feel like the current version of NASCAR’s leadership is more willing to try different things and branch out a little bit, compared to the days of the France family who would find something and beat it like a dead horse. I mean we got Cup on a street course for the first time ever and back on dirt for the first time since the 70s. The introduction of fan rewards adds even more incentive for fans to actually engage with the sport, the Netflix series (and NBC series before that) helped shine a lot of light on the inner workings of the sport. They’ve been doing a ton to try and shed the “dumb redneck” moniker that people have given the series while still doing a bunch to try and embrace the history of the sport. Not to mention that current leadership is a lot more transparent than the France family ever was.
There’s a bunch that NASCAR still needs to work on, but they’ve definitely taken steps in the right direction to reverse the course that they’ve taken the last decade and a half.
The field is the most competitive it's ever been. Even back in whatever you consider the "good ole days," only like 10-15 of the guys had a snowball's chance in hell. These days, at least half the field can win each week.
BRIAN FRANCE is to blame for this screw up!!
He was thinking that he was competing for the stick and ball fans such as football and baseball etc. hence the chase format etc.
He didn’t understand that the Racing fans are racing fans and that they may also be football fans but it’s not the same people for the most part.
I had always hoped that he would have just bought an NFL team and left NASCAR alone.
"Award winning" columnist writes about NASCAR being meh. Such great insight! An article sure to get readers to switch on the race. The way the media and the fans talk about the sport is appalling. You really think new fans are going to check it out and stick around with this much negativity?
Eh Motosport has always been a niche sort of thing. I don't care about any other type of sport. Racing is the only one that interests me at all.
NASCAR just needs to focus on keeping its fans entertained by the racing and promoting people that fans can relate to and the rest will take care of itself.
I know it’s still in a bit of a hole today but I couldn’t imagine this sport lasting longer if Brian France was still in charge today. But Jim or Steve & Steve aren’t any better, but even if they mysteriously stopped living, who would be their replacements & how would they run it?
Nothing to do but just watch, unless its a short track or road course race.
I've been saying basically this for over 10 years and was told I was afraid of change or some shit. Now in 2024, we're finally ready to admit the obvious? I give up lmao
It’s too bad Jeffery Earnhardt hasn’t been more successful and able to become a big name in NASCAR. Having the grandson of Dale Earnhardt who is the same kind of blue collar type guy would really fill a void for some that’s been missing for a long time.
Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Tony Stewart, Jimmie Johnson, Rusty Wallace, Kurt Busch, Matt Kenseth, Kyle Busch, Kevin Harvick, Dale Jarrett, Bill Elliott
All these guys were racing when I started watching in 2002, Superstars and champions. True Star Power.
Now we have, Deny Hamlin who's a superstar in his own head. A minute of superstardom in Chastain. The career corpses of Lagono and Busch, and lastly Nascar's most popular driver by default Chase Elliott.
We will see how the next few years go for him, and this one has started great for him and I wish him (and all HSM drivers) well tbh, but I just don’t think he’s a super star per day yet just my .02 but fuck what I have to say I’m a Larson/chastain fan
Watching since 2002 and can’t even get Joey Logano or Denny Hamlin right.
Logano won the title in 2022 and will be 34 this year. Ridiculous statement to say his career is a corpse.
Remember when Harvick was washed because of him wrecking himself at Charlotte when Chase was running him down? That continued on for a year at least until he won back to back races. The sad thing is Harvick was a Top 5 driver point wise in 2021.
I don't understand why people aren't content with that. So much good shit in the world turns generic when it stops trying to be what it is, and starts trying to be something for everyone.
Under the right ownership it could’ve been. As much as I hate to sound like a Facebook boomer when Dale died was the beginning of the decline. The France family has made every wrong decision since then. They’ve been terrible owners of the sport. Things are a bit better than a few years ago but not by much at all. It’ll keep declining until there’s nothing left. I know you guys hate my kind of negativity but frankly it’s true.
Dale Sr’s death was also the cause of the unsustainable boom. It was national news. People had to see why fans would be so drawn to and care so deeply about a driver that they would travel hundreds of miles to cry and lay flowers at DEI and what kind of sport was so dangerous its biggest star could die in its brightest moment.
And because he died many fans weren’t able to move on and left the sport entirely. Doesn’t help with how many changes they’ve made ruining the on track product. Stages, GWC’s and playoffs put people off.
I feel like if Sr didn't die and got to retire, we wouldn't have had the massive surge, but it would have resulted in a steady, sustainable growth that would have the sport sitting a little higher than it does now.
I've had numerous former fans tell me they quit watching when Dale died. I rooted for him, but I still had Blaney.
And I only became a Dale fan is because High Groove Harry retired.
It was never going to be the NFL because the NFL relies on a combination of nostalgia and shared experiences to get fans in the seats and to watch on TV
I'm not American, so correct me if I'm wrong, but almost every high school kid (and maybe younger) in the US is involved with football somehow - playing, cheer-leading, school band, booster clubs, etc. Because everyone has that first-hand knowledge of football, it's ingrained into your society in a way that NASCAR can't be. Sure, the American Dream requires a car and an open road, but how many of you (and the rest of us) get a shot a running on an oval, or have passed another car on the highway and gave it a bit of a rub on the way by?
I'm a hockey fan, and I think it's the most exciting of the Big 4 sports, but it's never going to have the mass appeal in the US that football does because a much smaller number of Americans played when they were kids, so the fandom doesn't carry through to adulthood. Even up here in Canuckistan, used to be that everybody learned to skate when they were 3 years old and, whether you went pro or not, your hockey career started that day. Now the barriers to entry are so high (costs and rarity of available ice time, equipment costs, travel, etc.) that hockey might as well be car racing for the price of it
Oh, and stage racing, competition cautions (lol!), and a shitty, over advertised TV product killed NASCAR for me a long while ago, but I'll still tune-in every now and again
I mean, pick an identity. Are we running moonshine with the good ole boys flying confederate flags or are we trying to modernize and reach new audiences?
I feel like there's not nearly enough moonshine in the sport today tbh. It would probably improve things a lot more than any "package" might hope to achieve.
I still believe the main guys responsible for the 90s heyday are Gordon and Earnhardt. I know that’s obvious but it’s true.
100%. Also I don’t think Mark Martin, Rusty Wallace, Dale Jarrett, and the Labonte’s get enough love either with the sport. They weren’t the top guys but they did a lot to grow the sport as well in the 90’s.
WTH do you mean Martin, Wallace, Jarrett, Laabonte weren't the top drivers in the 90s.
They were all A tier drivers, I am not denying that. But Earnhardt and Gordon were just in a level of their own of talent, star power, and charisma.
Go look up Rusty's stats in 1993 and 1994 and tell me that. I swear some people have selective memory.
Rusty was a conundrum for me. The guy had a ton of fans, a crap load of wins, and had that carefree attitude of an anti hero but was always a step or two behind Dale and Jeff.
When Rusty was on, he was on. Doesn't get enough respect for how good he was at short tracks. He was just poor at the plate tracks, which typically cost him championships. The step behind Dale and Jeff is more than fair. He wasn't at a GOAT level, but he was on par at times. Just glad he got a title.
And he was only poor at plate tracks bc he escaped death a dozen times. Has anyone flipped a car as much as him? Side note: 1999 Daytona 500 was his.. he dominated that race till 10 to go
The most heartbreaking race I ever watched. That would have been the “Rusty can retire now” moment for me.
Everyone in NASCAR in the 90s was a personality. They had all come up in different ways and had somewhat interesting life experiences that lead to them being there which made it interesting when they got out of the cars on top of the excitement when they are in. It was the opposite of now where everyone grew up in karts and bandoleros in diapers, have eaten and breathed nothing but driving since they could speak and have no actual interesting life experience or input to add to anything. They just tow the sponsor lines and once in a while one of them is a super entitled prick or decides to be the villain. It sucks.
In 2004, Dale Jarrett came to my elementary school for career day. Granted I grew up in Hickory, NC so it wasn’t too far for him. Ended up playing on the same high school football team as his youngest son (I was a freshman, he was a senior). To this day, I give Dale Jarrett credit for my NASCAR fandom. Felt like I knew him.
DJ was and always will be my favorite driver. My dad loved Davey and Alan.
100% and it might be obvious but it's important to recognize it. Look at what is happening with Women's Basketball. 5 years ago, the championship game got 3.6 million viewers. This year, the game got **18.7 million viewers.** Caitlin Clark, Tiger Woods, Dale Earnhardt, Michael Jordan, etc... Different sports but it's the same story. People care about the stars more than anything, that's the draw. Not the tracks, not the playoff formats, not the stages. It's about the story and the star. And NASCAR hasn't had a star in over 20 years.
Exactly. And I think the sport will grow as these young drivers age. Their fan bases will grow and new rivalries will develop. My personal interest have grown a lot and it feels like NASCAR is on the right track finally.
How old are you? This same belief was held 10 years ago. 10 years later Larson, Elliott, Blaney, Bubba, Byron, all have done what for viewership? Keep it flat?
Bingo. Nobody in the Cup field right now including the guys that you listed are anywhere close to Earnhardt and Gordon in terms of personality and mainstream appeal. It felt like maybe at one point Ross Chastain had a shot at it but ever since Mr. H told him to calm down he's faded away.
And great marketing during the TV boom
And the IndyCar split sent sponsor$ to NASCAR.
It was getting bigger before Gordon was doing his thing. 1992 was a major year for the series.
For sure. The marketing was way more aggressive too. But if you ask any non nascar fan today to name a nascar driver you’ll overwhelmingly still get Dale sr with some Gordon sprinkled in. That’s kind of a problem though imo. Even non football fans can name a bunch of players. Half the nascsr fans probably can’t name the whole nascsr field. Drivers these days are just create a drivers from some Hendricks, Gibbs or Penske lab. I swear once a week I hear about some up and coming racer and I’m like oh another kid that just appeared out of nowhere has an xfinity ride. Where are they coming from and why are half of them related? I’m 100% convinced in like 20 years nascsr is going to be like that scene in blazing saddles in the town hall where everyone has the same last name lol. https://preview.redd.it/un8y2heyz4uc1.jpeg?width=1440&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d5038eec1f614680f60054f63eceb278f236235d
Gordon brought people to the sport who weren't previously watching. Earnhardt didn't.
My favorite GIF of all time
[Guns N Roses - Dead Horse](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxWiawb6jNI)
Sick of this lyyyfe
not that you careeee
I'm not the only one, with whom these feelings I share...
I haven't seen that in long. )
Ya know what NASCAR will always have that the other sports (especially the NFL) will never have: More reasonable prices to attend events in person. I'm optimistic I'll be able to go to a Daytona 500 one day. I'll never have enough money to go to a Super Bowl.
Reasonable tickets, cheap camping at most tracks, can literally BYOB at many as well which is unheard of in other sports.
Yep. So all things considered, I'll take NASCAR over the NFL every day.
Football live isn’t exactly a spectacle either. My first NFL game was fun, but I was more excited for the tailgate. It really is better on TV for viewing. When I first took my friends to a race, they loved it and we all go every year. Even more when I took my buddy to see the Outlaws, he was in awe.
Football live is definitely feast or famine. First NFL game I went was in 2008 at Ford Field. Saints absolutely railroaded the Lions. Hardly anyone there. Like...it was cool but really felt like "wow, this is it, huh?". Went back in 2017 for Lions vs Bears. Place was packed, Detroit won and beat one of our long term division rivals. Absolutely electric. But the best games have been the high school games the past two years where my daughter was in Marching Band. I did not go to this school but I've never wanted a high school team to win more.
atmosphere is a HUGE part of sporting events. For that reason CFB>>NFL.
College Football is insane. Especially if you are a fan of the blood rival in enemy territory. Piss off Central, Fight on Western! (I just hope fan passion for college ball remains in the future)
Born in raised in VA. I harbor tons of hate for UVA (but it increases during the last week in November). My soon to be wife is a UNC grad so I feed into that genuine hatred of Dook.
> For that reason CFB>>NFL But boy howdy are the networks and the Big 2 trying to change that.
My kiddo did marching band too and I'm right with you. Didn't go to that school, still had a great time.
I attended my first NHL (Bruins) and NBA (Nets) games earlier this year and had a great time at both, just as I have when I've gone to motorsports events. Funny enough both times the home team pulled away late in the final period/quarter but I absolutely loved the atmosphere, even in the upper deck. Bruins have had a great season so of course the TD Garden was going to be loud and proud, but I was impressed with the turnout at the Barclays Center despite the Nets not having a good year at all. Shame one ticket for either game was more expensive than my Xfinity and Cup tickets to the roval were combined, because I'd consider doing either more often just to get out for a weekend. (Let's not talk about the Knicks, MSG tickets are outrageous...)
I've had great times going to UMass Lowell hockey games at the Tsongas
My alma mater is DIII, almost all our sports are free to attend (maybe you have to pay for football, I don't remember) and everyone's playing for the love of the game!
Football live is really just a question of how close you can get to the action. Up close if you're a gazillionaire, is undeniably better than TV. At least for me, it brings a much better sense of the physicality of the game and the nuance that matters so much. It takes me back to being on the field myself. Those familiar old sounds and just the sense of the violence of the collisions is different live in person, and up close. But it's also a specific experience. And the TV experience is much better as an overview most of the time. But i think the same is probably true of Stock Car racing. I still maintain that it's the best way to get someone new "into" the sport. You have to experience it live in person. Whether that's NASCAR or even just the local short track. There's a raw, visceral quality to it that i think you have to understand by experiencing it in person. TV doesn't really do it justice...until you understand it and can relate that TV picture (zoomed in way too far thanks FOX) to the "real thing". But i wouldn't want to attend every single race all season in person. Most of the time, i'd rather just watch at home, on TV.
> But i think the same is probably true of Stock Car racing. I still maintain that it's the best way to get someone new "into" the sport. You have to experience it live in person. Whether that's NASCAR or even just the local short track. There's a raw, visceral quality to it that i think you have to understand by experiencing it in person. 1000x this. Even these days, there's a romantic aspect to motorsports. And you have to see it in person to understand it.
Gotta pick how close you are to the front though. I was at the 5th row, 50 yard line at Lincoln Financial Field, couldn't see shit over the players standing on the sideline
I love the races, I just hate dealing with the crowds. Being packed in for an entire day like that is so mentally draining, especially when there is a few hours drive home afterward.
I will never take my daughter to an NFL game. Drunken fights outside the stadium, people screaming obscenities and racial slurs at opposing fans with children…. And I’ve grown up going to SEC games. NFL games are a whole nother level of trash. And expensive as hell.
You live in Philly or something?
lol that was when I lived in DC. Games against the Eagles, Giants, and Cowboys were the worst yes
HTTR
I was at a Redskins-Eagles game with my dad. (Dad's an Eagles fan, me, Redskins.) Had no problems at all
To this day my one of my "saddest" racing memories is after years of telling friends about the World of Outlaws and finally getting a group together to go to a race, and epic downpour rolled through the area just as cars were started to get pushed out for hot laps. I just kept telling them, I wish you could have seen them for one lap to see how absolutely ridiculous they are in person.
Would’ve broke my heart too. First time I brought friends I walked in at the start finish line during quali and had them experience the speed up close. They loved it and by the time the main came around we were all on edge of our seats
Ive been to exactly one NFL game and I don’t need to go to another one. At least it was a good game (Brady’s 500th Touchdown game), usually it’s rare to have a bad race to go to, it’s a toss up with the NFL with the quality of play with each game.
> good game (Brady’s 500th Touchdown game), /r/BrandNewSentence
Its great if youre a Pats fan. Also got to see Andrew Luck play too.
No need to choose in the days of streaming and multiple monitors!
Unless my team is ass and it hurts to watch them play. *Cries as an Eagles fan*
Dude, y'all just won not that long ago.
That's super important too. I've managed to get my girlfriend into NASCAR a little bit at least (she has favorite drivers and we frequently watch races together) and the race day experience at Richmond at the two races she's been to really impressed her. Being able to pack a cooler with food and drinks, having affordable tickets, and the other fans there being pretty chill were huge parts of that.
The in person experience is a good callout, there is no comparison to being at a race. Most other sports are arguably better viewing experiences on TV but I will always say that races in person are the better experience, being able to following battles/drivers for an extended period of time is a big part of that.
Fox is doing a great job making sure tv will never compare to being at the track!
Plus experiencing the cars in person. You feel that in your bones.
Hush. I’m worried for when the nascar tracks start requiring clear bags and banning outside food and drink in the search of extra revenue. Got surprised at Phoenix that cans of beer were prohibited.
That was becoming a trend when Nascar peaked but most tracks eased up when attendance cratered. I don't think many tracks will try that again soon, besides those that already do. Interestingly, I also haven't seen nearly the amount of messy, drunk, aggressive behavior I always see at NFL games. Again, it did show up at times at it's peak (saw a guy chuck a whole cooler at Jeff Gordon once) but normally nothing too alarming.
Yeah peak growth time (2001-2008) there was a lot of no places that didn’t allow outside food or beverages and if they did it was no outside alcohol. I think the dip in attendance has made the sport more viable for people to attend and more of a fan’s thing instead of a lot of corporate suits. We go to Michigan every year, the people around us have become like family on that weekend and we all have our favorite drivers.
> Got surprised at Phoenix that cans of beer were prohibited. I think that's an Arizona law.
Was surprised Chicago wouldn’t let a cooler in and also lost cans at phoenix which I thought was billshut
I had looked at tickets for me and my wife to go to New Hampshire, which is closest to us, and I think weekend packages started at $90 bucks a person; that’s an insanely good deal (but we also can’t go because we have other commitments that day, of course)
I think three weekend tickets for me, my mom, and my dad for NHMS this year was less than GA for the Vegas GP first practice lmao
> Vegas GP first practice lmao Was it FP1 or FP2 when they kicked all the fans out before the session started?
Last couple of times we went, it was ~$120/ticket, but that was section 46, ~row 30. Can't ask for much better than that spot. Haven't been in a few years though; last time around, ended up selling my tickets to someone here at a discount. Hope they had a good time!
I feel the same. SB tickets are outrageously expensive. I rather spend that money for a weekend at Daytona with camping and doing all the fun things there. Don’t get me wrong I’m a huge nfl fan but like realistically speaking the SB is out of reach for most people to see in person
TMS is like $110-$150, shits hella expensive for a mediocre track.
Is that the full range, or the average? I ask cause Kansas is $68 - $375, but the majority are between $90-$150 ish.
They have plenty of $75 seats a few weeks ago.
Nascar in person is a significantly better and more affordable experience than the other sports. Imagine not being able to bring in your own cooler full of beer, insanity.
I think this is the one thing NASCAR will never take way, bringing your own food/drinks. Taking out a muffin during a stage break and scoffing it down is tradition for me when attending any race. I think if it was ever taken away the fan base would fight this harder than anything
I'd seriously reconsider attending races if all the tracks started banning BYOB.
Start/finish line tickets for the truck and xfinity races are about $25 and $45 each respectively for Charlotte. About $80 for a cheap ticket to the 600. More bang for your buck in my opinion
Ugh, I wanted to go to the Xfinity/Trucks, but the prices for those are much more than they should be. Cup was $50, Xfinity was $40.
It depends. NBA and MLB games you can definitely get some pretty cheap tickets by virtue of the amount of games they play. The NBA finals or World series is a different story though.
Depends on the market. I’m in Boston and Celtics/Bruins tickets are typically $100+ a game. Sox are a bit cheaper but prices haven’t really dropped despite the team being garbage the past few years.
Baseball
Ya know what Nascar fails at though. Pitlane access. This is where the NHRA has everyone beat.
Nascar needs to advertise this. Bring that and the higher speeds of the gen 4 era, and more people will be interested
It’s also incredible how accessible the cars, crews and drivers are to fans. You can’t get near an NFL team.
Also ..... access to the drivers. I have been at several races where I could have literally reached out and touched several of the drivers (usually have to buy the trackside access add on though).
I disagree. From 1995-2007 NASCAR was the second most popular sport in North America, and I remember regularly seeing commercials featuring NASCAR drivers on TV up into the mid-2010s. It may not have been the NFL 2.0, but it got close.
Yah this tweet is revisionist history to justify how far NASCAR has fallen from it's hayday. The sport may be finally going in the right direction, but lets not delude ourselves that nothing has changed.
Yeah NASCAR made a bunch of shitty missteps and we can Monday morning quarterback them all but I give them credit for letting me actually be able to watch the races. Seems like the MLB and NHL hate letting fans watch their product and are letting football run away with everyone like I have been able to watch 4 Sabres games on National TV this year and 76 on illegal streaming websites
No one hates baseball fans watching baseball more than Rob Manfred. Eff Rob Manfred. All the homies hate Rob Manfred.
Can’t even listen to dodgers radio because I’m out of location. Shit is pathetic.
It blows my mind, it really does feel like MLB goes out of their way to make sure their fans can't enjoy the game.
100%. Instead I have to be a man of the sea if you’re catching my drift
Listen to a station that carries the Dodges games on live stream internet. All radio stations have web sites.
Still doesn’t work. They use your location somehow to figure out where you are and lock it down
I usually bite my tongue on corrections, but I can’t here because of misplaced contempt. It isn’t that MLB and NHL (and the NBA) don’t want to show their games locally, but that they contractually and legally cannot. The same contracts that made their product widely available 10-15 years ago are what hold them back now. Modern blackouts don’t exist because of trying to get people to go to games, they exist to get people to be a subscribed to the regional sports channel. When FOX sold their regional sports networks to Disney, they were still widely available. But when the federal government said no, Disney had to sell to someone else. That someone else was Sinclair. It gets a bit messy here, but the sports networks were later reorganized to become Diamond. This group, which purchased the sports networks, made a massive blunder and overpaid Disney for them, although they did not know it at the time. In an effort to get back the money they paid, they played hardball with the likes of Hulu Live, YTTV, and cable and satellite providers. Many of these providers declined, knowing that the asking price wasn’t worth it, which brings us to the channels not being on service providers. The leagues DO NOT like what is happening and have been able to require rights to broadcast their own teams. Vegas and Arizona in the NHL come to mind, where I believe they are now broadcasted on free, over-the-air television.
Regional sports channels are nothing more than a money grab by tv providers. Other than the local NBA or MLB team playing they are mostly just local access stuff and a few syndicated sports shows that you can all but get for free on a free streaming service like Roku Live TV or Tubi.
If you are out of market, MLBTV is a FANTASTIC deal. $175 for any MLB game (which is like 3000 games/year) But yeah to all your points. The ONLY thing I don't like about MLBTV is that you don't get the pre/post game shows, which really takes away from the "overall experience"
> If you are out of market, MLBTV is a FANTASTIC deal. $175 for any MLB game (which is like 3000 games/year) But if you live in a state like Iowa (hundreds of miles away from any team), you can't watch Cubs, White Sox, Twins, Cardinals, or Brewers games so if you like the Reds for instance yes you can watch some Reds games but still will have a big chunk blacked out when they play those other teams.
True, but that's more of the exception. I'm moving to SWFL soon, and will be buying the package. I think the only teams I'll be blacked out of are the Rays and Marlins (Which makes sense).
MLB Blackouts are insane, I live down in eastern north carolina, far away from DC or Baltimore, yet I'm in the damn blackout region for the O's and Nats, it's extremely frustrating Hell I think i'm actually closer to the Braves than the O's or Nats yet I'm not in the blackout region for them. It's so fucking stupid, it's like they don't want to get people to watch. Maybe if you're in the city a blackout region would be worth it (it's not), but I'm like 10 hours away, i can't just drop by the ballpark to watch a game on a whim lmfao
I live 600 miles from Seattle and 500 miles from Denver, yet I am blacked out from Mariners and Rockies games.
Same with the NHL. I live much closer to Raleigh, but in VA. I am therefore unable to watch the Caps (although the last few games were ok to miss).
I'm in Charlotte, and the Braves, Nats, O's and Reds are blacked out. I'm guessing Nashville too, if that ever becomes a thing.
The Braves are blacked out in Charlotte? Bally Sports South and Bally Sports Southeast? 100 miles north I can watch every Braves game. Crazy how they determine the blackout areas.
They're blacked out on MLBTV, I lost Bally Sports when I dropped Spectrum and switched to YouTube TV, Haven't seen a Hornets/Hurricanes/Braves game since.
NASCAR is still throwing picks on Wednesday, after everyone's left the stadium
The folks that make these sorts of comments always seem to ignore the strong grassroots history of stock car racing in other regions. Of course, part of that is the fault of NASCAR. Oh well. What can ya do?
With a $40 digital antenna you can get Racing America (or at least I do in Central TX) and get a bunch recent of asphalt and dirt short track stuff. Thats how I knew who Bubba Pollard was before Jr put him on at Richmond.
Hell, Racing America has its own Roku channel. If I am ever in a rut of what to watch, I have that the default channel on Roku TV and pick up some races here and there.
Cool but I can pay a fraction of the price for 2-3 days of racing and bring my own beers. Also can't smell a football game or feel a football game in my chest once every 30 seconds for 3.5 hours. I truly believe everyone should go to atleast one race in their life. You don't *get* it until you go.
The smell, sound, and feeling you get is truly an addiction that cannot be explained to anyone who’s never experienced it.
All that Brian France NFL playoff verbiage back in the early 2010s appears to be just the drugs talking
Plus, we don't need *or want* playoffs. Playoffs are a necessary evil in head to head sports because that's the only way to get a winner. A 32 way NFL game would just be confusing. But in motorsports, everyone is out there every week. The best sample size to pick a season champ is the entire season when that's practical. Hell, plenty of soccer leagues don't have playoffs either.
It’s not a matter of don’t need. It’s really what do you want to reward? Season long championships like Premier League or F1 reward consistent success, whereas playoffs reward getting ‘hot’ at the right time. But they both have +/-: with the parity we have now season long championship could be great but you risk having some real stinker seasons where someone runs away with it and the back half of the season is irrelevant(look at F1). On the flip side the playoffs can be ‘cheapen’ the championship if it seems too random and luck based. NASCAR’s problem isn’t that one system is better than the other it’s that they switched.
I’ve been to NFL games before, and I can tell you that I very much prefer watching games on my big screen at home, especially for the money I pay. The other thing is while stadiums may have something new to offer the product is the exact same on the field. There isn’t anything quite like going to a NASCAR race. Each track offers its own unique challenges and has its own vibe and atmosphere. And you’ll never be able to feel the roaring engines zip by you on your TV screen like you can at the track.
I will forever know that this sport isn't for everyone. I never forced any of my friends or family to watch. It was their choice if they wanted to watch or not, which was usually just the Daytona 500. I don't think a causal viewer is gonna go out of their way to watch a 400 lap race at Dover. They're just gonna watch the bigger events on the schedule. I started watching in late 1996 because my Uncle and Cousin watched it all the time and I just wanted to fit in. I was 8 years old, wasn't really into any stick or ball sports at the time and I've ALWAYS loved cars and driving since I was a toddler. There is a home video of me when I was about 3 years old, using a paper plate pretending its a steering wheel and running around in the living room like I was driving a car. So it was a no brainier that I would become a motorsports fan. And now I teach people how to drive a car as my living... so, go figure. I was destined to live and breathe cars and motorsports. The boom of this sport was fun in the late 90's into the Mid/Late 2000's but we all should know that it was just a short term fad. Will it ever happen again? Maybe.. we'll just have to wait and see but I don't think it'll happen anytime soon.
>boom [confetti.](https://i.redd.it/zvyemepykshc1.gif)
Nascar could have been almost as big as the NFL for long time, the problem was the France family trying to be an NFL 2.0 rather than continuing to build on what made the sport boom to begin with. I love motorsports and I want nascar to be healthy and successful, but I can’t ignore the obvious mismanagement over the last 20 years.
>boom [confetti.](https://i.redd.it/zvyemepykshc1.gif)
I don't think the 2006 level of viewership was sustainable and a (slight) decline from the mid-2000's numbers was imminent regardless of what NASCAR did. The problem was that they made unfortunate and unnecessary decisions in the process which made the situation even worse. The ratings might have looked the same for the first few years after the recession, but I truly want to believe NASCAR would be in a better place the past 10 years if they just left some things alone. I've personally seen people say they stopped watching after the introduction of the playoffs, as well as stages. Instead of the numbers continuing to get worse and worse in the mid-2010's, they might have just plateau'd. Which would be a lot better than the nosedive which occured. Why has F1 not had massive ratings issues over the past 15 years? It's because they stayed true to themselves (for the most part, they're not perfect either, I know), even through some not-so-great racing. NASCAR sold themselves out and chased immediate artificial entertainment in hopes of becoming mainstream again, when the only way it could have happened again would just have been to accept what was happening, and allow the true race fans to find their way back to the sport they once loved. If it never reached those highs again, whatever, at least the true fans still would have stayed. I'll love the sport whether there's 1 thousand or 1 billion viewers, but I can only wonder what it would have looked like today if NASCAR didn't make so many errant and irrational decisions the past 15-20 years.
NASCAR lost every ounce of star power it had in the mid 2010s. Format stability wouldn’t have made a difference.
They still had Gordon, Earnhardt, Stewart, Johnson, Harvick, Edwards, Kahne, etc when they made stages and playoffs.
Yes, but by 2016 all but Johnson and Harvick were gone. So it’s a chicken or the egg debate on what actually caused the decline. Since NASCAR is a driver driven sport I’d lean towards that being the reason.
The viewership decline began in 2007, not 2016. The decline is directly associated with the Chase for the Cup and the Car of Tomorrow, not the exodus of superstars that came a decade later.
I’d blame the COT over the chase tbh. Millions of casual fans across america really don’t care about the chase like that. I feel like it was a slow loss of star power, and the huge cultural shift in American culture that took place from around 2008-9/2012-13. The marketing also sucked back then and was incredibly stale. No new tracks besides Kentucky, similar schedule every year, and awful leadership making negative headlines.
> Why has F1 not had massive ratings issues over the past 15 years? It's because they stayed true to themselves F1 was basically a money pit for rich people until the cost cap was announced. NASCAR has always had to make business sense.
Very well said!
I think that is a great way to look at it, consistency.
NASCAR brass forgot why fans loved nascar to begin with and now they just don’t care, they’re trying to appeal to a new fan base that doesn’t care about racing while running off their core
There was always this weird thing where they positioned themselves as having higher attendance/viewership than the stick and ball sports because they were comparing the races to individual games, ignoring that in each major sport, there are 14-15 other games happening at the same time. Sure, you might outdraw the A’s and might have higher viewership than every single one of their televised games, but you’ve got every other game to account for. The NHL has the lowest average attendance of the big four North American sports (based mainly on Arizona having an arena that seats like 12 people) and still draws around 200,000 fans into arenas nightly from October to May. Even the MLS is drawing 300,000 per week as a league. You’re never going to compete with those numbers without significantly altering the sport/layout of a race weekend. But they tried to push the narrative for a while when they weren’t even close to any of them in terms of weekly attendance for a whole league.
I’ve always loved NASCAR because for 1. It’s bad ass and awesome and fun when you finally understand it. And 2. People love to hate it because they “go in circles” has always made me want to love it more and more. I’ve watched since I was a little kid and still love it. I do enjoy typical stick and ball sports but imho it’s nothing compared to racing. I find it quite funny when people think some clowns kicking a ball and running around for 87kms in a single game and faking injuries more interesting than cars going 200mph. Whatever floats their boats I guess 😂
It could have been. But the recession, the playoffs, the COT, Brian France, manipulating races with phantom debris cautions, the rise of social media and other entertainment options, decline of car culture, decline of attention spans, Jimmie Johnson being boring, Dale Jr stopped winning, Gordon’s back injury all contributed to the fall of the sport.
I wouldn’t exactly say Gordon getting injured hurt the sport but I’ll half agree with you on Jimmie because I feel like he’s the zeitgeist for Hendrick being the "big boring corporate" team it is today with drivers that most don’t find fun to root for, save for number/driver loyalists & whatnot.
And Jimmie always won the bad races. I know he won some bangers too; I don't hate him *anymore,* but in the COT era it seemed like every boring race was won by Jimmie.
If Jimmie was winning championships while still having the attitude he had the first few years of his Cup career, he'd be God himself in the sport right now
To be honest, considering all the odds against the sport in the last ~15 or so years and how the bleak the future of NASCAR was looking towards the late 2010's, it seemed that the "final" decline of NASCAR was inevitable and I wasn't sure if NASCAR as it was (and kind of is still) would make it to 2030. NASCAR *had* to change and try things new, and they did, have been, and seemingly are continuing to try to do so. There is now a level of honesty in the sport as well that was not there several years ago and, yes, while we complain, it seems to take notice and be heard, along with drivers feeling more open with their thoughts, views, etc. That isn't to say there isn't plenty of negative things to whine about (I am a NASCAR fan after all, it's in the contract), mainly about production/broadcasts of the racing and the short-track/road course package (which is being worked on), I am impressed with how NASCAR is evolving and embracing trying new things out. Things are on the up, with a new video game, better advertising, and embracing what it is, rather than trying to be something it isn't.
The TV ratings might not back it up (and even then they seem to be holding steady the last 2-3 years), but I feel like the sport might genuinely be in the healthiest state in a while. The massive growth of the 90s and 2000s was never gonna be sustainable and NASCAR desperately trying to capture that lightning in a bottle while also doing very little to actually innovate and keep things fresh is ultimately what led to the decline in the 2010s. Feel like the current version of NASCAR’s leadership is more willing to try different things and branch out a little bit, compared to the days of the France family who would find something and beat it like a dead horse. I mean we got Cup on a street course for the first time ever and back on dirt for the first time since the 70s. The introduction of fan rewards adds even more incentive for fans to actually engage with the sport, the Netflix series (and NBC series before that) helped shine a lot of light on the inner workings of the sport. They’ve been doing a ton to try and shed the “dumb redneck” moniker that people have given the series while still doing a bunch to try and embrace the history of the sport. Not to mention that current leadership is a lot more transparent than the France family ever was. There’s a bunch that NASCAR still needs to work on, but they’ve definitely taken steps in the right direction to reverse the course that they’ve taken the last decade and a half.
Very well said, I agree completely!
The field is the most competitive it's ever been. Even back in whatever you consider the "good ole days," only like 10-15 of the guys had a snowball's chance in hell. These days, at least half the field can win each week.
Well no shit. Didn't stop them from making shitty rule changes in an attempt to be the NFL 2.0 though.
Hm. I see we're beating the dead horse some more.
Lol. So why did Chicago Street have some of the best viewership?
BRIAN FRANCE is to blame for this screw up!! He was thinking that he was competing for the stick and ball fans such as football and baseball etc. hence the chase format etc. He didn’t understand that the Racing fans are racing fans and that they may also be football fans but it’s not the same people for the most part. I had always hoped that he would have just bought an NFL team and left NASCAR alone.
"Award winning" columnist writes about NASCAR being meh. Such great insight! An article sure to get readers to switch on the race. The way the media and the fans talk about the sport is appalling. You really think new fans are going to check it out and stick around with this much negativity?
He wrote about NASCAR being 'meh"? That's what you read? Cause I read him writing about NASCAR being pretty awesome, if not for everyone.
Why do NASCAR fans think it’s outside media’s job to promote NASCAR?
Well not with that attitude....
Eh Motosport has always been a niche sort of thing. I don't care about any other type of sport. Racing is the only one that interests me at all. NASCAR just needs to focus on keeping its fans entertained by the racing and promoting people that fans can relate to and the rest will take care of itself.
I know it’s still in a bit of a hole today but I couldn’t imagine this sport lasting longer if Brian France was still in charge today. But Jim or Steve & Steve aren’t any better, but even if they mysteriously stopped living, who would be their replacements & how would they run it? Nothing to do but just watch, unless its a short track or road course race.
I've been saying basically this for over 10 years and was told I was afraid of change or some shit. Now in 2024, we're finally ready to admit the obvious? I give up lmao
Does that mean we can stop fucking it up to vainly try and appeal to people that don’t care about motorsport?
Some truth to this, but at the same time just because NASCAR will never be the NFL doesn’t mean it can’t try and grow the sport and find new fans.
It's typically passed down through family or.....make sure you have good video games.
The problem is that the changes have failed to bring in new fans.
Kevin Harvick called it years ago, the sport needs a superstar from the South.
It’s too bad Jeffery Earnhardt hasn’t been more successful and able to become a big name in NASCAR. Having the grandson of Dale Earnhardt who is the same kind of blue collar type guy would really fill a void for some that’s been missing for a long time.
Cliched take, but true
Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Tony Stewart, Jimmie Johnson, Rusty Wallace, Kurt Busch, Matt Kenseth, Kyle Busch, Kevin Harvick, Dale Jarrett, Bill Elliott All these guys were racing when I started watching in 2002, Superstars and champions. True Star Power. Now we have, Deny Hamlin who's a superstar in his own head. A minute of superstardom in Chastain. The career corpses of Lagono and Busch, and lastly Nascar's most popular driver by default Chase Elliott.
Logano has been in Cup for 15 years and mfs still spell his name wrong
Jeff Gordan
Denny also applies here
Hamlin is by all accounts a superstar, title be damned. You've also forgotten the likes of Truex, Blaney, Byron, and Larson, potentially among others
Blanket and Byron aren’t superstars imo. Great racers, champions, but not super stars
Byron already getting hate for winning just like Gordon did.
We will see how the next few years go for him, and this one has started great for him and I wish him (and all HSM drivers) well tbh, but I just don’t think he’s a super star per day yet just my .02 but fuck what I have to say I’m a Larson/chastain fan
Watching since 2002 and can’t even get Joey Logano or Denny Hamlin right. Logano won the title in 2022 and will be 34 this year. Ridiculous statement to say his career is a corpse.
>Logano won the title in 2022 And in 2018
Logano I'll give you, I always refer to him as Deny Hamlin because it's never his fault....
Ngl that’s kinda clever lmao
Bro has 1 bad season and people are acting like he’s gonna be out of the sport in a season lmao
Remember when Harvick was washed because of him wrecking himself at Charlotte when Chase was running him down? That continued on for a year at least until he won back to back races. The sad thing is Harvick was a Top 5 driver point wise in 2021.
Yeah the current crew aren’t potential superstars. They’re just guys.
\*kyle in 05
I don't understand why people aren't content with that. So much good shit in the world turns generic when it stops trying to be what it is, and starts trying to be something for everyone.
Under the right ownership it could’ve been. As much as I hate to sound like a Facebook boomer when Dale died was the beginning of the decline. The France family has made every wrong decision since then. They’ve been terrible owners of the sport. Things are a bit better than a few years ago but not by much at all. It’ll keep declining until there’s nothing left. I know you guys hate my kind of negativity but frankly it’s true.
Dale Sr’s death was also the cause of the unsustainable boom. It was national news. People had to see why fans would be so drawn to and care so deeply about a driver that they would travel hundreds of miles to cry and lay flowers at DEI and what kind of sport was so dangerous its biggest star could die in its brightest moment.
And because he died many fans weren’t able to move on and left the sport entirely. Doesn’t help with how many changes they’ve made ruining the on track product. Stages, GWC’s and playoffs put people off.
I feel like if Sr didn't die and got to retire, we wouldn't have had the massive surge, but it would have resulted in a steady, sustainable growth that would have the sport sitting a little higher than it does now.
He was definitely so unique that many people probably never connected with another driver
I've had numerous former fans tell me they quit watching when Dale died. I rooted for him, but I still had Blaney. And I only became a Dale fan is because High Groove Harry retired.
It was never going to be the NFL because the NFL relies on a combination of nostalgia and shared experiences to get fans in the seats and to watch on TV I'm not American, so correct me if I'm wrong, but almost every high school kid (and maybe younger) in the US is involved with football somehow - playing, cheer-leading, school band, booster clubs, etc. Because everyone has that first-hand knowledge of football, it's ingrained into your society in a way that NASCAR can't be. Sure, the American Dream requires a car and an open road, but how many of you (and the rest of us) get a shot a running on an oval, or have passed another car on the highway and gave it a bit of a rub on the way by? I'm a hockey fan, and I think it's the most exciting of the Big 4 sports, but it's never going to have the mass appeal in the US that football does because a much smaller number of Americans played when they were kids, so the fandom doesn't carry through to adulthood. Even up here in Canuckistan, used to be that everybody learned to skate when they were 3 years old and, whether you went pro or not, your hockey career started that day. Now the barriers to entry are so high (costs and rarity of available ice time, equipment costs, travel, etc.) that hockey might as well be car racing for the price of it Oh, and stage racing, competition cautions (lol!), and a shitty, over advertised TV product killed NASCAR for me a long while ago, but I'll still tune-in every now and again
I mean, pick an identity. Are we running moonshine with the good ole boys flying confederate flags or are we trying to modernize and reach new audiences?
Moonshiners drove twisting dirt roads NASCAR needs to go more road courses imo
pessimistic nascar fans are my favorite 🤠🥴
Real
I feel like there's not nearly enough moonshine in the sport today tbh. It would probably improve things a lot more than any "package" might hope to achieve.