September 3rd, 2008 
Journo In a rare reversal today, the National Stock Car Racing Commission removed the probation penalties against Joey Logano and Tony Stewart. The points penalties still stand. If you do not remember the team was heavily penalized by NASCAR for spacers placed on the throttle to manipulate dyno tests. Seven crew members were suspended and various monetary and points fines were assessed.
Well, I have an issue to raise with the reversal. For anyone who has played team sports, they know when one person screws up, it is the whole who is penalized. The idea being that those punished will put pressure on the one who screwed up and whatever it was they did will not happen again. Likewise the team learns not to make any actionable mistakes in the future.
Before I go any further, let me play devils advocate. True, it is not fair that Logano and Stewart were penalized for the poor judgement of select members of their crews. It was of course not them down there putting the spacers on the throttle, nor were they ordering others to do it. So then what is the problem?
The driver’s role as the leader of a team puts them in a unique position. While he is not ordering the team to do things (that is what a crew chief is for) he is the one benefitting from any changes. Part of taking the risk of cheating is accepting the penalties that come with it if you get caught. Regardless of knowledge of a particular incident, the driver deserves to face some kind of penalty. While points are certainly the most obvious penalty (and they still stand in this situation), probation will keep the team in line, because if they do it again the driver could face suspension.
So now I know you are thinking, well then why not punish the team when the driver receives a penalty for something he did on the track? Would you punish an entire football team for something the coach did during the game? No. However the whole team would be punished for a recruiting violation. As I see it, this is a similar situation.
While perhaps this is not the most fair line of thinking, it is the way things should be done. NASCAR is in place to keep things equitable, and as fair as possible. When a team steps out of line it is their duty to not just punish the one, but to punish the whole.
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NASCAR probation is a joke anyway. Does it really matter if a driver is on probation? Tony Stewart had spent a large part of his career on probation, I have seen no effects of it, it did not change his attitude at all. My biggest problem with NASCAR is they are not consistent. When Robby Gordon was suspended from the cup race because of the Nationwide incident (in which NASCAR royally screwed him over) if Dale Jr. di what Robbie did he NEVER would have been pulled from the cup race.
NASCAR needs to start pulling teams from races. No matter who they are.
You people who preface every stupid statement with “if it would of been Dale Jr., then….”, need to do a little research. Dale Jr. and his teams are fined and docked pts. as much if not more than other drivers and their respective teams. So if your trying to make a point pick another driver. Take the time and look it up before you type!
the only way to get they will ever make a difference is to bench the whole team.
if they catch them “cheating” in pre-race send the hauler home. if you catch them after the race you sit out the next race. no execptions across the board for everybody.
the pressure comes from the sponsors. can you imagine how quickly hendrick would keep chad knauss in line if there was no #48 on the track.
personally, i like the fact that we arent watching racing where there is only one or two cars on the lead lap like “back in the day”, but i dont think you can have it both ways forever. eventually we are going to be watching glorified iroc racing and there wont be any “cheating”
it is curious how they cant find that JGR is cheating on the track, but when they try to hide the fact they got back the horsepower that nascar took away from them once before (DO I UNDERSTAND CORRECTLY THAT BACSICALLY IN NATIONWIDE AND TRUCKS THE TOYOTA’S ARE USING RESTRICTOR PLATES THAT THE OTHERS ARENT?) .
jgr is winning without breaking the rules. they are not cheating on the track. the hendricks, rousch boys are cheating on the track and getting caught. send there cheating butts home.
didnt JR get fined for saying the S-word?
gojgr02111820: To answer your question about the plates, they are actually tapered spacers. Restrictor plates have holes that are all one size. Tapered spacers are taller then the plates, and the holes are tapered (bigger at the top, then the bottom). And in the NNS and CTS, every team in competition has one on their engine. What NASCAR did to both series over the last few weeks, is make the holes smaller on the spacers for the Toyota engines, thus decreasing their horsepower and making the racing more “equal.”
I know that Dale Jr. has been fined money and points. What I said was NASCAR would never suspend him from a race like Robby Gordon was last year, or Harvick in 2002. He is the show, the fans would freak out.
NASCAR has a history of looking out for it’s big names, it’s not just Dale Jr. Tony Stewart had pulled at least half a dozen stunts that should have gotten him suspended. NASCAR won’t do it because of his popularity. There have been times that Tony was on probation and pulled more stupid crap and NOTHING was done about it.
If you take out the superstars you take away the draw for people to come to races. NASCAR is not at all interested in fairness, they are interested in a good show. Robby suspended last year from Pocono was just about the end for me. NASCAR don’t care, how many people go to a race to see Robby Gordon really? I do, but I’m the minority here.
Pull Dale Jr. or Tony Stewart from a race and you have hundreds of thousands of angry fans, NASCAR will never do it, no matter what they do there is nothing but a few points and probation.