Will a Johnson Win Hurt Nascar?
With Jimmie Johnson near the top of the Chase, will a fourth consecutive victory be beneficial or harmful to the sport?
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43 laps into the fourth race of the Chase for 2009, Jimmy Johnson sits comfortably in first place at the top of the forty-three car field. Entering the race, Johnson sat in second place behind team-mate Mark Martin in championship points.
Johnson set history last season by becoming only the second driver in the history of the sport to win three consecutive championships in a row. He remains the driver to beat. Each year, at the beginning of the Chase, Johnson and his team turn the dial up and become a NASCAR powerhouse team. This year seems not much different from previous years. Johnson won the second race of the Chase at Dover. He finished fourth at Loudon and ninth at Kansas. At Kansas, he and his team did display some unusual vulnerability late in the race with a questionable call regarding a tire change.
If history repeats itself and Johnson wins the Chase this year, will NASCAR benefit? Or will anther Johnson win create a stalemate for America’s largest spectator sport?
The answer for that depends on how you define the word benefit.
Yes, NASCAR will benefit from another Johnson championship. Any sport benefits from a champion of Johnson’s caliber. The example he and his team set is incomparable to any team. In short, Johnson sets the bar for the rest of the field.
Yet, NASCAR is in need of a personality that shines at the top. Johnson lacks the personal charisma and bravado that many drivers have. His reign at the top has been one without gloating, without flair, and without much of anything resembling a personality. He lets his results speak for themselves.
That mentality is not necessarily a bad thing. He displays the sportsmanship that many parents would love to instill in their children at a young age in ball fields all around the country. Yet, that mentality does not inspire the type of idol worship needed to sustain a true star at the top.
Perhaps the best example to describe whether or not Jimmie Johnson’s reign at the top is helping the sport is from another sport, very distant to cars, tennis. Pete Sampras ruled the courts of tennis in the mid to late 1990s. His mentality and personality were similar to that of Johnson. Yet, the fans and those in charge of the sport, pushed his less-successful compatriot, but much more likable, Andre Agassi, as the top player of the game.
Perhaps Jimmie Johnson should take a tip from the Sampras-Agassi story. He has the numbers and the results, he just needs to show a little bit more likability.
