Taking the good and the bad of preseason predictions
I’m not the best at preseason predictions, but this year I was especially bad. But what’s the fun of making predictions if you can’t look back later and say how stupid you were?
Quite stupid, it turns out. Where I typically get just two or three drivers in the Chase For The Sprint Cup wrong, this year I was incorrect on half the field - a career-high (or low, depending how you look at it).
But weather forecasters have often been wrong about NASCAR this year as well, so I should be OK.
Check out this embarrassing line I wrote in the January predictions column:
“Is Juan Pablo Montoya ready to take the next step now that he’s driving Chevrolets? Are Ryan Newman and Tony Stewart going to make the Chase despite starting with virtually all new personnel? Can Kurt Busch rebound at Penske Racing, and will Kasey Kahne get back in form at what is now Richard Petty Motorsports?
“If you ask me...here are my answers to those questions: No, no, no and no.”
OOPS!
I even added, “Perhaps those drivers will win races and end up somewhere in the top 15 in points. But they won’t make the Chase.”
Apparently, I should have quit while I was behind.
Other goof-ups:
• I said David Ragan would make the Chase. Yeah, the David Ragan who is 29th in points with one top-10 finish all year.
• I had Kevin Harvick and Jeff Burton in; no Richard Childress Racing cars made it.
• I wrote that “I wanted to include Brian Vickers, but he was my final cut.” Guess I should have gone with the gut on that one.
• I said Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards would be the Chase favorites and battle it out all the way to Homestead. Busch didn't even qualify, and Edwards doesn't look to be in championship form (I picked him to win the title).
• I convinced myself that the lack of testing would consolidate all the power in the four biggest organizations. “Sadly for fans, all 12 of my drivers again come from the megateams: RCR, Joe Gibbs Racing, Hendrick Motorsports and Roush Fenway Racing.”
I’m glad I was wrong about that last one, as it’s good for the sport to have drivers from so many different teams (a record eight organizations are represented).
There were, however, a few things that made me look smart. I guess if you make enough predictions, at least a few will come true:
• I wrote that “despite missing the Cup championship, Busch beats Edwards for the Nationwide title.” That seems likely at this point.
• I picked Dale Earnhardt Jr. to make the Chase (another for the oops category), but I added that a lackluster result “forces team owner Rick Hendrick to shake up the team and possibly separate Junior and his cousin/crew chief Tony Eury Jr.”
• I said Clint Bowyer would be out, and “new combinations such as Casey Mears with Bowyer’s two-time Chase team at RCR and Joey Logano in the No. 20 car for Joe Gibbs Racing won’t be in the Chase, either. And personally, I don’t think they’ll come close.”
Of course, I doubt anyone else picked Mears or Logano to actually make the Chase, but I had to find some positives where I could.
Thanks to Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Denny Hamlin, Greg Biffle, Mark Martin and Edwards for holding up their end of the deal.
But the fact that there are only six names on that list shows you how meaningful predictions really are: Not at all.
After all, unless you hear of some reporters who have a crystal ball, we’re all just guessing.
