Re: What happened to Ryan Newman?

On Sep 24, 4:43 pm, "RickyBobby" <nasca...@xxxxxxx> wrote:
Wasn't Ryan Newman a world beater just a couple of years ago? Didn't he win
about every other pole and about eight races just a couple of seasons ago?

I have some of the races on TiVo and sometimes I go back and watch them and
the talking heads to do even mention him any more than they do Raines or
Blaney.

Over the years I have seen drivers go from also rans to media darlings, such
as Mark Martin. I cannot recall a driver going from being a big star to
being a field filler so quickly as Newman.

My theory is that Ryan Newman is actually too intellectual (for a race car
driver) and figures that he would rather reel in his 8 million per year for
another decade than to risk life and limb to turn it into 16 million or die
in the effort. In other words, he may have found his comfort zone.

I agree with you that might be part of it. I had been wondering the
same thing about him. He used to win a lot of races then started
winning a lot of poles only without winning races. Lately, he hasn't
even been winning many poles.

I suspect that part of his problem might also be the problems with the
change to the Dodge nose since all of the Dodge drivers seem to have
fallen off since the changes to the Dodge. Look at Evernham's drivers.
Kasey Kahne has done nothing lately also. Another part of Evernham's
problem is I think he was also distracted by boinking his "young
lovely" Busch driver last year.

Also, the change in the Dodge nose wouldn't explain all of Newman's
problem either since the COT wouldn't be affected by that. On the
other hand, I think all the teams except Hendricks have been behind
the curve on the COT.

So...I think Newman's problem is partly what you said, partly due to
the changes to the Dodge (and the fall-off in almost all of the Dodge
drivers) and finally the fact that his team along with others is
probably behind the curve on the COT.

And....while I agree with you about Newman, there are actually a
number of other good drivers who have fallen off considerably in the
last season or two. For example, there is Biffle, DJ, Sadler, Kahne
and even Kurt Busch to some extent although he has been starting to
come back some lately. Also, DJ and Sadler's drop off has probably
been aggravated more because of changing teams. I think Biffle's
problems have also been aggravated by some problems/distractions I
suspect Rousch is having within his organization. That's subject of a
whole other thread however.

.

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