Rating the Brickyard 400: 3 Stars ***

A year of spectacular surprises continued Sunday at the Brickyard when Paul Menard … Yes, Paul Menard … kissed the bricks after winning the Brickyard 400. Overall, Indy had a race with a 3 Star Rating, but a 5 Star storyline.

Wow. Was that race even real? Is this season even real? The variety of drivers visiting Victory Lane is reaching epic proportions. Menard became the 14th different winner in just 20 races this season.

We’ve had several of the regulars make their visit and others snap long losing streaks, but we’ve also seen new drivers.

Regan Smith, David Ragan and Menard have shown steady progress of late and the win culminated a long stretch of improvement, but for years it felt like these guys were never going to win. Their job was to challenge the winners but never really factor into the win. All of a sudden they are all factors and could bring new faces to the Chase.

Regardless, Menard’s win at the Brickyard is a stunner. This was the low-performing, family funded, way too long sideburned driver of the brightest car in the field. Menard has always been the butt of jokes, but Sunday his butt was in the air as he made NASCAR’s most famous kiss at the finish line at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

What an incredible season this is becoming. The action on the track has been curiously tame the past several months, but at the end somebody new comes to the front and is able to hold onto the lead, or at least hang in the top 10 for a good finish.

Interestingly, several teams have made crew chief changes in a year where a crew chief has to make a strategy call almost every race that either puts his driver at the front or relegates him to the back of the field.

There’s also no reason to think this type of racing will change any time soon. The series hasn’t been to a track outside of Daytona in months where it hasn’t been incredibly difficult to pass, the tires continue to show little drop-off in speeds week after week and there have been very few late-race cautions.

These ingredients continue to produce a race where strategy determines where a driver finishes nearly as much as the quality of his car. It will be interesting to see if some of the regular suspects start to rack up wins as the series returns to tracks for a second time.

Overall, Indy was typical Indy until the crazy circumstances that developed at the end. It’s amazing that one of the longest tracks on the schedule can also be one of the most difficult to pass. The speeds are so high entering a corner with only one groove that drivers rarely even attempt to race side-by-side. If they do, it usually results in a big wreck. That was the case Sunday when four drivers thought they could make it through Turn 3 four-wide.

Anyway, next week it’s back to the ever-exciting Pocono Raceway. Now that Menard has a win, the Race to the Chase is on as three drivers are now eligible for the two wild-card spots. The next month or so will be fun to watch that battle continue to develop. Have a good week, everybody.

Earnhardt Jr.’s margin for error is gone

That all-too-familiar feeling is coming back. Dale Earnhardt Jr. is struggling as the series heads to Indianapolis to begin the final stretch toward the Chase.

Just weeks ago it looked like Earnhardt Jr. was a lock to make the Chase, and could be a legitimate contender for the championship.

Then came Michigan, the track where he won 111 races ago.

Late in the race his teammate, Mark Martin, pulled up in front of him and cut down his tire to relegate the #88 car to a 21st-place finish.

In the last five races, Earnhardt Jr. has an average finish of 25.2 and has fallen from third to ninth. He went from just 10 points out of leading the standings to just seven points from being outside the Chase.

Is it time to panic? Yes. The tracks coming up on the schedule aren’t some of his best, and all of a sudden it looks like the team’s mojo is gone. Maybe the off-week allowed the team to get some things straightened out at the shop, but Earnhardt Jr. is out of mulligans at this point.

Earnhardt Jr. cannot have anymore bad luck for the next seven weeks. Bad luck has been part of the problem during the last month as he got taken out by Martin at Michigan and was involved in an early wreck at Sonoma, where he finished 41st.

While the past four-and-a-half years have been difficult, (Earnhardt Jr. hasn’t finished in the top 10 in points since 2006) this year could be the most painful for his fans.

Finally, it seemed, Earnhardt Jr. was back up at the front. No, he hadn’t yet won a race, but that was right around the corner. Even if he didn’t win a race, he would at least comfortably make the Chase and have a shot at the championship.

It would be back like the good ‘ol days. That nagging pain his fans felt every time he spent most of a race out of contention would finally go away. It would be OK to be excited about his chances before a race.

Well, that is gone. Now Earnhardt Jr. fans will likely have more anxiety before a race than excitement. With Earnhardt Jr. barely hanging on to a Chase spot, it is now more important that he have good, consistent finishes than take chances for a win.

The margin of error for Earnhardt Jr. is gone. For the next seven races, Junior Nation will have its collective stomach in knots.

If Earnhardt Jr. comes through and makes the Chase, there will be an incredible feeling of relief and joy, but if he misses the Chase again, it might sting this year more than ever.

Edwards and Beltran hold keys to moves in NASCAR and MLB

The Major League Baseball trading deadline is less than a week away, and there is plenty of speculation about who will be moved, and similar statements could be said about NASCAR.

NASCAR doesn’t have a deadline and drivers aren't traded, but speculation about who they will drive for next year is just as rampant.

Carl Edwards is the NASCAR version of Carlos Beltran this year. Everybody wants to know where he will drive in 2012, just as they want to know which team Beltran will try and help make a push for the playoffs.

Both men came to this point in a similar fashion. During the mid-2000s, Beltran was the best postseason hitter in baseball bar none. That postseason with the Houston Astros in 2004 was simply incredible. However, after he tied the big league record of eight homeruns in the playoffs that year, Beltran has seen his production decline.

Beltran hit just 17 homers combined in the past two seasons with a career-worst .255 batting average last year. But, this season his average is back up to .291, he has 15 homeruns and several teams want him to join them for the stretch run.

Edwards has had a similar career path. At times he has looked like the best driver on the track every week, and other times he has fallen back into mediocrity will long winless stretches.

He had 12 wins combined in 2007 and 2008 while finishing in the top 10 in points both years. Then he hit rock bottom during a 70-race winless streak before winning last fall at Phoenix.

Now Edwards is back on top of the standings and is the most sought-after driver available for teams to lure for 2012.

Joe Gibbs Racing has made quite an effort to bring Edwards aboard, and it might work. Edwards has kept his mouth shut so far, but it might not be too long before the actual race during a weekend becomes a secondary story if Edwards does choose to move from his current #99 ride with Roush-Fenway Racing.

In both cases, the rest of the puzzle pieces will fall into place once these two athletes make a decision to either stay with their current team (Beltran has a no-trade clause) or take their talents somewhere else.

Particularly for the NASCAR world, Edwards’ decision will have far-reaching consequences. Joe Gibbs Racing could suddenly have maybe the best team in the sport, and Roush-Fenway Racing will have to shuffle people around to make things fit for 2012, not to mention try and find sponsors to fill the hoods of both Matt Kenseth’s #17 car and the #99 car, perhaps driven by Trevor Bayne or Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

Until Edwards and Beltran make their decisions, tension will continue to build throughout both sports.

ESPN finally restores Bestwick to play-by-play role

ESPN made its best decision since returning to NASCAR in 2007 when it announced Wednesday that Allen Bestwick will replace Marty Reid as the play-by-play announcer for the network’s 17 Sprint Cup Series races.

Bestwick finally returns to the booth full-time since NBC made an ill-advised decision to send Bestwick to cover the pits and bring Bill Weber up to the booth.

Well, that didn’t work out too well as Weber is off somewhere trying to be a magician (seriously) after being fired from TNT in the middle of the network’s six-race summer series in 2009.

Now Bestwick is back where he should be. He will be the man to call home the 2011 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion.

ESPN has struggled to find the right combination in the booth ever since it got back into NASCAR. The network’s first play-by-play man in the new era was Dr. Jerry Punch, who is a great NASCAR mind and one of the best pit reporters ever, but he fit in much better down with the people in the pits than upstairs with two other analysts. Punch is great at explaining a situation, but not being the main soundtrack throughout a race.

Next, ESPN tried Marty Reid. While Reid was decent, he never reached that point where he really connected with fans. They knew the others in the booth, but not Reid, other than from his IndyCar and NHRA work.

All this time, ESPN had the right guy on payroll, but he wasn’t in the right position. Sure, Bestwick did a fine job as the pre-race host, but he needs to be the main guy, somebody fans respect and trust to guide them through the race.

Bestwick now steps into a situation that could fit perfectly. Along with Dale Jarrett and Andy Petree, this group could finally be a NASCAR TV team that doesn’t have fan complaints trailing them from the start. Each of the three men are not over-the-top in their calls and analysis, and they each bring a knowledge to the broadcast that fans can respect.

So, enjoy the final stretch of the season. It will be a pleasure to have Bestwick back on board to guide the television viewers from the Brickyard on through to the championship at Homestead.

Rating the Lenox Industrial Tools 301: 2 Stars **

One of the shortest races of the year kicked off the second half of the 2011 season at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, but it took plenty of time to get through those 301 laps. The first New Hampshire race of the year gets a 2 Star Rating.

This race continued many of the themes of the season, and one annoying difference. Throughout the afternoon, there were several lead changes, although only a few were actual passes for position on the track. The race also came down to fuel mileage, and it was incredibly difficult to pass.

Maybe that old, ugly nose of the COT cars wasn’t that bad. As the season drags on, it has become incredibly difficult to pass, and the only major change to the cars this year is the new nose. Sure, the numbers say there have been more passes and lead changes as ever, but that certainly hasn’t been the case lately. Aerodynamics look to be as big a problem now as they have been since NASCAR introduced the new car style.

Granted, it’s always tough to pass at New Hampshire, but this was nearly a restrictor-plate type race because if a driver had track position and a decent car, he could hold on to his spot.

Also, once the field sorted out after a restart, the racing was pretty much single file. In the past, drivers have been able to have really good, clean battles with each other and race side-by-side at New Hampshire, but that wasn’t the case Sunday. Only five or six drivers had cars that were capable of winning, and they were the only ones to pass anybody all day. The Stewart-Haas cars, Jeff Gordon and Kurt Busch could run up front, but everybody else was pretty much stuck.

Ryan Newman also became the 13th different winner In 2011. Of all years to implement a wild-card system, this was a good one to do it. It’s possible that every driver in this year’s Chase could have a win. That is remarkable. But, aside from coincidence, the reason for so many different winners could be because it is so difficult to pass. Once a team plays its cards right to be in position on the final restart, it becomes pretty hard for somebody to make a late pass for the lead.

Finally, those ugly debris cautions became an issue again Sunday. Overall, this season has been better in the debris caution department. However, three of the 10 cautions at New Hampshire were for debris, and they chopped up the race. In general, the cautions were a large contributor to the pace of the race, and how the teams’ strategies played out. Every time there was a caution, a different group of cars came to the front. Thankfully, the best cars in the field ended up at the front anyway.

This current run of races with pit strategy that doesn’t rely on tires hurts the quality of the race. In New Hampshire’s case, it didn’t matter too much how good of a car somebody had, but rather what pit strategy they used.

In any case, now it’s time for that horrible week in the middle of the summer without a race. The drivers and teams surely need a break, but this week always becomes the bleak mid-summer. Thankfully, it’s the last off week of the season. Have a good one, everybody.