Petty Enterprises To Be Run by Equity Firm, Labonte Extends Contract

It's the end of an era as NASCAR fans know it.  Petty Enterprises will be run by Boston Ventures, a private equity firm, who's bought controlling interest in the team.

Despite this change in leadershup, Richard Petty will remain involved in the organization.  Barry Baker, the managing director of Boston Ventures, will become PE's new chairman while David Zucker will be the CEO. 

Additionally, with the company changing hands, Bobby Labonte has signed a four-year extension with Petty Enterprises.

Who's Boston Ventures?  Boston Ventures invests in media and entertainment (And now motorsports). Its past investments include Motown Records, Six Flags Entertainment, Billboard Publications, Continental Cablevision and American Media Inc., publisher of The National Enquirer.  (Eww)

OK.  So who's this David Zucker guy?  Up until March, Zucker had been CEO of Midway Games (video games).  Previous to that, he was president and CEO of Playboy Enterprises and from 1988-1999 he was an executive vice president at ESPN under the Walt Disney Corporation.  He also was director of ESPN International.

Bruce's Take:

And again, an outside business invests in yet another team who has to do this to maintain viability in the sport.  At what point will the outside investors start to look for outside outside investors?  What happened to a sport who's purse winnings helped pay a team to stay competitive?  It seems that competing in NASCAR is just becoming a marketing tool for the hood and fender decals these days since the shops can't afford to spend the funds necessary to stay competitive.  I could be wrong, but that's just my emotional reaction to this development.  Somewhere down the road, it will be APPLE racing vs The Wall Street Journal racing teams.

You know what I do see, or more to the point, predict?  Kyle Petty can sit back and actually just drive the car.  The one year he did that, his performance improved greatly over his present output.  If that's what he does.  It would be a mistake to have him still do both now that they have an outside corporate structure.  He needs to choose what he wants to do.  I like him in the TNT booth.  It gives us some pretty fresh, competitive perspective.  I wouldn't mind if he went that direction.

Source:  USA Today