Is NASCAR's Cheating SpinGate Scandal An Exlusive Anomaly?

NASCAR has been taking a slight beating these days because of the nasty little event being referred to as spingate, where Michael Waltrip Racing had one car seemingly spin intentionally while another car pitted way out of sequence, to help various factors of the outcome of the driver points standings at the race at Richmond a few weeks back.

NASCAR has been handing out penalties and making adjustments on the fly, with the 12, now 13 contenders for the Chase for the Cup, due to these events.  And MWR has lost NAPA as a sponsor.

I was asked the other weekend why some of the sponsors are still on the cars of the other participants of the various teams that are getting caught (up) in this scenario, and the blatant answer is they don't care.

But to be honest, it takes certain obligatory events to create an "out" for a sponsor who has signed a contract with a team that's worth around $10-$30 million a year.

And these days, NASCAR is taking it hard on the nose of this cheating environment.

But let's be honest, who doesn't cheat?  Where the term cheat could be creatively implied from various actions.

Most sports have had some kind of issue or situation in the past that has caught the media's attention.  From video taping the opposing team, to jacking up with performance enhancing drugs, to jockeys hauling back hard on the reigns of a horse to keep it from leaping out in front of the pack at the finish line.

We've seen it all and this is not a new event in the world of sports.

At the moment, it's the biggest scandal going on in the sports world and in some cases, getting some (undue) attention.

The problem I'm having, well, having for, MWR, is that they risked two incredibly great sponsors of the sport for this endgame of theirs that included publicly decrying in various methods that their stunt worked.  And that the stunt was as blatant as it was.

NAPA's had enough.  They're bailing in the middle of a lucrative contract with MWR.  (Yes, contracts have clauses that address these kinds of special moments, giving sponsors an out when their client does dumb shit.)

I wish to apologize to NAPA and 5-Hour Energy.  This Waltrip thing is not exemplary behavior of NASCAR.  Sure, teams find themselves in the grey area from time to time, but these flagrant bonehead moves are not the common practice in the sport. (...that I know of.)

Please, don't leave the sport of NASCAR.  Other teams who are in the thick of good, near-honest competition could use your $10-30 million contracts to keep afloat.  Please find other worthy drivers of your funding to stay around.

That would be appreciated and it would let the fans know it's the sport you support and not just a specific driver.  Though I must say, you have a lot of marketing out there that you're being forced to probably pull to minimize your expsoure to this crap Waltrip pulled.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 1