Dale Earnhardt Jr. news and notes

	Dale Earnhardt Jr. Stories
	Dale Earnhardt Jr. returns #3 car to Daytona victroy lane The next era of the NASCAR Nationwide Series got off to a start tonight with homage to an earlier era. Dale Earnhardt Jr. won the first ever NASCAR Nationwide Series race with the COT program in a #3 car painted up to resemble the car that made his father one of NASCAR largest stars. Junior has stated that this will be his last run in a number 3 car, and it feels pretty safe to say that this car will not ever return to the NASCAR Cup series, but it may just come back in the Nationwide Series one day.
	2009 Sprint Cup season in review: Dale Earnhardt Jr. It is kind of sad to say, that Dale Earnhardt Jr. just completed the 2009 season in the worst final drivers points position of his 10 year career. He finished 25th in points and that is six spots worse then his previous worst points finish of 19th in 2005.
	Has Dale Jr. lost his passion for racing? It seems as if Dale Earnhardt Jr. has lost something. It seems that just a few years ago Dale Jr. was the up and coming NASCAR driver that was set to dominate the Sprint Cup series for years to come. Then the bottom fell out at DEI, and Junior was forced to join the most successful team in NASCAR history. Many thought that driving Hendrick equipment he would once again dominate the Sprint Cup series. Apparently Junior has lost his passion, or his will to win. Since joining Hendrick Motor Sports more than a season and a half ago, Dale Junior has only been able to win one race.
	Does NASCAR rise and fall on the success of Dale Jr.? There is little doubt the Dale Earnhardt Jr. is the most popular driver in all of NASCAR. The question always seems to be should the media play into that popularity while ignoring other drivers and sponsors of this sport? It seems to be that even if the media stopped covering Junior tomorrow that he would still be the most popular driver in NASCAR. However giving this much of the spotlight to one driver may be what is driving down the TV ratings.
	Dale Jr. is a hypocrite or a liar First and foremost I am not a Junior fan, and this has nothing to do with his ability in the race car. Even though I don’t particularly like him I am willing to admit that he is a top 15 talent in the Sprint Cup series of today. However, his personality has always rubbed me the wrong way. On top of that it now appears he is nothing more than a hypocrite at best and an outright liar at worst.
	Dale Earnhardt Jr. is the most over hyped NASCAR talent Think about it, if a casual NASCAR fan tunes into a race to watch Dale Jr. perform and he is having one of those days where he rides around the track in 20^th place while getting no TV time, which happens more often then not these days That casual fan is turning the NASCAR coverage off, because all they know is the hype surrounding Dale Jr., they think he is the best driver out there and should be laps ahead of the competition when he is running round mid pack they realize they are victims of hype, and they stop watching.
	Dale Jr. is the NASCAR economy, and that is a problem I came across an interesting article over at Forbes Sports money. Included in their coverage was a ranking of the ten NASCAR divers who made the most money over the course of the 2008 season. Some of those figures really were surprising but the most surprising was that Dale Jr. accounts for 40% of all NASCAR licensing sales.
	Hendrick needs to fire Tony Eury Jr. I have often talked about the over hyping of Dale Earnhardt Jr., and how that is bad for this sport. This is not to say that he is not a talented race car driver, because he is. However his loyalty to his cousin, Tony Eury Jr., while commendable is a key factor why Dale Jr. does not have a Sprint Cup title to his name, and ultimately why he will struggle to win more then one race a year.
	NASCAR and Dale Jr. should both feel very ashamed Then in Sunday’s Daytona 500 Dale Jr. got into an incident with Brian Vickers. Both incident were very similar the only exception being that Dale Jr. retaliation seemed more blatant that the one of Leffler. As Predicted NASCAR officials levied no penalty on Dale Jr.
	Dale Jr. Blasts Track promoters So Bruce Martin of SI.com gets Dale Jr. to say the following, “The race track owners want drivers to do more? Yeah, right. They need to go back to work,” he said. “They forgot what it’s like to sell tickets. That’s their problem. They ain’t had to sell tickets for a long time and none of them remember how or knew how or ever learned how.”