Business as Usual, Part II
by M.L. Morgan 9-29-1999
Well, race fans, we recently did a piece Business As Usual about the 'feeding frenzy' surrounding the so-called Silly Season. Today's announcement of Ray Evernham's split from the Hendrick Motorsport organization is tantamount to throwing raw meat to these 'paper' tigers who masquerade as reporters, journalists, analysts, or whatever impressive-sounding description they have found in the thesaurus.
Our hypothesis originally was the myriad personnel changes which occur EVERY season are merely business deals. Today's events involving Evernham are great proof we were accurate.
The combination of Hendrick, Jeff Gordon and Evernham was one of the most successful on record. 47 Winston Cup victories and 3 Titles in less than 6 full seasons. Everyone involved made a ton of money. That's the measuring stick for many. Both Gordon and Evernham are already set for life, financially, so perhaps they need different motivation.
Racing at this level is a difficult business, physically and emotionally. 18-hour days are commonplace, and accepted by the participants who have been as successful as Ray Evernham. Evernham is 42, a young man to my standards, but he has been competing in a very stressful environment for more than 20 years. In my opinion, he would be entitled to claim 'burn-out', but he didn't.
Evernham has been very open the last couple years about his desire to be a car owner, and he and Gordon took the first steps last year forming a BGN team. This team was intended to be a test vehicle, as it were, for the #24 team, just as much as anything else, in that it would afford them some extra test dates at certain tracks. This team is already functional so I'm not buying into the idea that Evernham left Hendrick to be a team owner. Spare me, please. He already had a team.
Another alleged reason for this divorce you'll see bandied around is a rift within the team, i.e., the chemistry was lost, or some other preposterous notion. Nothing could be farther from the truth. This team won more races from sheer pride than any other team which ever competed. Granted, the team has won only 5 races and $4.6 million this season and is mired in 6th place in the points, as if 40 other teams wouldn't love to trade places with them, but I don't think that will cause mass suicides of the Rainbow Warriors. They enjoy a scrap. That's why they have been so successful.
Evernham isn't running from a scrap. Hendrick had been actively pursuing hiring a crew chief to replace him so he could move into a management position within the Hendrick Motorsports organization. The search was fruitless. I imagine it was a case of mighty big boots to fill, and few established crew chiefs were willing. Hendrick had hinted that Brian Whitesell would therefore be promoted from within to take over as crew chief for the 2000 season. Sounds easy enough.
Now all Evernham had to do was get Rick Hendrick's signature on the contract to make him Manager of Hendrick Motorsports. This was the carrot which had been dangled for some time, but when it came to that particular bottom line, the position was already filled by someone named John Hendrick, coincidentally Rick's brother - Damn ! I guess it was just an oversight on everyone's part.
Then it got ugly for a while. Everybody was going to sue everybody - but wiser, cooler heads prevailed. Everyone in racing was aware of Evernham's desire to be a car owner so that was the escape clause. Hendrick would release him from his contract in order to let Evernham pursue this ambition. Of course, the "provisional" release means Evernham can't make a deal to compete against Hendrick in any capacity until the 2001 season, at which time Evernham is free to field his own team and let the better team win. Rah, Rah.
I am impressed by the professionalism displayed by both parties. They both showed a lot of class. Could have been very ugly. But it wouldn't have been "silly". Nothing silly about stuff like this. Just business as usual.