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March 10, 2009
Jimmy Watts from JTG-Daugherty Racing Suspended Four Races
During Sunday's race at Atlanta Jimmy Watts, the gasman for the #47 team of Marcos Ambrose at JTG-Daugherty Racing ran onto the front stretch grass while the race was under green in pursuit of a tire that had been knocked out of the #47 pit (reportedly either by a car or crew member from Yates Racing). NASCAR was forced to immediately throw a caution for safety reasons since a car spinning onto the grass towards Watts could have been a disaster. Although NASCAR would have thrown a caution anyway for the tire, had Watts not ran after it odds are they would have waited until the pit stops had cycled through so that most of the field didn't end up trapped a lap or more down, which is what happened when they had to throw the caution for Watts. To express how displeased they are with what he did, even though it was an honest mistake, Watts has been suspended for four races and the crew chief of the #47, Frank Kerr, has been placed on probation until December.
I think this penalty is ridiculous and excessive. I understand that NASCAR felt they had to send a message that crew members can't run onto the track or the grass for any reason, even if they aren't thinking and make a mistake like Watts. But four races? Placing Watts on probation or at most suspending him for a race seems appropriate, this seems overboard. Dave Moody from wondered on his Facebook page and on Sirius how NASCAR was supposed to prevent other crew members from doing what Watts did if they didn't penalize him. Well, considering I don't recall any crew member doing anything similar to what Watts did, it seems to me that the vast majority of crew members understood that they shouldn't run onto the track without Watts being used as an example. Moody also brought up the possibility of teams getting the idea to use their crew members to deliberately cause cautions by telling them to run onto the track - I think it's a stretch to think that a team would put a crew member in danger to draw a caution.
When NASCAR doesn't do anything when drivers deliberately cause cautions and only rarely penalize for drivers deliberately retaliating by using their cars as weapons against each other, a clear safety issue should something go wrong, it makes a four race penalty for being in the wrong part of the track seem over-the-top, as wrong as his actions might have been.
Update: Just saw that there's the possibility that the Yates Racing crew member who kicked the tire sending it into the grass might have did so deliberately. Where's his penalty? If NASCAR feels they need to send a message that crew members running onto the track won't be tolerated why don't they also want to send a message that deliberately trying to sabotage another teams is just as wrong?
Update Two: ESPN.com has a video interview with DJ Cobb from the #47 team in which he says that reportedly (he didn't see it himself but says that many others did) that a crew member from the #98 team that was pitted behind them actually pushed the tire off the wall where it had been placed by someone from the #47 team. From the sounds of it the #98 team was miffed because Marcos pitted in such a way that he was somewhat in their box. The actions by the #98 crew member should be immediately addressed by NASCAR as well.
Posted by silverdsl at March 10, 2009 06:28 PM