The Dale Jr. Download - 8 - Martinsville

Episode Date: April 8, 2013

Big reactions from Junior Nation after a 24th-place at Martinsville. Check out Dirty Mo Media on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@DirtyMoMedia  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

This is Dale Jr. And you're listening to Dirty Moe Radio. Dale Jr. finishes 24th yesterday. I don't want to talk about it. Oh, well, this should be a great podcast. The Dale Jr. download starts now. And with Mike Davis, I'm Taylor Zarzer. And I don't know what we're going to do now.

If you don't want to talk about it, we have to talk about it, Mike. When things go poorly, you still have to be a man. You got to face. Listen, Lartre was on with us last week. He said things aren't always going to go so well. Stevie, I wasn't ready for that to be the following race, though, at the paperclip. Come on, man. Hey, you know what?

The thing about this, everybody kind of wondered whenever we would have a bad race, what were we going to say on here? Is this going to be a glowing PR podcast or are we going to just tell it like it is? We're going to tell it like it is, Taylor. Let's do it. All right. It was a bad day. I mean, we'll go through the race.

We'll play a bunch of these clips, but a thought first. You're going to have days like this, and clearly they had some mechanical issues. yesterday the car got worse as the race went on early in green flag runs his car was extremely competitive i would argue it was one of the best cars on the track especially in the first 250 maybe first 200 laps or so but as the runs went on and as the day went on it just really disappointing it was there was definitely some mechanical issue in the rear that contributed to that finish and you know what As long as their man-made machinery is being pushed to the limits like we do with these race cars, it's going to happen. That's just what's going to happen.

So we have days like this, you know, 36 races in a season. You can't have it all the time. You know, a lot of people are going to lose their mind. They're going to hit the panic button when something like this happens. I don't know why. But watching that race yesterday, I felt like, you know what, this is just a blip. I'm not worried about this. I feel like all these guys, I mean, you're so.

close to all these guys on the 88 team. I feel like all these guys will say, you know what? It was a bad day. We'll learn something from this, especially for Martinsville. But most importantly, we'll throw this away and go to Texas. I learned back in my first year in the sport, our crew chief, Johnny Allen for fence racing, said, you've got to take the good with the good and the bad with the bad. If you get hung up on a race, on a bad race, you'll just keep going downhill.

You've got to get it behind you, move forward. We've got Texas coming up this week. But, Mike, I feel I would have been more concerned a few years ago if something like this happened. I'm more positive and more optimistic now than ever. The team's too good to let this bog them down. The team's too good. We know that. Let's go through some of these clips.

Let's listen to the radio chatter from yesterday. And let's first hear what Dale Jr. had to say is he was running fourth at lap 84 after starting 17th. He really had a good car early on. It's a road good front of your lane. It doesn't have much check up. Patience, yeah, you know, don't want to use up your car. I think Stevie alluded to that about Dale Jr. earlier in the week saying that that's one of the things that impresses him about Junior is that he knows how to take care of his equipment early in the race. And at Martinsville, it's so easy to abuse your equipment early and you don't have anything for the end.

Yeah, that's important. Well, clip two during the third caution as I texted to you, Junior in the 88, very good on new tires. But as the run went on, he would drop off a little bit. Here we go. The bounce is the other thing I see. It's lap time-wise and speed-wise, our car is almost too good for the first. Yeah, you could really sense that. Yeah.

I mean, it was almost like we, I mean, there were a lot of cautions yesterday. I wish there had been about 50. We don't win the race. Yeah. Been right there at the finish because five, ten laps in, junior was a rocket ship. Yeah, if there are 50 cautions and 48 pit stops, we put in four tires every time. The tire bill would have been big, but we'd have won the race. Yeah.

I mean, and we'll get to this coming up later, but after Junior gets wrecked there as the 55 got into the 10 and the 10 got into the 88, I was thinking, okay, if Junior can get back this, the lucky dog, if we get three green, white checkers, Junior's going to be right there. We're there. And it's not above the real possibility that you can have that at Martinsville, but it didn't happen. But they were really good on the short run, just drop it off at the end. I want to ask you about what happened here after we hear this clip at the lap 179 restart right after that. Dale Jr. gets in a big mix-up as there's damage to the left rear quarter panel. Let's hear it. Left rear time. Say hi, hi, hi, hi, the low-level. Yeah, I hate to give up the little bit of track position we got, but we got to fix it.

Do you think that had any impact on how the car was running as the day went on? No, I don't. I think whatever mechanical issue he had going on in the rear before that, you know, probably had more impact than anything. They seemed to be able, they were running about 10th, I believe, when that happened. and they went in, took their time in the pits, got it repaired. Did you see how many cars had tape on it, even by the halfway point? I mean, there was a lot of banged up cars. So I don't think that had a whole lot to do with it. You know, I'd like to take this moment to make this statement real quick.

People have made fun of me my whole life for using duct tape. If you watched the Martinsville race yesterday, that made me feel a lot better about it. It comes in handy at Martinsville, doesn't? It comes in handy, yeah, man, duct tape can save things. Lap 358. Dale Jr. all the way back to 22nd, and Jimmy Johnson was about to lap him. Here we go. You should have a vet your head of a straightaway.

I got one tire pulling down a straightaway. The left are all the way down and straightaway. I like to put your brake lever where you think you want it for this restart here. And we'll attack it again from here. Clearly, it was a handful. It was a handful. And as the day went on, it got worse and worse. Yeah, yeah.

And Stevie says there at the end there, you know, we'll attack it from here. They never quit attacking it. You know, they went after it. It just wasn't handling. There was just some mechanical issue. And what else do you say? You have it. It happens.

Well, then we pour gas on the fire here with 45 laps to go. As Dale Jr.'s in the Lucky Dog position. He's trying to get that lap back. But then the 55 gets into the 10, and the 10 gets into the 88. Hang on, no caution. Get ready here. Costs out. Costs out.

That's the 55 car force. Just come this time. Come this time. There's no reason to tear it up, tear a brake line off. 55, got the lucky dog out of that. That was his goal there. You know what? I didn't actually, I watched the replay, but I couldn't tell how much the 55 actually contributed to it.

I know the 55 and Danica were racing hard. Yeah. You're inside of 50 laps. It happens. So I don't know what the 55 was really trying, like TJ suggested, was just trying to get the lucky. Everybody's racing for the lucky dog at that point. You're inside of 50 laps. So I don't know how intentional that was, I guess.

Well, I don't know that it was intentional, but two things here. First of all, Junior had no problem with Danica. Right, right. You know, said that in the last few laps, said, tell her, no problem, understand. And then after the race, he said the same thing. And secondly, as somebody that used to race for J.R. Motorsports last year, I'd like to congratulate her. Absolutely. Unbelievable day.

Absolutely. I mean, ninth place, what was it, ninth at Daytona? Was that right? I think she finished ninth at Daytona. finishing 12th in Martinsville and way more impressive. Way more impressive. Nobody saw that coming.

She deserves congratulations for that. Absolutely. I'm glad you mentioned that. All right. Well, enough of the radio chatter. Not a very good day, but hey, still third and the points right there. Where you need to be after six races.

A lot of momentum. If you look at the whole big picture, they're going to a track. Virginia won his first race. He has a lot of confidence in Texas. So we'll get to that. coming up. Hey guys, if you haven't tried Dale Jr. potato chips, well, you're one of the few holdouts, but you can change that right now. Go to Dale Jr. Foods.com for a store locator or order any of

four flavors today. That's DaleJR Foods.com. Let's speed dial. All right, let's talk to one of the very best in NASCAR. He's been doing it for a long time. Bob Pocker, NASCAR Beat Rider for Sporting News, is with us now. And Bob, you were one of the few people to talk to junior after the race. appointing day, finishing 24th on a track that he's been very successful at lately. What do you have to say afterwards? He's appointed. I mean, he knows that you're not going to run in the top. You know, he felt Martinsville was that his team could have a good finish,

and he feels that at tracks that they're good at. They need to capitalize. Bob, I don't know how much you paid attention specifically to the 88 during that race, but, you know, his drop off after 10 laps was pretty significant. I remember 20 laps. He was one of the best at the first of the run. And then it just went backwards. What do you think attributed to that?

As much as, you know, a couple weeks ago, you know, all the talk about Dale Jr. and Steve LaTart was, you know, how great they make adjustments during the race. And even if they seemed to make the next three or four seem to work really well. And Dale Jr. start, you know, he admitted they started and had a good car, and they made a lot of adjustments during the race, and it changed. And it was a bad car at the end of the race. And, you know, some people might say, well, you know, how can that happen? But when you look at their first five weeks, I think that's what makes their first, you know, that they got it right for five weeks and get it wrong for one week.

That's a pretty good. If you're in baseball, you'd be leading, you'd have the leading batting average, right? So, you know, these. You know, Bob, Steve LaTart was with us last week, and he said, look, we're going to have bad races. We're going to have days where things just don't go well. And this was an example of that. And in past years, I feel like maybe they. there'd be more cause for concern.

And you hear from Junior Nation just as much as anybody, a very passionate fan base who, you know, some can hit the panic button after a day like that happens. But based on what you just said, after all the success they had in the first five weeks, do you feel like fans should calm down and say, you know what, it's just a blip, move on. Texas is a good track for him.

I'm not going to tell them what to think. You know, I mean, that's part of being a fan is that you want your guy to do well every week. you know and and as Dale Jr. said himself it's a long year things are going to happen it doesn't mean you have to like it though you know so um you know Dale Jr was upset I think he'd expect his fans to be upset but also be expected talk about the points race now after these race after the Martinsville race Bob what are you thinking still thinking that junior's in a good position I think that you know that's what makes doing well the first five weeks so important that you can have a they can have a mulligan

or two. And yeah, you know, so he dropped from first to third, you know, if he runs the, he expects to run the way they think they can run, you know, he'll be because he's going to go out there and panic and just, you know, say, hey, Martinsville is Martinsville. Not much from Martinsville translates that, you know, just near in October. Great perspective from Bob Pockris, Sporting News, NASCAR Beat Rider. Thank you, Bob. Thank you, guys. Lars Anderson from Sports Illustrated. Lars, how you doing? Good. How are you guys doing this morning?

Doing well. I'm going to read a piece of your preview for Martinsville because I think I found the problem on what happened to the 88 yesterday. All right, Dale Jr.'s never taken a checker flag at the short track in Southern Virginia, but it says here that will change on Sunday. He is my pick to win. Lars, I thought we've talked about this. You are not to pick Dale Jr. We have gone over my research, Mike. And if you look at all of the tracks that NASCAR competes at, Dale Jr.'s best average. something happened. It wasn't me. It was you. Taylor, just so you know, there's a history here. As long as I've known Lars, and it's been a long time when he picks Dale Jr., it traditionally and statistically, has proven to be Dale Jr.'s worst races. Lars, am I lying?

I hate to say it, but I think ever since 2004 when Dale won the Daytona 500, and I don't think I've picked Dale to win the Daytona. I'm only 0 for 9 or whatever since then on the Daytona 500 pick. Listen, I'd make fun of him here, but I'd pick Junior and win. in Martinsville, too. So I don't think that I can say much at this point. But, hey, all his logic made great sense. I mean, Junior does have a great, he's got a great record at the paper clip. He's never won there. You really thought this was his day, but it was a bad weekend all around. But, you know, Lars, big picture is he's still having an excellent season, and the 88 team has

a lot of confidence. So I kind of get the sense. It's just a blip. How about you? You know, just being around Dale for a long time and being close with Mike and the whole team, I think I just did a piece of that. Well, personally, I think you might want to pick him and not make the chase now after what just happened. So, Lars, we've established that he's a title contender. What I need you to do is not pick him again. If you do, I'm going to send out to Junior Nation your phone number and your mailing address and let them handle you, okay? All right.

Okay, so to get on your guys good side, I'll just pick Jimmy Johnson to win every year. Well, no, no, you just need to pick junior finish like 39th in Texas. Thank you, Lars. Great stuff, Lars. Thank you, man. Good talking to you guys. You too. All right, enough of that.

Enough of speed dial. Time for Reaction Theater. I think Junior Nation may have something to say about yesterday. I don't know how much I want to hear this. I don't either. You want to hold hands? You want to have a big group hug here, Dustin? This could be dangerous.

All right. Let's go. What you got, Dustin? Tough race. We all knew. We have one of these at some point in the year, but like Junior's, said, we don't have to be happy with it. But Junior Nation, we just need to kind of chill out and can't get too down on them.

We've had five out of six good races, so I've got to keep her heads up. Okay, all right. Well, that was level-headed. Level-headed. I don't feel so bad about things now. No, this is going to go well. Oh, good. All right.

I feel a lot better. What's next? Mike, you said on Twitter, you don't understand the animosity that we have towards JJ. He keeps screwing Junior over. Junior does the right teammate thing, pushes him to the win at Tallade. and they all went four wide, cut some breaks on the racetrack, but when Jimmy gets the chance to return a favor,

he never does it. What do you have to say about that one, oh, Mike? Well, I guess my point was, after all that had happened that day, I don't think that was what our biggest problem was, you know? And I also think they're giving drivers a little too much credit in processing all this information. He's inside 50 laps, he's winning the race,

you're coming around the corner, you see Junior there. you know you take it from what it's worth i you know i didn't think it was as big a deal clearly i'm not uh i would agree wasn't the biggest problem i mean anybody that would say that is crazy i do think it's pretty funny what jimmy tweeted this morning you haters have it right i'm a bad teammate i've a cheated up car i'm lucky and the race was fixed got to love twitter that's the 48 on on twitter who's next what in the hell common a teammate is jimmy jopson are you kidding me dude couldn't have pulled over for four seconds and let junior gone by, I do not understand that guy. Brian Vickers is an idiot.

I've known Vickers was an idiot for a long time, but Jimmy Johnson, seriously? Four seconds at Martinsville is like a quarter of the track. Yeah. Now that is true. But listen, maybe Johnson was in his own world thinking about winning, didn't see the 88th. I don't know. It's up for debate, I don't know how much. I believe that.

Who's next? Hey, what time is it? Y'all don't know, because y'all ain't got no clock. Y'all ain't got no clock. That's true. We don't have any clocks. No grandfather clocks in our cabinets. I have no idea what time it is. I'll only wear a watch. If Jimmy Johnson doesn't know what time it is, he's crazy, by the way. We'll ask Jimmy.

Yeah. Nobody's sleeping in that house, by the way. My gosh. Next. Oh, Mama said every day is like that, and even Stephen's part last week said that we'd have a stinker once in a while. Just remember next. week is Texas, the size of Dale Jr.'s first win, and hopefully, it's 20th. Go, Dale Jr., and Brian Vickers, I hate you.

That sounds that one little jab here. Poor Vickers got it from all angles yesterday, and then Harvick tried to put him in the grandstand. Yes, he did. Wow. That was neat. Next. I guess we just had a bad week, didn't we? Good news is they get to line up again next week and do it all again.

It's just one week, fella. We still going big. Junior Nation, the building. I like this. I mean, that's a good call right there. Look, it was a bad day. It's over. Let's go to Texas and race Saturday night.

That's like the Stevie Latart of Junior Nation. I like that, right there. Right there. Right there. Right. Right. Right. Yeah, Jimmy Johnson could have helped the 88 out there on that caution,

but Jimmy's got more important things to worry about than a piece of a car on the track. It's going to go another lap down. The 88 team ought to be damn embarrassed. I'll tell you one thing. You better not bring that piece of shit to Texas. Well. Oh, okay. Well, there's good news there.

They won't take the Martinsville car to Texas. No, no, no. I can promise you that. No. No. No. Oh, me. Lots of passion.

You got to appreciate all of it. Absolutely. Oh, Junebug's car acted like my wife does the week before. All over the place. Oh, God. Okay. I don't know. Is that a dig at his wife or her car?

Both. Okay. Next. When you run night, you get run over by and that's it. Can't blame Johnson for not stopping because he had to do what he had to do. But Brian Vickers. Oh. You remember my Brian Vickers story, by the way?

I like the golf course. When Junior went out to play golf with Jimmy Johnson. Tell it real quick. Out at Quail Hollow. Yeah. And Junior does not like to play golf in front of prominent people, by the way. But he's out there anyway. And some dude that's a member out there at Quail Hollow comes up and says,

hey, man, thanks what you did for that. charity deal a couple weeks ago and Jr. says, I don't know what you're talking about. He goes, you know, you were out there. You did that charity deal. It was great. It was wonderful what you did. And he's in front of all these people, Jimmy Johnson, all these people. And Junior's like, man, I have no idea what you're talking about. And the guy goes, wait a minute, aren't you Brian Vickers? Everybody at Quail Lalo was laying on the putting green. Was Jimmy Johnson laughing? Oh, he's rolling on the ground. Cry and laughing. And Jimmy's, Jr's like, no, man, I'm not.

not Brian Vickers. That's funny. Next. You've got certain positions that matter in that car. You've got wins, top five, top ten, and then positions that you finish behind Danica. We've reached an all-time low. Well, a lot of people finished behind Danica yesterday. Kevin Harvick.

All right. I mean, she did good. She did. She had a great day. All credit to her. And, you know, she had an early wreck with Ruderman, ironically, who used to drive that car. And she was with traitor, wasn't it? Yeah, but first it was with Ruderman.

And she's in the last place, 43rd there. About 50 laps in. Finishes 12th. Impressive. Next. Mike Hogg comes back to the track. Dale Jr. has its worst rates of the year.

Come on, man. Stay home. Come on, Mike Hogg. Come on, Mike Hogg. Mike Hogg went to the track after being on the injured reserve, and we have our worst finish to the year. I love this because people, People blame me for the three or four years of our little funk.

Yeah. And for me being there, I come off the road and all of a sudden he wins races. Y'all finish six in Bristol when you went, you know, and had a good finish. And I was first thing I saw J.R. this morning, I said, J.R., you get back on the road, man. Yeah, he went to Fontana. It's all my hog's fault. Yeah, let's blame hog. Thanks.

Cock Mountain says that Dale Jr. should have won to whop Brian Vickers' ass instead of Kevin Harvick. Turkeycock Mountain is actual place. It is? Yeah. I had to look that up. It's in Virginia, I believe. Is that right? Yeah.

I believe that. Turkey Cock Mountain. That makes a lot of sense. Next. I'd just like to say I'm the biggest Dale Earnhardt Jr. fan. Love you, Team 88. Let's go get us a championship. Woo!

That's a good one to finish on right there. All right. That's reaction theater. Folks, a reminder there are four flavors of Dale Jr. Potato chips, Krispy Original, Zesty Halepino, Creole and Green Onion and Carolina Barbecue. Go to Dale Jr. Foods.com right now to get yours today. That's Dale J.R. Foods.com.

And one thing, Taylor, I will say that we get so many voicemails, what we started doing last week or two weeks ago, I believe, was we're going to put an extended version of Reaction Theater because there's so many good voicemails, and I wish we could put them all on in this podcast, but we'll do an extended version so a lot of other people that left voicemails can hear themselves on Dale.Jr.com. So check that out.

We're going to put it on Thursdays. Being spirited people. this week. At least some of them. We love you all. Let's throw the white flag. There you go, buddy white flag. It will be a busy weekend for Dale Jr.

As he is running both nationwide series and cup races at Texas. He'll be in the number 88 Helmand Chevrolet for Friday night's nationwide event. It will be on ESPN2. And then he'll be back in the National Guard colors for Saturday night's cup race. That will be on Fox. As we announced last week, when Dale Jr.'s ride has officially started. Up for grabs the Junior's 2013 Corvette Sports Coupe. go to the the Dale Jr. Foundation.org to buy raffle tickets today.

Don't forget, you can meet Dale Jr. at Talladega through great clips just by texting Dale, D-A-L-7-3-28, or if you're in Canada, to 7-7-77. That's 5-7. Hey. Last week on JRN 360, we announced Jeffrey Earnhardt. Dale Jr.'s nephew will drive a junior motorsports car at Richmond. Well, we'll have some more news regarding that this week, so stay tuned. Now, lastly, Taylor, I feel I owe you a public.

congratulations and Marty Smith. I congratulate you both for all you've done in helping Eric Church win album of the year last night. I'm fired up for Eric. I had nothing to do with it. Maybe Marty did. The cuddling, all that stuff. I had nothing to do with it. I'm a boy chief, though.

Good stuff, guys. For Mike Davis and for Dustin Lee, I'm Taylor Zarser. You've been listening to the Dale Jr. download. Thanks for listening to Dirty Moe Radio. Have you tried the new Dale Jr. potato chips? Are you wondering where you can find them? Today is your lucky day. Go to Dale Jr. Foods.com to see where you can find the chips in your area or place an order online.

You can have them shipped right to you. That's DaleJR. Foods.com.