DARLINGTON, S.C. -- Dale Earnhardt Jr. is always a presence at Darlington Raceway, even when he's not at the track. His image, clad in Budweiser red, smiles down from billboards along the highway running by NASCAR's oldest major speedway.

But for how much longer? The sport's most popular driver announced Thursday that he would leave Dale Earnhardt Inc., the team his father created and the only Nextel Cup home he's ever known, when his contract expires after this season. Now the biggest free agent in NASCAR history is on the market, with everyone wondering where he's going to wind up in 2008.

Earnhardt Jr. leaving DEI at end of season

In a news conference at his JR Motorsports race shop on Thursday, Dale Earnhardt Jr. announced he will leave DEI at the end of this season.

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"We'd like to see him over here, obviously," Joe Gibbs Racing driver Denny Hamlin said after Busch practice Thursday at the 1.366-mile track, which hosts the Dodge Avenger 500 on Saturday night. "He'd bring a lot to Gibbs. As a team, myself and Tony [Stewart] have a pretty good relationship with him. So it would be a great fit."

With only three Nextel Cup entries, the Gibbs organization has room for Earnhardt to fit under the four-car limit established by NASCAR. So does Richard Childress Racing, the team Earnhardt's late father made famous driving a black No. 3 car many fans would love to see Junior in next year.

"When a driver says he's going to leave, it's only natural to start wondering where he's going to go. I don't think there's anything unusual about that," RCR driver Jeff Burton said. "But certainly Junior's comments about one day wanting to drive for Richard certainly add fuel to that fire. I honestly have no idea what will happen there, I honestly don't. If we're going to do a fourth team, if that's what Richard decides he wants to do, then Junior would be one of the drivers we'd like to talk to, without a doubt. But I have no way of knowing what would happen right now."

Earnhardt said he'd prefer to continue to drive Chevrolets, leaving RCR, Gibbs and Hendrick Motorsports as the most obvious top contenders. Childress, who is scheduled to speak to the media Friday morning, wasn't available for comment Thursday. Neither was Joe Gibbs Racing president J.D. Gibbs. A spokesman for Rick Hendrick, whose team has won seven of 10 races this year, offered no comment.

But surely, behind the scenes, the telephone lines were buzzing. A 17-time race winner who has finished fifth or better in final championship points three times in his seven-year career, Earnhardt will bring a massive fan base and a big-money sponsor with him wherever he goes.

"I don't know that car owners are going to throw drivers out to get Junior, but certainly car owners are going to be enticed to make things work," Burton said. "He doesn't necessarily have to have the crystal ball to see, 'I'm going to have a good ride.' He can probably rest pretty well at night knowing that he will have good equipment. He may not understand what it's going to be just yet, but he can probably sleep at night knowing he's going to have an opportunity to drive good cars. Whenever I make any business decision, I always make it based on, what is the effect of this decision? The thing that he has that a lot of people don't have is -- you can pretty much guarantee he won't be driving junk."

Where will Earnhardt land? There are no guarantees. Hendrick is the sport's best organization, but has a full stable of four Nextel Cup cars. The Gibbs organization has won three championships since 2000, but car owner Joe Gibbs is a man of strong Christian faith who may be reticent to accept an alcohol sponsor. And despite the clamor among fans to see him drive his father's old car at RCR, Earnhardt said Thursday he'd have to do "a little soul-searching" before taking that leap.

"He's probably one of the biggest guys in the last ... well, forever that is now looking for a ride, and he can probably go wherever he wants just based off what he can bring to the organization money-wise," Hamlin said. "I think in the end, there's probably two teams that will end up fighting for him."

But Hamlin wouldn't speculate which two teams they would be. "I haven't talked to J.D. or anything like that. I don't know if they've even talked to [Earnhardt]," he said. "Just from talking to his people a few times, there are a couple of teams that are going to be way ahead of the others."

At Gibbs, the personalities would fit -- Earnhardt helped Hamlin find his career break, and is also a friend and frequent restrictor-plate drafting partner to Stewart. "We're really more off-the-track friends than anything," Hamlin said of his relationship with Earnhardt.

"He was a big part of me getting to where I'm at. Anything he ever needs, I'll be there to help him out. He doesn't need me to tell him how good Gibbs is as an organization. They've won three of the last seven championships, they've won races. He'll figure it out. He knows what he needs to win championships, and when he sees what he needs to see on a team, he's going to go with them."

Meanwhile, life went on at DEI. Earnhardt's crew pushed the No. 8 car through technical inspection Thursday, although crew chief Tony Eury Jr. was nowhere to be found. Paul Menard, one of Earnhardt's two Nextel Cup teammates, was at Darlington practicing in his Busch car.

"It's something we didn't know about, but kind of had to plan for. The doors are still going to be open on Monday, and we're still going to try and win races like Dale Earnhardt would have wanted," Menard said.

"I don't think DEI is going to be any less ambitious than they were before as far as trying to expand. They want to go to four cars eventually, and I think that's still in the long-term plans, to go to four cars and make it as good as we can."

But they'll do it without Earnhardt, whose disagreement with his stepmother Teresa over the organization's direction has led him to seek a new home.

"There can only be one captain of a ship. I know some people will be upset at Junior and some people will be upset at Teresa, but at the end of the day, somebody's got to be the boss. Somebody's got to be running it. If Junior felt like he couldn't be successful with Teresa at the helm, then he needed to go somewhere else. If she felt like she needed to be at the helm for it to be successful, then she needed to stand firm and do what she did," Burton said.

"Only time will tell, but there can only be one boss, and it appeared just from the outside looking in that it would be difficult to get through Teresa not being the boss. I'm not saying that's wrong. It would be hard for her just to say, 'OK, here's the company.'"