By now Teresa Earnhardt must realize the simple, undeniable truth. How can she not? The only way she and Dale Earnhardt Inc. can emerge from contract negotiations with her stepson, driver and fledging NASCAR icon Dale Earnhardt Jr., some semblance of a winner is to lose.

Young Dale holds all the trump cards, and he is playing them ever so carefully with a touch of understated class that only endears him even more to his legions of fans and even unattached but highly interested bystanders to this family drama.

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On Tuesday, Earnhardt Jr. invited the media to see his new JR Motorsports shop in Mooresville, a 66,000-square-foot facility that currently is home to his Busch Series operation. But of course what everyone wanted to know was how contract talks are going between Junior and DEI, the company founded by Junior's late father and Teresa's husband.

Kelley Earnhardt Elledge, the NASCAR driver's sister who is running point in the negotiations for her famous brother, told reporters that if a deal is going to get done with DEI, it needs to happen by June 1. And she made it clear that the hard part of the negotiations, at least in her mind and in Junior's mind, have been completed and laid out for approval.

Now it's up to Teresa and her point man, DEI president of global operations Max Siegel, to do what they should have done months ago: acquiesce to the reasonable demands of the youngsters in the family.

"We need to have a decision by no later than June," Elledge said.

The deadline makes sense. Plans need to be set in motion for 2008, even though it's still early in the 2007 season. Sponsors and drivers and other employees who work at DEI and/or with Junior need to know what's up for the immediate and long-term future.

More importantly, for Junior to completely focus on driving, he needs to know and put his own mind to rest.

Elledge has been talking earnestly with Siegel even though she has yet to return to work full-time as president of JR Motorsports since undergoing surgery on March 23 to have a growth removed from her pancreas. If that isn't enough of an indication of how urgent she and her brother are to put their signatures to the deal of their choice, then Teresa is even more clueless than even her worst critics would suggest.

But Teresa Earnhardt is not stupid. She may be stubborn. She may be overly protective of a DEI empire she helped build from the ground up. But she is not dumb.

She is savvy in many ways of business. She has rightly preserved the image of her late husband and the black No. 3 Chevrolet he drove to so many victories before his tragic death in the 2001 Daytona 500. No one uses anything that had anything to do with her husband without her approval, and DEI no doubt has profited greatly from this approach.

But Dale Earnhardt never intended the greatest part of his legacy to be how much DEI made from souvenir sales of a car that no longer runs in the races that are viewed by millions of spectators live and via television for 36 weekends a year. That is what Teresa Earnhardt appears to somehow, inexplicably, fail to understand at least on some level.

She cannot carry on her husband's legacy in the manner he intended by herself. She cannot carry it on without her stepson -- and he will not carry it on without taking his beloved sister, who has meant so much to him on a personal and professional level, along for the multi-million dollar ride.

Can you imagine how Dale Earnhardt would have reacted if someone would have told him that Teresa would hire and hand over much of the control to a "director of global operations" before making sure Junior was locked up for the long haul and promised a portion of control of the company as well?

On Tuesday Elledge reiterated that her and her brother want at least a 51-percent stake of DEI. She told reporters that 51 "is the right number because it gives you control." She went on to add that she and Junior will take "75 or 95 or whatever we work out" but that it has to be at least 51 so they have that control.

"The biggest reason we want ownership in the Cup program is so that we can direct it to where we feel like it needs to go," she said.

Her message is clear. They don't like the current direction of the DEI's Cup program, or at the very least believe they can greatly improve upon it.

Give up control of DEI, Teresa and Max, or face the alternative: life destined for NASCAR obscurity without Junior. And we're talking about Dale Jr. here. Folks -- meaning fans and sponsors -- don't fork out big bucks to come to the track and see Martin Truex Jr. race. Or Paul Menard.

They line up to see Dale Jr. And they'll line up to see him and cheer for him and put him in advertisements for their products no matter who he is driving for. That's why Kelley Earnhardt Elledge and Dale Jr. have Teresa Earnhardt over a barrel.

They know that it's time for Junior to call his own shots, even if Teresa is only now grudgingly coming to that stark realization.

The opinions expressed are solely of the writer.