No. 2 series needs names, development to survive

At heart it is designed as a ladder series, one where Nextel Cup organizations place their young, up-and-coming drivers to prepare them for the big show. But in reality it's something different, a haven for sponsors who want to back the big names of NASCAR for a lesser dollar amount, and fans who want to see their heroes race without paying the price of a Sunday ticket.

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This is the strange, conflicted world of the Busch Series, which attempts to be everything to everyone but succeeds in only being something that no one can quite figure out. NASCAR claims it's the No. 2 motorsports series in America, behind Nextel Cup. Nationwide paid a reported $12 million annually to take over the naming rights for the next seven years. So, what is the insurance giant getting -- a developmental circuit, or a secondary stage for the sport's biggest stars?

In all honestly, it doesn't seem to care.

"It just wasn't a major consideration for us," said James Lyski, Nationwide's chief marketing officer. "We really looked to say, is this a competitive series? Is it one that excites the fans? Is it one that holds true to our core values around safety and delivering an 'on your side' experience? All those things really resonated for us. Whether the Cup guys come down and race or don't, I think this is all about the drivers that are racing in the Nationwide Series demonstrating they're some of the best in the world and having very competitive and exciting races. That's what we really cared about."

It should care, because the Busch Series is an entity trapped between the opposing forces of development and commerce, both of which are key to NASCAR's growth. For its future, the sport needs this to be a developmental series, the kind that's produced drivers like Clint Bowyer, Denny Hamlin, and Kevin Harvick. But to sell tickets and attract sponsors and television viewers, the circuit needs big names like Carl Edwards and Greg Biffle and Kyle Busch. Without those names, the series languishes. And if the series languishes, development suffers.

Of course that's occurring to a certain extent already. In open-wheel racing, teams identify promising drivers at a young age and fund their development. For a while, at least, a similar practice was all the rage in NASCAR. But teams realized how much money had to be spent on development, realized that sponsors weren't keen on the idea of backing cars on dirt tracks, and started cutting some of those drivers loose. A few organizations, most notably Joe Gibbs Racing, have stayed the course -- and it's likely to pay off in the form of Joey Logano, a Busch East champion who Mark Martin has tabbed as a future star. But in too many cases, young drivers are forced to either catch lightning in a bottle, or see their careers linger.

Nationwide Series

NASCAR announced that Nationwide Insurance will become the title sponsor of the sport's No. 2 series.

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• 2008 Nationwide schedule

That's evident in the Busch Series, which is littered with drivers like Burney Lamar and Shane Huffman and Danny O'Quinn, who got a chance -- but a short one, before they were squeezed out by the economic realities of the sport. Sure, it's all well and good to give a young kid a ride in the Busch Series, and see if he can swim, But sponsors want to back a name driver like Jeff Burton or Kasey Kahne. Fans want to see Harvick and Edwards. And many of those once-promising young drivers fade away.

There's no question that the presence of so many Cup drivers corrupts what everyone assumes to be the Busch Series' central mission: development. But strangely, those same Cup drivers provide the series with a level of viability and visibility other ladder series don't have. In world motorsport, countless developmental circuits have come and gone, many of them barely noticed. Toyota Atlantic, Barber Dodge, Formula 1000, Indy Pro Series -- all of them have existed in a vacuum, with limited amounts of sponsorship and attention. Driver development alone is a noble, necessary, worthy effort. But it doesn't pay the bills.

NASCAR chairman Brian France said Wednesday that he'd like to see the Busch Series distinguished a little bit more from the sport's other two national circuits, but a new sponsor had to be chosen before anything could be set into motion. He points out that Cup drivers have always dabbled in the Busch circuit, with the numbers rising and falling over time. Their current dominance, series director Joe Balash believes, may be on the brink of leveling off.

"I think if you look right now, we've probably had over 140 different drivers take starts so far this year in the series, and we look into the future that we'll have a continuous flow of young new talent that will be heading our way," he said. "I think we have a very talented new Busch East Series driver [in Joey Logano] that we just crowned this year that will move to the NASCAR Nationwide Series. We may have been heavy for a little bit with the double-duty drivers, but we see that's a trend that's kind of migrating the other way, and we'll start seeking a more normal level."

There are no plans, France said, to ban moonlighting Cup drivers altogether and turn the Nationwide Series into a purely developmental tour. If there were, the series would risk losing sponsors, viewers, and ticket holders -- three things it can't afford to lose. Other elements, like the implementation of the Car of Tomorrow into the Cup series full-time next season, may help stem the tide. But NASCAR does hope to eventually transfer many aspects of the COT into the Nationwide Series, even if that car doesn't necessarily feature a rear wing and front splitter.

So it's quite realistic to think that NASCAR may see a reduction in "Nationwidewackers" as long as the two series are using dissimilar automobiles, and then witness that trend reverse itself as the cars become more alike. But the issue hinges on sponsors, the lifeblood of the sport, who have proven to get what they want. If they want Cup drivers in the Nationwide Series, they'll be there. And NASCAR will continue to walk a tightrope, straddling the line between big names and development, and overseeing a series that strangely needs both to survive.

The opinions expressed are solely of the writer.