Keller out at CJM, quickly finds ride at Baker-Curb (cont'd)

"He said that one of the things you could do would be, if I find an opportunity for '08 that leads into '09, would you be open to allowing me out of my contract," Mullet said Keller told him. "I said that I would because if that was something that allowed [Jason] to move forward and to be successful, we definitely would support that.

"On the other side, that allowed us to start building chemistry for '09 as well. But we think a lot of Jason. He's a great guy and I've thanked him many times for what he's done for the program, so we're excited for all those things."

CJM Racing made 16 starts in 2007, all but one of them with Keller behind the wheel of its No. 11 Chevrolets. The consistent Keller's average finish was 19.8, with seven of those races coming at the wheel of Brewco's No. 27 Fords.

Keller scored CJM's first top-10 finish in the season's 15th race, at Nashville, which was only the operation's third start. Keller went on to score three more top-10s in the final eight races of the season, with CJM planning a full schedule, pending sponsorship, in 2008.

The '08 season opened with a thud as Keller finished 36th at Daytona, but wearing no sponsorship, the team arrowed into the top 15 in the standings after four races, when the salvation of a multi-year primary sponsorship deal with America's Incredible Pizza Company was signed, in time for Race 5 at Bristol.

With 28 races down, Keller was 11th in the driver standings on the strength of four more top-10 finishes, including the organization's best of third, at Gateway; and only three DNFs. But a change was brewing.

"We wanted somebody who could be branded with CJM, who was relatively unknown, but is as close to ready to go as they could be, and yet was unbranded," Mullet said. "And that's when we thought of Scott. We spent some time forming a relationship, and character is very important to us, so we're tremendously excited about moving ahead to next year."

"I had to make a change for 2009, and it made the most sense to do it in '08," Keller said on Friday. "I gave it a lot of thought, a lot of pieces had to come together to make the puzzle, and it did.

"I think we did a great thing," Keller said of what he'd achieved with the group at CJM. "With limited resources, and limited people -- because it's still a people business -- I'm extremely proud of what we were able to accomplish."

Keller paused, almost as if to bite his lip, and not 10 minutes after he'd granted an interview the affinity his former team held their former driver was apparent as a small group that included Keller, a couple CJM mechanics and a couple more from Baker Curb had a bench racing session in the 27's garage stall, with plenty of smiles all around.

"That's just the way the business is, and you just try to focus on the position you've got right now," Keller said. "And I've got a great position here with Kimberly-Clark and Baker Curb. We've got a few hurdles to overcome, and I'm not oblivious to that, but we'll just focus on what we can do and what we can control."

Baker Curb has its program with Kimberly-Clark, which has backed the No. 27 car for years with its variety of brands, but it's struggled to keep two cars on track. Keller, however, was able to qualify 17th at Dover, sixth among the teams with no Sprint Cup affiliation.

"It's extremely tough in many ways [to compete], but if you don't have a sponsor you can't race," Keller said. "And one of the great things about this team is that next year will be Kimberly-Clark's 15th year in the sport.

"But it's tough to see that decisions have to be made on financial situations, [such as Team Rensi announcing it has no sponsorship and doesn't know what it'll do next season]. We need the Team Rensis of the world and we can't afford to run them out."