INDIANAPOLIS -- The official release announcing Ryan Newman's impending separation from Penske Racing said the split was by mutual decision. But former NASCAR champion Rusty Wallace, who drove for Roger Penske for more than a decade and still talks to the car owner regularly, isn't convinced that's how it happened.

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He needed to move on and find a driver, rather than Ryan saying, 'Well, I don't know if I'm going to come back, I might, I might not.' Roger's not like that.

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RUSTY WALLACE

Wallace, now a television analyst, thinks Penske effectively fired Newman, having grown weary of the driver's indecision over his future as well as his less-than-flattering depiction of the organization's equipment. Penske's two Sprint Cup cars are currently 16th and 18th in points, and Newman said he would consider leaving the team if on-track performance did not improve.

That became reality last week, when Newman and Penske "mutually agreed" to part ways, according a release sent out by the team. But Wallace believes it was more a matter of Penske splitting with Newman than the Daytona 500 champion leaving.

"He didn't leave," Wallace said Friday at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, where will be help call the Allstate 400 at the Brickyard for ESPN. "I've read many, many stories that said that. Roger Penske called Ryan Newman into to his office and said, 'I don't need your services next year.' Ryan Newman didn't come to him and say, 'I'm leaving,' OK? Y'all need to write about that. That's exactly how it went down. I've never seen Roger Penske let anybody in his life go. Obviously there was some bad blood there. I don't know what went on, I don't work there anymore, but that's what happened. I love Roger Penske, so I'm going to clear the story up right now."

Wallace admits that he and Newman, old-school and new-school racers respectively, didn't have the best of relationships during their four years together at Penske. He also said that Penske hasn't told him explicitly how the separation with Newman went down. But Wallace said he knows Penske very well, and added that the car owner did tell him how disappointed he was in Newman's comments regarding the team's lack of performance.

"Roger doesn't like anybody telling him his equipment's junk or he doesn't like this or doesn't like that," Wallace said. "Obviously Ryan and I never got along real well, that's for sure. You guys all know that. [Penske] will give anybody anything they want: engineers, whatever. And Ryan knows that. And we hyped up forever and ever how he is the engineer for years and years, and they can't get that car figured out. I talked to Roger, and he didn't like it. He didn't like all the negative stuff. I didn't know exactly, but I knew that they needed to move on quick. That's the key. He needed to move on and find a driver, rather than Ryan saying, 'Well, I don't know if I'm going to come back, I might, I might not.' Roger's not like that. He's not going to be held hostage by somebody else. You're in or you're out. There's no waffling. And Roger says, 'I'm not waiting, I'm moving.' and that was it." (Continued)