Many to precede Stewart learned ownership's risks (cont'd)

But also present on Stewart's new team are several advantages Waltrip didn't have. Stewart-Haas will race tried-and-true Chevrolets and get its engines from juggernaut Hendrick Motorsports; in comparison, the fledgling Toyotas the Waltrip outfit rolled out in 2007 weren't quite ready for prime time. There's an owners' points issue, but it's not as dire -- whereas Waltrip fielded three cars with no points, Stewart has only one outside the top 35, a fact mitigated somewhat by his past champion's provisional. At 37 and 31, respectively, Stewart and Newman are in the prime of their careers; Waltrip was 44 and Jarrett 50 when Michael Waltrip Racing as we know it went full-throttle two years ago.

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So the Waltrip organization of 2007 and the Stewart-Haas team of today are in some ways vastly different, with the latter clearly more prepared to contend immediately than the former was two seasons ago. There was Stewart, in his first event in his new red No. 14 car, mixing it up at the front of the Budweiser Shootout on Saturday night. But if Waltrip's experiences teach us anything, it's that there are no guarantees. He may not have considered himself a championship contender from the first race, as Stewart does today, but the upheaval of the past two years obscures the fact that Michael Waltrip Racing started with plenty of assets that teams would fight over today. UPS, NAPA, and Toyota carry plenty of weight. Put Stewart and Newman in the same situation Waltrip and Jarrett were in two years ago, and would their expectations be any different?

Maybe not. And yet, it's been a struggle for Waltrip from the very beginning. There's not a riskier economic venture in all of sports than starting a Cup team. Who was the last start-up owner to really succeed, to the point where his cars could contend for race wins on a regular basis? Ray Evernham, who opened doors in 2001, won 15 races -- no small feat, in retrospect -- and is now all but out of the sport. Before that it was Dale Earnhardt in 1999, and Gibbs in 1992. Seventeen years, countless hopeful new car owners who have entered the sport, and three who can truly say they made it. And two of those were eventually forced to merge. Only one has won a championship. NASCAR is a sport that eats its young.

So even if Waltrip hadn't been busted for that illegal substance two years ago, even if he hadn't suffered through the then-record penalties and point deductions that followed, it still almost certainly would have been difficult. Toyota backed another start-up franchise that season, one with all the money of the Red Bull energy drink empire behind it, and even that organization is only now beginning to find its footing and race at the front with anything resembling regularity. Remember Tim Beverly? Remember Andy Petree? Remember Jim Smith? Remember Cal Wells? They all started with high hopes, too. Some of them even won races. None of them lasted.

To a man, executives at Stewart-Haas believe they're going to be different, believe they're going to win races and challenge for Chase berths, believe they can do it as early as Sunday afternoon. They may very well succeed. They'll also be defying a lot of history in the process. What will be the difference? Stewart believes it's people like competition director Bobby Hutchens, and crew chiefs Tony Gibson and Darian Grubb.

"I think the people are the key," Stewart said. "Everybody with the rules package has pretty much got the same thing. I think what makes the difference, and Joe [Gibbs] has said this, which makes me feel more comfortable, too, is it's the people that make the difference. That's why the hardest part for me was hiring Bobby and hiring Darian and Tony Gibson and Ryan, and making sure we got those key people in place right away. Once we got that done, it seems like it's taken a little bit of the pressure off me and put more of the weight on their shoulders. I don't feel like I have to do it all by myself."

He doesn't, but this is still his team, with his name on it, and he'll receive any requisite credit or blame. On that, Waltrip can surely relate. And should Stewart ever need a reminder of the unpredictability of the venture he's embarking upon, he can always look inside the No. 55 car, where he'll find a living, breathing cautionary tale.

The opinions expressed are solely of the writer.