Deflecting the blame for Junior's poor performance

Upon having time to reflect on all of the troubles that have been laid at the driver's-side door of Dale Earnhardt Jr., it was inevitable that this conclusion would be reached in this space.

It's not our fault.

Yep. You heard it right.

It has been going on two weeks since Tony Eury Jr. laid it all out for us at Chicagoland Speedway, revealing that the blame for Earnhardt's dual failure to win more races and truly contend for a championship since joining Hendrick Motorsports is mostly the fault of unrealistic expectations placed upon poor Junior by the media.

Look, before anything more is said on the subject, it must be noted that the interview granted by the immensely likable Eury was much appreciated by the said media. There has never been a time in this reporter's experience when Eury dodged a question or was anything less than courteous and, at least on the surface, full of mutual respect in an interview session -- whether it was a group gang bang in the heat after a race, or during a one-on-one with no one else around at a more leisurely pace in the garage or during an event at the Hendrick shop.

To Eury's credit, his answers to the many legitimate questions fired at him in Chicagoland -- where he spoke publicly for the first time since team owner Rick Hendrick mandated that the crew chief split with his driver/cousin -- were thoughtful and heartfelt.

Eury is a smart man who clearly has plenty to offer to the Hendrick operation in whatever capacity he and it decide is best moving forward.

But when he blamed the media for his demise as Junior's crew chief, and for Earnhardt's struggles in general since coming over to the No. 88 car at Hendrick, he not only was dead wrong but may have inadvertently revealed a bigger part of the problem eating away at Earnhardt's effectiveness behind the wheel.

Doing the job

As in all sports, success in racing depends to a certain degree on accountability. So let's set the record straight on a few items.

When Earnhardt's new car first was unveiled in Dallas during the 2007 season after he had announced he was leaving Dale Earnhardt Inc. for Rick Hendrick's ride, it was a huge media event. Hendrick even chartered a plane to fly local media from Charlotte to the Texas-sized affair (some of us, if not all, paid a reasonable going rate to make certain there was no appearance of conflict of interest).

Reporters flock to a willing Dale Earnhardt Jr. car unveiling.

Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Cup Stats (since 2005)

Year	W	T-5	T-10	Avg. Fin.	Rank
2005	1	7	13	20.5	19
2006	1	10	17	13.5	5
2007	0	7	12	18.6	16
2008	1	10	16	14.1	12
2009*	0	1	3	21.2	21

* Thru 19 races

But the point is that Earnhardt and Hendrick not only welcomed all the attention at the outset of their relationship, but encouraged it.

While in Dallas that day, former champion Darrell Waltrip predicted great things for Junior. He boldly stated that he expected Earnhardt to win the season-opening Daytona 500 and "at least" six races in 2008 while contending for a championship.

Yes, the media who flew there asked Waltrip what he thought Junior would be able to accomplish in his new seat. It seemed then -- and still seems today -- a fair and reasonable question to have asked under the circumstances.

Furthermore, once Waltrip made the prediction, this reporter asked him point-blank if he really meant it, if he was serious. Waltrip emphatically stated yes.

Then this reporter went directly to Earnhardt and Hendrick, telling them of Waltrip's statement and seeking their reaction. Both driver and owner said something to the effect that Waltrip's prediction sounded about right to them and that they fully expected to compete for championships right off the bat.

Shame on the media for reporting what they said that day, and shame on us, I suppose, for continuing to remember it. But it's called doing our job. We ask the questions and the subjects we write and talk about provide the answers that we then pass on to the masses.

That's the way this deal works.

Record speaks

By now everyone knows the sad story. Earnhardt started out well enough at Hendrick, but he didn't win the Daytona 500 that year and fell five races short of the six wins Waltrip had predicted for him.

Eury complained in Chicagoland that race fans unrealistically expected him and Junior to win every race.

"I have one of the most popular drivers out there that race fans expect to win every weekend -- and it's not possible in this garage," Eury said. "Jimmie Johnson, he can win. But nobody has won over 10 races in a year. That's the fact of the matter.

"The competition level is way high over here. One screw-up on pit road, one dropped lug nut or something like that is going to cost you the race -- and if you don't have the whole act together, then you're not going to win the race. A lot of times we didn't have the whole package; we just had part of it."

Well, first of all, there have been some drivers who have won more than 10 races in a season. Jeff Gordon won 13 in 1998. But we're nitpicking. Eury makes a valid point there in that rarely does anyone win more than nine or 10 in a season, and even that is considered pretty much dominant.

But guess what? The media didn't have anything to do with Earnhardt missing his pit stall at this season's Daytona 500, after which Eury correctly stated that the pressure increased on his driver and his team.

And the media didn't have anything to do with the No. 88 team not having its whole act together much of the time while the Juniors were together. That was their own doing, and no one else's.

To blame it on anything else is a form of excuse-making that tends only to make bad situations deteriorate into something worse as time progresses.

The sooner they can admit that to themselves, the better Junior's chances will be of improving his performance on the race track as he moves forward in a new era without his cousin on top of the No. 88 pit box.

The opinions expressed are those solely of the writer.