@nascarcasm: Why teammates getting mad at each other is awesome

NASCAR fans are lucky, for in our sport, teammates can actually get into huge spats on track. They can wreck each other. They can ruin one another’s day. When it happens, team owners likely grimace and try to resolve the situation as quickly as possible. I WISH THEY WOULDN’T. Teammates enraged at one another is fantastic. The more the better. Here’s why.

Every time cars on the same team collide, rub or take each other out, you can bank on the entirety of NASCAR Twitter posting those exact words. We collectively envision the team owner separating both drivers like Dana White at a UFC pay-per-view weigh-in. That probably doesn’t happen. Regardless, we can pretend it’s a contentious meeting with office chairs getting thrown around the room, instead of a sedate affair with folks who returned to Charlotte at 4:30 a.m. on zero sleep sitting around a meeting table.

“OH WHAT THEY GONNA SAY??!!” we wonder when the victim of a teammate-on-teammate shunt gets to say a word once cleared from the infield care center. Granted, it’s usually something reserved and non-escalatory. “I’ll have to see the replay,” they used to say, until networks wisely started showing them the replay right there. At that point, they sometimes have to go back into the infield care center to receive treatment to their tongues from biting them way too hard.

Remember in junior high how if you said something derogatory about a classmate, the news would travel from one person to another to another until it reached said classmate? You could deny it and blame the rumor mill. NOT in NASCAR. If you called the driver with whom you share a race shop “A F---ING IDIOT THAT NEEDS TO BE THROAT-PUNCHED,” chances are it’s on Reddit before you un-key your mic. And if it’s Alex Bowman, it’s on a T-shirt ready for pre-order.

Does the teammate the race winner punted for the win come by and congratulate the race winner? We keep a keen eye. Sure, they might come by, shrug, say “Hey, one of them racin’ deals!” and congratulate the team. If they don’t, well, we read into it. It’s a clear sign of anger, and these two will be throwing chairs at each other in the competition meeting. (See slide No. 2)

When teammates feud, you have to assume drivers on single-car teams think “At least I’ll never have that problem.” No, they can safely collide with anyone they like. There will likely be repercussions, but at least the competition meeting will be nice and calm. (See slide No. 2)

This is something that never happens, but it’s fun to pretend it does. We can pretend team members for the feuding drivers can engage in petty arguments at the race shop. They don’t hold the door for one another. They park each other in. They steal each others’ lunches out of the break room refrigerator. Who knows, it might escalate to putting each others’ staplers in Jello.

Not really all that different than having an argument with a co-worker in the office and then remembering you’re car-pooling home. Aside from the transportation.

Rejoice knowing that racing is unique in that teammates can spoil each others’ days in ways that can’t happen in any other sport. We don’t mean the second baseman bobbling a routine grounder, thus ruining the pitcher’s perfect game. We don’t mean a receiver dropping an easy pass from the quarterback. This is way different. Rather than two teams clearing the benches and brawling in the infield, picture one team clearing the benches and brawling with each other while the other looks on. It’s more like that.