Drivers who missed time due to injury

Dale Earnhardt Jr. met with the media at Darlington Raceway for the first time since Hendrick Motorsports announced he would miss the rest of the 2016 season due to recovery from a concussion. He joins a list of drivers who have missed time in the car due to an injury. The following list isn't every driver, just some of the more memorable ones.

Yes, Earnhardt previously missed time in the seat -- and it was also due to concussions. Back in 2012, Earnhardt missed two races before being cleared.

Kyle Busch broke his right leg and left foot in the 2015 NASCAR XFINITY Series opener at Daytona. He missed 11 races, but went on to win the Sprint Cup Series championship.

An all-terrain vehicle accident in January 2016 kept Tony Stewart out of his No. 14 Chevrolet for the first eight races of his retirement season.

Stewart also makes a second appearance on this list. He missed the final 15 races of the 2013 season after breaking his right leg in a sprint car crash.

Last-lap contact with Joey Logano ended with Denny Hamlin smacking the Auto Club wall -- and getting taken to the hospital with an L1 compression fracture in his back. The injury kept him out of four races in 2013.

A broken bone in his neck sidelined Sterling Marlin for the final seven races of the 2002 season, which helped to launch the career of fill-in driver Jamie McMurray.

Ricky Craven suffered a concussion following a wreck during practice at Texas in 1997 (note: this photo is from a different incident), which caused him to miss two races right away and then four months later as symptoms lingered and then worsened.

A wreck at Michigan in 1994 put Ernie Irvan out of the car the rest of the season, and most of 1995.

A scary 1991 wreck at Talladega parked Kyle Petty for 11 races.

A bad wreck during a 1990 practice at Daytona resulted in a broken leg for Darrell Waltrip. Waltrip actually started the next week, running one lap before getting out of the car, and then sitting out the next six races. The timing couldn't have been worse, either, as the driver was mulling driving for himself next year (which he did).

Before he won the season finale in 2000, Bill Elliott missed two races with a fractured kneecap. He was injured after tripping while carrying a bag of fertilizer. He also missed seven races in 1996 after fracturing his leg.