Bayne deserved better at Roush

 You can sit and argue this with me until you are blue in the face and I am too, I have followed the working surroundings of Roush since the day this team was formed in 1988.  The fact is, Jack Roush has always had a surrounding piece where one car runs better than the other.  It was that way in his sports car operation, it moved through his stock car shop when they went to two cars in 1992 and it has always remained that way. 

The jest of this comes from a decision made last week to take Trevor Bayne out of the 6 for a majority of the races and part him with Matt Kenseth for the races that appears his sponsorship AdvoCare isn't on the car.  Let us just sit here an analyze a few things for a minute to get a better apprehension of what I am saying when I mean Bayne deserved better with this company.

April 27, 2018 -  Trevor Bayne stands at Talladega during
qualifying
Source: Josh Hedges/Getty Images North America

1.  No Driver Deserves to Find Out from Family - Jack Roush let this out on SiriusXM that Bayne found out through a family member that this deal was going down last Monday night.  In no way shape or form should a driver have to find out from a family member that this is happening, and nor should a family member find out before the driver what is going on.  To me that showed the first true sign of Roush's true colors right there, and while they made a statement that they planned to take a flight to Knoxville and tell Trevor, I don't buy it one bit at all. 

2.  Jack Roush and Mark Martin set the deal up almost a month and half ago - If you listen to Mark Martin on several podcast he made the statement that Roush asked to call Matt Kenseth over a month ago and did so and got the ball rolling to get him back into a race car for the company.  So that left ample opportunity for them to notify Bayne of what was going on.  I believe that Roush and Martin played the biggest part in this deal and if you go back to when Martin says he made the first call to Kenseth, that's when the performance truly started to fall off the map of the 6 car totally.  I feel that Martin and Kenseth have more into the deal than what is being led to believe after you hear Matt Kenseth say he wants to have more of a role after he is done driving. 

3.  Stenhouse gets 4 crew chiefs since going full-time, Bayne two?  - Yeah, you read that right.  Ricky Stenhouse Jr., went through three crew chiefs before Brian Pattie was able to help him win two races last year.  Trevor Bayne has worked with Bob Osborne and Matt Puccia, and they have not been the pick of the litter in my opinion when it comes to making decisions on changes with the race car during the races.  You can't just make a simple air pressure adjustment and expect a car that is handling so negatively to go back to the positive.  I think that this is one of those moves that shows a motive of how Jack Roush either loves you or he hates you, and it's been that way since this company started. 

A crew chief is the leader of the team and Puccia has not been able to get the results, even with veteran Greg Biffle when he was his crew chief on the 16 car.  The basis is, the crew chief needs to be able to listen to the driver and make sure he pulls the right changes from the engineer.  But where I am getting at, when one driver goes through 4 crew chiefs and the other has gotten two and he's the one getting replaced, something just isn't right with this picture. 

Conclusion - I believe this company has been a let down to Trevor Bayne since he came here.  Bayne has been loyal, he's never thrown anyone under the bus, while I do feel there's been times he should have thrown the whole organization under but that is not his style.  Many fans didn't like how Trevor handled the situation with the media last week, I was proud of him.  He was at the toughest track on the schedule and he wanted to focus.  Then after being wrecked, he thanked AdvoCare and the people that supported him through this tough time, not one mention of Roush.  I was proud of how he handled that situation.  He didn't need to thank the team that had just pretty much handed him his pink slip and put someone else in his ride for a majority of his races. 

It's time Trevor Bayne goes in a different direction

Michael McDowell, driver of the #34 K-LOVE RADIO Ford, and Trevor Bayne, driver of the #6 AdvoCare Ford, speak during practice for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Toyota Owners 400 at Richmond Raceway on April 20, 2018 in Richmond, Virginia. (April 19, 2018 - Source: Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images North America)

I have been sitting here with my blood pressure rising everyday since this news broke about Matt Kenseth coming back and pretty much taking over the 6 car except for the races that AdvoCare is going to be on the car.  There is something that sits on your mind a lot when ill-minded decisions are made by an organization that you have been a fan of and even been a part of since 1988. 

I have listened to Jack Roush, Steve Newmark, Mark Martin and Matt Kenseth and heard so much the past couple days that I'd really say something to either one of them if I got around them this week, let's first discuss Mark Martin and Jack Roush.  They have a history together of course and according to Martin, the owner called him almost a month ago to call Kenseth and try and get him back into a car.  Kenseth agreed to come back.  So lets use our heads here and mark it here.  One month ago this move was made and lets look at how Bayne has been performing since then. 

A month ago would have been Martinsville.  His best finish is 12th at Texas, he has not qualified better than 13th and that was in the same race. I listen to the scanner every week and there's nothing but disappointment when I hear how Matt Puccia handles things with changes to the car.  The team has showed up to the track with mediocre race cars, plain and simple, and they cannot improve.  Alright now lets fast forward to two races ago at Bristol.

I was listening to the radio and I hear a voice from the past and I hear Jason mentioned.  I knew it was Jason Hedlesky, who used to spot for Carl Edwards and was Kenseth's spotter the last year at JGR.  Now I knew something was going on and it was fishy.

So I listened to Jack Roush and Tommy Wheeler last night on SiriusXM and they made this claim that that it was true that Trevor knew nothing about the situation until a family member called him and alerted him of the rumors.  To me that is where this whole piece of the puzzle is the biggest mess I've ever heard.  You do not do this to a guy that has been loyal to you and especially nine races into the year.  This was a clear cut move to get Bayne out. 

The one person in the media that seems to really be able to see this is Dale Earnhardt Jr., and he made a comment that it was that time where Trevor needs to keep his contacts (sponsors/Advocare) close and find a team that he feels that he can perform well and win with.  It was time to get away from Roush Fenway Racing and I agree with him. 

He needs to do exactly as Earnhardt said and rebuild his reputation because this company is a major reason why his reputation is hurt.  I think the one thing that he does have is a sponsor that truly believes in him and they like him for who he is. Fans keep bringing up his multiple sclerosis that he was diagnosed with in 2011 after winning the Daytona 500 with the Wood Brothers.  The fact is Trevor Bayne has not had a flare from MS since he was first diagnosed.  I believe that fans need to realize this had nothing to do with his health, this was a move by Roush and it is to phase him out of this company.

It is time for that change to come, whether it be moving to a top-tier Xfinity team or another cup team and get his career back on track.  I think he will handle this professionally and eventually he will get a better opportunity than what he has at Roush Fenway Racing.

Daytona 500 will mark 7 years

When Trevor Bayne first came into the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series it was suppose to be in development role with the Wood Brothers in 2011.  After starting one race at Texas Motor Speedway in 2010 and finishing in the top-10 the Wood Brothers and then affiliate Roush Fenway Racing decided to put Bayne behind the wheel of the legendary No. 21 Ford Fusion for a part-time schedule.

No one expected the outcome that would come in just Trevor Bayne's second career start that would be the 2011 Daytona 500.  Bayne started his weekend off being one of the fastest cars on the track and qualifying third on February 20th behind the Hendrick Motorsports duo of Dale Earnhardt Jr and Jeff Gordon.  On Thursday afternoon he showed some strength drafting with Jeff Gordon but finished 19th in the second duel. 

The final restart of the race

During the race, Bayne was a strong contender throughout the event drafting with strong contenders Jeff Gordon until he was taken out of the event and David Ragan until he was black flagged for moving over to soon on a late restart that put Bayne in front of the field after a lap 202 green-white-checkered restart.  Many thought Bayne was a sitting duck on the final restart with veteran driver Bobby Labonte behind him and veterans Tony Stewart and Mark Martin lined up together.  However, Bayne's Ford was able to stay out in front with a push from Labonte and when a hard charge from Carl Edwards came Bayne moved down to slow the progress of the No. 99.  Bayne would cross the line as the youngest winner of the Daytona 500 at 20 years and 1 day old. 

"I keep thinking I'm dreaming.  Our first 500 -- are you kidding me?" Bayne said "To win our first win our second ever cup race, I mean this is just incredible.  Wow, this is unbelievable.  How cool is it to see the Wood Brothers back in victory lane?  It's crazy to get my first win before a Nationwide win, I didn't know how to get to victory lane!"

It has now been seven years since Bayne won the Great American race in his second career start and he is still with Roush Fenway Racing driving the No. 6 Ford Fusion and will go for his second 500 victory this coming weekend in the 60th Daytona 500 at DIS. 

Bayne "Back in Black" for 2018 with AdvoCare

You can hear AC/DC "Back in Black" when you look at the new No. 6 AdvoCare Ford Fusion for 2018 when the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series returns to the track at Daytona in February. 

This will mark the first time since 2006, when Roush Fenway Racing patriarch Mark Martin ran a black AAA Ford in his final race behind the wheel of the No. 6 Fusion.   Martin ran a black paint scheme with white numbers, while Bayne's number will remain the AdvoCare red. 

"This new paint scheme is pretty awesome," Trevor Bayne said.  "If you look through history a lot of the great drivers have driven black race cars as their primary scheme and I am pretty excited to have one as well going into 2018.  I think that this new look by AdvoCare is really great and shows that we mean business every time we head out onto the race track. 

"This scheme just makes me even more excited about getting back behind the wheel in 2018.  It is really cool to have the No. 6 Ford black again for Roush Fenway.  I know that Mark ran really well in these colors and hopefully we can replicate that same success next season."

Next year will be Bayne's fourth year behind the wheel of the No. 6 Ford, each year he has been able to make improvements on his statistics from the following year. 

Roush Fenway needs to go back to its roots

Burton(left) and Martin share a conversation
during the 2001 season

Racing has certainly changed in the last 18 years, however, success can certainly be something that burns a company when they aren't keeping themselves up.  Jack Roush has been around since 1988 and his Hall of Fame driver of the past Mark Martin and another driver shared something in the late 90s and early 2000s that helped provide the company with one of the strongest working cores in the sport but once Martin and teammate Jeff Burton were gone the working core at RFR was gone.

Back then the two believed in helping one another -- even if -- it meant in return the other driver would run better than the other.  Back then Martin and Burton was part of Roush's five car operation, however, they were housed in the same shop together. I do not see that these days with this organization.  Since these two drivers parted ways with Roush it went to "I have to beat my teammate system."  Martin and Burton had a system where all come together to make the organization better and that is what needs to happen with Trevor Bayne and Ricky Stenhouse Jr., even if Stenhouse is racing for playoff positions. 

The organization has to have two drivers willing to work with one another and two crew chiefs that

Bayne and Stenhouse need more of a working bond in the
Roush Fenway shop

have that same attitude.  I believe back in the day Jimmy Fennig and Buddy Parrott shared that same idea and the cars and success reflected it on the race track.  There has to be that will to want to be a successful pair of teammates in this sport.  Martin and Burton knew what it took to make that happen, so if there are notes that were left behind by these two drivers Roush's current drivers need to take a look at them and see how being a working pair in the garage can win you races. 

People speculated in 1998 that Martin was given better race cars than Burton, however, the teams kept working together to find more speed and were solid contenders all the way around .  I think that there is a missing piece at Roush Fenway Racing right now that they need to find to bring back some of their driver chemistry that they had in the late 90s with Martin/Burton and get the cars back up front.

Bayne is currently 21st in the standings and you can tell the 6 team is not getting the same equipment as the 17 throughout the playoff run.  It is just a disappointment to see the cars perform this terrible and know there are ways to get more out of a team and know that the team is missing that little tiny piece of the puzzle.

Stenhouse playoff run maybe good for RFR but has another effect on Bayne

While it is good for Roush Fenway to get into the playoffs, their moves to make sure Ricky Stenhouse moves forward has a totally different effect on Trevor Bayne and his season. 

Trevor Bayne and his team are struggling through the run of
playoffs as the focus is on teammate Ricky Stenhouse Jr

You can argue that it is the Ford issue, the crew chief issue but fact is, right now Bayne and his No. 6 team are pretty much lab mice for the 17 team until they fall out.  The money is flowing into the 17 team and here is the major down fall that is having on Bayne and his team.  The sponsorship dollars that are suppose to be going into Bayne's car probably are going to Stenhouse to try and make it further and fans can clearly see it. 

As a former crew member I would have took it as a slap in the face if I was the 17  crew that got Stenhouse into the playoffs and then told I was being swapped to the 6 team because they were faster.  They got Stenhouse there, they should have had the chance to get him to the finish line.  I heard at the beginning of this year that the cars would be built equally and there would be only several differences in case one car was faster than the other, yet I just don't see that right now. 

Performance is an issue, plain and simple and you need both cars performing at their maximum and with the organization flushing it to the 17 team to try and move forward it is truly a bitter time.  I never seen this happen when Mark Martin and Jeff Burton were teammates, the two worked together to make sure each other performed as well as the other.  It was a partnership in the garage when these two were teammates.  Since then Roush Fenway Racing has turned into more of a competition between its teammates than a working partnership.

These finishes are not good on attracting sponsors that the 6 team needs for next season either.  It still remains to be seen how many races that they have left this season where the car will carry that dreaded 401k sponsorship from Ford and Roush Performance.  The fact of the matter is Bayne carried the team with full sponsorship for two seasons and AdvoCare backed off after last year to a part-time sponsorship but remained the major sponsor on the car.   Liberty National Life stepped up as well this season, along with Performance Plus Motor Oil, however,  you've still got to put money into a car that the sponsorship provides and make sure they perform to its fullest and right now its clear RFR isn't with the 6 team. 

This season seven races have gone with those 401K sponsors as we used to call them at the shop when I worked.  So that's a lot of money that needs to be found and RFR is hurting the 6 team by hindering their performance during the 17 team's Playoff run.

Now it's time for NASCAR to take it all away for cheating race teams

It is clear that NASCAR isn't getting the attention of teams like Joe Gibbs Racing who like to twist the rules quite often in the sport with the penalties that they are handing out right now.  So in my opinion it is time to do something even harsher to the teams that break the rules. 

I was a crew member in both local and NASCAR competition so I know that teams like to bend the rule book to get every little inch that they can.  However, when I look at the result of this past weekend when Denny Hamlin's two teams were penalized for the same exact issue in the two NASCAR divisions it is time to go with a heftier penalty than encumbering the finish, suspending the crew chief and taking points away as NASCAR did. 

NASCAR needs to think now about suspending the entire team for a race or two.  That meaning if you have a penalty such as this you can't race for an entire weekend, driver, crew chief, everyone, the entire team is suspended along with the car and the win needs to be completely stripped away and given to the next car in line that passes inspection.  Also fans need to understand that NASCAR can't do a complete inspection at the race track and find what they did on Hamlin's car at the track, a lot of it has to be done in the R&D Center at North Carolina. 

It is time that if you illegal to disqualify people and take the wins away and give the victory to the guy that truly deserved to win the win race.  I think there doesn't need to be any of this stuff about  "encumbering a finish," just truly take the finish away and send the guy back to dead last in the running order of the race like many of short track divisions would do in an event.  Also I think it is time NASCAR takes the top-5 cars from each divisions to R&D each week because who is to say one of the top-5 cars isn't illegal either?  It is just time for much harsher penalties.

I believe this past weekend Hamlin tried to hide something when he backed the car into the wall and did his burnout.  So it is time NASCAR looks at a different penalty system.