In a year that the sanctioning body was supposed to get back to its roots, it may be time for NASCAR to take an even longer, harder look at itself, #88-Dale Earnhardt, Jr said. Foremost in his mind: the length of the season. “We have saturated the market with race after race after race,” Earnhardt said. “The NFL, they do such a great job. I hate to keep comparing to them and using them as examples, but they do the best job. They give you just enough to keep you wanting more. The season ends before you want it to. You get just enough to get excited and then it’s all over and there’s such a long wait. The model works.” But perhaps Earnhardt’s most pointed comment was a swipe at what could be construed as greed and excess, not only by the sanctioning body, but drivers, team owners and practically everyone associated with the sport. “We’re driven by the ability to go make another dollar and make more money and there’s no way we would ever trim it down,” Earnhardt said with a shrug. “When we were a 28-race schedule, the sport was giving you just enough to get really get excited about the next season. When we were racing at 12 o’clock, people were racing home from church to get to see the start of the race. We’ve just made it too easy and too much. We sort of lost a lot of the substance that we really had before and the character of the sport I think has waned a little bit, but its part of the times, too.” Even though it would mean a significant drop in revenue, Earnhardt would love to see NASCAR scale back. But he isn’t holding his breath it’ll happen any time soon. “No way we would ever trim the schedule back,” he said. “There’s no way we would change what we really already have here.”(Yahoo Sports)(11-1-2008)
