It was February of this racing season when
The Daly Planet published the first column about the performance of the NASCAR TV partners. This was the first year of a new NASCAR TV contract that welcomed ESPN back to the fold, and moved NBC Sports back to the stick-and-ball world.
Now, we find ourselves with only one more opportunity to watch a weekend trio of NASCAR races in 2008. Somehow, there has to be a way to communicate to the TV networks involved exactly what the millions of fans nationwide expect to see. So, NASCAR fans, its time to make your demands.
You have braved some absolutely awful television this season to continue to this point. NASCAR announcers who had never been to a NASCAR race, ending four hour races by showing only the winning car and of course...Draft Tracker.
This experience of watching every race since February has empowered you to be the best judge of what the TV networks should show this weekend in Homestead. You have written your thoughts about the races, what you wanted to see in the pre-race shows and how much post-race activity should be on TV.
You have listened to various talking heads tell you about the racing action, the cars on pit road, the gossip in the garage, and the NASCAR news. They have hosted you, analyzed you, and told you their opinions....endlessly.
Who are the people that you want to hear from in these Homestead broadcasts? Which announcers from the three races do you trust and which ones have you learned to take with a grain of salt at tough as the COT splitter?
No one paid a lot of attention to this little site when we first started. But, that changed for one reason and one reason only. That reason was you. The NASCAR media laughed at us, the ESPN guys got angry, and my former friends in the TV business thought I was absolutely crazy.
But, one group did not laugh. It was you, the NASCAR fans. You kept showing up, kept reading my columns, and kept coming back and adding your opinions. The best part was, you told me that if I kept going you would keep coming back. And, you did.
Now, we can look back on hundreds of columns, thousands of comments, and hundreds of thousands of users who viewed this site since February. We can also look back on the one thing we both wanted to do this season. We made them pay attention.
Now, I get all the ESPN press releases and they respond to my emails inside of an hour. Now, the SPEED PR folks email me almost every day and tell me what is going-on in their world. Now, I get emails from journalists all over the country telling me that they like this site. Then, they tell me that they use your comments to create and reference their story material.
We have a high-school teacher who uses your comments as topics for his TV classes. We even have young TV announcers who read your comments as tips on what to do as they chase their dreams of being in the big time.
The best part is the quiet emails with the hotmail addresses that tell me things that stop me in my tracks.
The Daly Planet is on the laptop computers of the reporters in the Infield Media Center at Charlotte...Texas...Daytona.
The Daly Planet is on the laptop computers in the ESPN office trailer inside the TV compound in California...Kansas.
The best one of the season was from a certain driver of a certain car who told me he was feeling down and then he found this site and spent all night reading your comments. Now, things have changed for the better for him. Just maybe, your comments helped him understand that there were people who wanted the racing back and the hype and "TV junk" gone forever. You might already own his souvenirs.
So, here we are at the end of the line. SPEED is about to roll-out their final Truck Series race under the lights on Friday night. What do you want to see them do? ESPN is going to present the struggling Busch Series on Saturday. What can they do to bring you back when Nationwide steps into the sport?
Finally, the first season of ESPN on ABC concludes their NASCAR coverage with the final race in the Chase for the Championship. You talked about the announcers, talked about the music videos, talked about the pit reporters, the updates and the countless other "things" you dealt with this season.
Now, take a minute on this Friday to tell them very clearly and squarely what you want and do not want to see in this critical final broadcast. This power is the result of your relentless energy in expressing your love for this sport. You ideas aimed to make this sport better, to build for the future, and to cherish the past.
We invite you one last time to leave a comment that will be read by the networks, the reporters, and your fellow fans. Tell us what you want this weekend, what will leave you happy, and what you will not tolerate the networks missing. Let it fly... because you earned it.
The Daly Planet welcomes all comments. Simply click on the COMMENTS button below and follow the instructions. There is nothing to join, and we do not want your email address. We just want your opinion. This would be a good time to take a moment and leave us a comment.
