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Did you know that The Marbles has been around since NASCAR’s beginnings? It’s true!* And we’ve just recently come across a treasure trove of old Marbles posts from days gone by! Check out what was being said right here during the greatest moments in NASCAR history, only on Lost Marbles!

Well folks, the 1992 season has come to a close and we’ve got ourselves a changing of the guard, but more on that in a minute. I’m still catching my breath from that epic championship battle.

Bill Elliott just needed to beat Alan Kulwicki by 11 points and the title was his. And all Kulwicki had to do was hold serve, and boy, did he ever.

Yeah, Bill won the race, but thanks to a great move by Alan’s crew chief, Paul Andrews, The Hooters car (in the appropriately named Hooters 500) stayed out a few extra laps before pitting for a gas and go.

Those extra laps were the difference as when Elliott finally passed Kulwicki, he could only lead 102 laps. Alan led 103. That was the 10 point swing.

This was one of the best races in NASCAR history. What a great sport this is, given that the drivers were separated by just a couple of positions going into the final race of a 29 race season. I think we’re going to have some more points races like that, and Alan’s success bodes well for successful drivers owning their own race teams. This could continue to become a trend.

Back to that changing of the guard thing. Yes, this was the last race for the great Richard Petty, the greatest NASCAR driver who will ever live. But Richard got caught up in a wreck and finished 35th. However, he and his crew were able to get back on track for Richard to be running at the finish.

Some people think that this new kid, name of Jeff Gordon, is going to be the next Richard Petty, but I don’t see it. His car control was terrible all day, and he hit the wall and finished 31st. You’ve got to have good car control to succeed in NASCAR, as well as a personality that resonates with the fans, and Gordon’s California attitude and rainbow car and firesuit aren’t something that many fans are going to take a liking to. You heard it here first: this kid’s going to be a giant disappointment.

*-For the irony-challenged: no, it’s not true. This is satire.

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Yes, He With The Chin Hair vs. He With The Muscles is even more obvious than last week’s McMurray-Montoya feud, but that Barbaro has been beaten enough. He’s getting tired.

Instead, let’s talk about Atlanta Motor Speedway, site of He With the Chin Hair’s flip on Sunday.

Why Atlanta? Well, because Atlanta seems to be the odds-on favorite to lose a race date to Kentucky Speedway.

So should Atlanta go on an all-out jihad against Kentucky, finding a way to slip the grease from the Varsity’s grease traps into the water at the Jim Beam distillery in an attempt to sabotage the state’s reputation? (Cue the "does Kentucky have a reputation enough to salvage?" jokes.)

Probably not. Kentucky Speedway is owned by Speedway Motorsports Inc., the same track that owns Atlanta. If NASCAR and Bruton Smith, the chairman of SMI, can get their legal battles smoothed over, Kentucky’s getting a race, and the only way that Kentucky can get a race is if another SMI track sacrifices a race date.

That’s not going to happen at Charlotte, which is NASCAR’s hub, or New Hampshire, which is the only NASCAR presence in the Northeast. And if Bruton even so much as threatened to take away a race date from Bristol — a ridiculously farfetched idea to begin with given the attendance — NASCAR fans would get even more riled up than they do when Junior’s in the lead.

According to various estimates, Atlanta had anywhere from 60,000-70,000 people at Sunday’s race, and the track capacity is roughly 100,000. The logical scenario is to let Atlanta keep the Labor Day weekend date, allowing the Southeast to keep the tradition (I know, I know, it’s not Darlington) and transferring the spring date to Kentucky. Of course, March may be a little chilly that time of year near the Ohio River, but the 2011 schedule isn’t going to look much like the 2010 one.

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Hey, dig this! Dale Earnhardt Jr. is going to be a cartoon on the Handy Manny Show! First announced at the Daytona 500, "Handy Manny Big Race" is now officially on the Disney Channel slate for March 20. 

Now, I don’t know much about Handy Manny — I’m a Spongebob Man myself — but according to the plot summary, Manny and his tools will serve as a pit crew at the Wood Valley 500 race. (Must have been a tough year in Wood Valley; no sponsorship deal.) Okay, so here’s the deal: "Manny and the tools have to help Elliot fix up his used race car in
order to enter the race, and luckily the car turns out better than
expected, but not Elliot! Elliot is too nervous to drive!" (Hey, you would be too, if Carl Edwards was on the track.)

So anyway, enter Junior. "Dale’s character, Chase Davis, must step in to help out and Manny gets
behind the wheel to try to win the race for the entire team." (Hey, why isn’t Dale driving? He’s a NASCAR driver, and … oh. Never mind.)

Anyway, check the show out on March 20th on the Disney Channel. And send us clips. Please.

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So … quiet days in NASCAR these days, huh?

We’ve had the Edwards/Keselowski Atlanta spin, we’ve had Dale Earnhardt Jr. failing to live up to his pole position, we’ve had Jimmie Johnson not winning! And we’ve had plenty of new visitors to our site this week. If you’re one of them, welcome. This is where we hang to talk about anything and everything, NASCAR or not.

Oh, and after reading through the first hundred or so of the thousands of driveby comments, well, I kinda lost it. Not so much "lost it" as decided to offer up a few responses, via Twitter, on the most common quickie comments. Yes, it got fun on Monday night.  (Yes, this is a shameless bid to get you to sign up for Twitter and follow me at @jaybusbee. Trust me, if you like The Marbles, the Twitter feed is like the must-see DVD extras.) Anyway, here’s what I had to say on Twitter Monday night:

Notes for
commenters: 1. Calling it "CRAPCAR" or "NA$CAR" isn’t nearly as funny
as you think it is. 2. Racing was NOT better in… (cont’d)….the "old
days." It wasn’t. Deal with it. 3. If you say you’re giving up on
NASCAR, beat it. Nobody wants to hear your whine. (cont’d) 4.NASCAR IS a
sport. And even if it wasn’t, who cares? Does any other sport have this
many whiners? (Well, Duke hoops, but it’s the team.)

I feel so much better now … though it’s looking like I may need to offer up a sequel after Tuesday’s NASCAR statement on Edwards. Feel free to leave your own rants in the comments below, and we’ll see you back here soon!

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NASCAR has made its ruling: the boys can keep on havin’ at it.

On Tuesday afternoon, NASCAR president Mike Helton announced his decision on punishment for Sunday’s spectacular Carl Edwards/Brad Keselowski wreck: three races probation. No fine, no suspension. 

In the immediate aftermath of the wreck, NASCAR summoned Edwards to the hauler, where they "made it very clear these actions were not acceptable," Helton said. "This did go beyond putting driving in the hands of the drivers." Helton indicated that Edwards understood the severity of his actions. NASCAR plans to hold a sit-down with Edwards, Keselowski and their respective owners, Jack Roush and Roger Penske, to "clear the air" and allow them to get back to "hard, competitive, side-by-side racing."

(On a related note, Helton also questioned why the 12 car took flight at a track like Atlanta, which traditionally doesn’t see the kinds of flying cars that occur at places like Talladega. NASCAR will be investigating how exactly that happened, with the intention of figuring how to prevent it in the future.)

Certainly, this decision won’t sit well with those who feel NASCAR already plays too fast and loose with driver safety. Many fans and media observers wanted Edwards parked for a race or the season, with some going to the absurd lengths like advocating criminal charges.

On the other hand, NASCAR had said that this would be a year in which the gloves would be off and drivers would be permitted to police themselves — "Boys, have at it, and have fun," as NASCAR VP of Competition Robin Pemberton famously put it back in January.

So NASCAR was thus in a bind — do they condone this kind of violent retaliation, or do they drop the hammer and negate the whole "have at it" philosophy? 

The fundamental question in the wreck was whether the punishment should address the intent of the wreck, or the outcome. The intent was obvious; Edwards meant to screw up Keselowski’s day by spinning him and denying him a top-10 finish. It’s the kind of payback that happens all the time. The outcome, of course, was far beyond that, the kind of scary aerial maneuver that can end very, very badly. 

The Edwards/Keselowski feud is now all square. But here’s betting that the next driver to send somebody airborne isn’t going to get off quite so easily.

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This is a severely cringeworthy story that, thankfully, ended up OK, so we can exhale and relax a little with it.

Don’t know about you, but falling down an elevator shaft is one of my phobias. How many times has a door opened and you’ve walked blindly onto an elevator … never knowing when you might be walking off a cliff!

Well, just that scenario happened to F1 legend Sir Stirling Moss this past weekend, though fortunately it wasn’t a cliff, it was an elevator in his three-story home. He broke both ankles and chipped four vertebrae, but is otherwise fine. According to a statement, Moss said his "body still has the same resilience to injury as it did in his racing days."

Speaking of which, let’s check out one of those times, the 1961 Monaco Grand Prix: 

Moss won 16 Grand Prix events and was runner-up for the World Championship four times. Glad he’s OK, and I’m betting he takes the stairs once he’s walking again.

Moss falls down elevator shaft at London home [AP via Yahoo! Sports]

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Interesting piece from David Caraviello of NASCAR.com today on how Jimmie Johnson doesn’t have a nickname:

There’s a Rowdy and a Happy, an Ironman and an Iceman, a Smoke and a
Smokey. There’s a Junebug and a Jaws, a Mayor and a Herman, a Franchise
and a Four-Time and a Sliced Bread. There’s a Front Row Joe and a
Million Dollar Bill, a Gentleman Ned and a Handsome Harry, a Mr.
Excitement and a Cousin Carl. There’s a Cotton and a Buckshot, a
Rocketman and a Fireball. There’s a Big Bud and a Little Bud, a Tiny
and a Red, and of course an Intimidator and a Silver Fox and a King.

And then there’s Jimmie. Plain ol’ Jimmie.

See, I’d disagree. Around here, we’ve thrown out a few nicknames that are ever-so-slowly starting to make their way into the NASCAR mainstream — "Senator" Jeff Burton and "Rawhide" Clint Bowyer, for two. And the commenters at the Marbles have a way of creating their own little unique monikers for their drivers. And Jimmie isn’t exempt. Matter of fact, I discussed this very issue with Jimmie almost two years ago. Here’s what he had to say:

Around here, we try to give drivers new nicknames. What’s the best nickname you’ve ever had?

Jimmie: I’ve been very fortunate to dodge a nickname throughout my entire career. I’ve never had one.

Anybody ever called you Johnny?

Jimmie: No, I’ve not heard that one.

Caraviello suggests "The Foreman." Now, no disrespect to Mr. Caraviello intended, but that’s just a flat-out awful nickname. Here, offhand, are a few that we’ve come up with here in recent months and on Twitter:

• Jimbot (effective, but he ain’t gonna like it)
• Johnny Jimson (funny, but nobody’s gonna get it)
• The Hammer (Hank Aaron would say you can’t touch this)
• Horseshoe (best of the lot)

So here it is. I’m going to start calling him Horseshoe until somebody comes up with something better. Have at it in the comments, folks. 

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NASCAR has taken the reins off its drivers this year, and perhaps as a result we have the first spectacular wreck of the season. As with so many wrecks of the last few months, it involved Brad Keselowski — but the difference this time is, Keselowski was the victim, not the instigator.

Late in the race, Keselowski was powering to a top-10 finish when Carl Edwards, more than a hundred laps down thanks to a Keselowski-caused wreck from earlier in the afternoon, snapped his wheel upward into the No. 12 Dodge, and …

The wreck was ironic, a virtual photo-negative of last year at Talladega when Keselowski spun Edwards and sent the 99 careening into the fence:

This time, there were no fan injuries, and Keselowski himself was fortunately unhurt, if a bit dazed. ("Did I just fly?" he asked his crew chief over the radio. Yes, Brad, yes, you did.)

What this wreck will do is put NASCAR’s new "Boys, have at it" rule to the test. NASCAR immediately black-flagged Edwards and called him to the hauler; there’s been no word as of post time on any penalties. But should there be any? Should Edwards lose points or be fined?

After the race, Edwards came this close to admitting the wreck was intentional: "Brad knows the deal between him and I," he said. "The scary part is that his car went airborne, which was not at all what I [pause] expected." The pause was significant; this is speculation, but Edwards certainly seemed like he wanted to just spin Keselowski, not send him halfway into orbit.

"It could have killed somebody in the grandstands," Keselowski said. "I know that’s a little ironic that it’s got me saying that, but at least I didn’t do it intentionally when it happened. It will be interesting to see how NASCAR reacts to it. They have the ball. If they’re going to allow people to intentionally wreck each other at tracks this fast, we will hurt someone either in the cars or in the grandstands."

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For more daily NASCAR and automotive news throughout the 2010 season, click here to bookmark Yahoo! Sports’ From The Marbles blog and follow us on Twitter.

Related posts on The Marbles:

Tim Tebow’s posse stole Darrell Waltrip’s car! Sort of …
Be a shame if an accident were to befall Jimmie Johnson
Kyle Busch: Not such a bad guy after all, as it turns out

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ATLANTA, GA. — The Marbles is live from Atlanta, and that means we’re going to be bringing you along for all kinds of inside-the-infield action. (Not inside-the-garage. They don’t let us near that place after that incident with the arc welder.*) Anyway, you can follow me on Twitter at @jaybusbee as I give updates from throughout the garage and infield throughout the morning. During the race, I’ll be doing the live chat out on the mothership. But feel free to hang here and chat about whatever comes into your mind in greater detail. Race starts a little after 1 p.m. Eastern, and the pole is held by that fella there at right, Dale something-or-other. Enjoy the race!

*-To my bosses: I’m kidding. I’m not banned. I blamed the "incident" on some ESPN guys.

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As an avid video gamer, I’ve always had to have the latest NASCAR game and I have been terribly disappointed with EA Sports’ next-generation NASCAR titles.

Heck, disappointed may be an understatement. NASCAR 08 and 09 have been so bad that when I need a virtual NASCAR fix, I fire up my old XBox and play NASCAR 07.

EA tried to make the game more realistic, and while they succeeded from a graphics standpoint, driving the car was almost impossible without the right setup and a $100 wheel instead of a controller. And when you did hit the setup correctly, you were competitive when racing online, but if you wanted to race against the computer, you were way too fast.

And let’s face it, we want our NASCAR games to be realistic, but at the same time, a lot of us just want to spend the majority of our time actually, you know, driving the car instead of trying to figure out if another half round on the trackbar is going to keep the car stable on the exit of turn two at Texas Motor Speedway. (Sure, you could use the same general setup at every track on NASCAR 07 and have fun, but at the same time, you couldn’t blow the field away unless you used Tony Stewart-the best driver in the game-and got his adrenaline meter or whatever it was called up to 100%)

So when it was announced that EA wouldn’t be producing another NASCAR game, part of me was disappointed, but at the same time I was ready for someone else to take a swing at it as it couldn’t be too difficult to beat EA, right?

Well, enter Polyphony Digital.

You probably haven’t heard of them, but they’re the creators of Gran Turismo, and according to that blog post and accompanying video, it looks like the long-awaited Gran Turismo 5 will have a Sprint Cup simulation and if the video and past Gran Turismos are any indication, it could be fantastic:

However, the market will be a little limited as Sony produces Gran Turismo, so it will only be available on the PlayStation 3. I’ve been a lifelong Xbox loyalist, but when Gran Turismo 5 finally comes out, I’m probably going to get a PlayStation 3. If nothing else, it’ll make a great Blu-Ray player.

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