There are a lot of teams in the Nextel Cup Series that have struggled on the high-banked speedways this season. Count Elliott Sadler`s No. 38 Ford as one of the best examples.

Sadler`s outfit has been competitive on restrictor-plate tracks and short tracks, but on the 1.5-mile tracks, the team has merely struggled to stay on the lead lap.
Crew chief Tommy Baldwin says the team`s downforce struggles is the main reason they sit 19th in points, well shy of a spot in the Chase for the Nextel Cup.

"Our major concern is this upcoming weekend at Chicago. That is where we have our problems, those types of tracks," Baldwin said. "We have a brand-new car and a brand-new body. We are going to be much better in those types of racetracks than we have all year."

Sadler`s best finish on a high-banked downforce track is 14th, which came at Las Vegas.

Things grew especially bad for Sadler in May. He fell off the lead lap almost immediately at Darlington and followed that up with a 30th-place finish at Charlotte.

The poor speedway runs completely erased the gains Sadler had made during the three short-track races, when he was consistently in the top 10.

"It got bad, you get frustrated," Baldwin said. "We have got to get a good piece. Elliott is only as good as the piece you provide him and we have not been giving him good pieces. It hasn`t been for a lack of effort. We have all our tools in place and we are going to move forward."

One of the team`s lone bright spots this season has been its restrictor-plate cars. Sadler was fourth in the Daytona 500 and sat on the pole at Talladega, and he wound up sixth in Saturday night`s Pepsi 400.

Baldwin employed a three-stop strategy to steal an eighth-place finish at Sonoma the week before, so his sixth at Daytona gave him back-to-back top-10s for the first time all year.

"We needed this at our company," Sadler said. "I`m proud of my guys and how hard they worked. This is a great finish for us.

"They gave me a car capable of winning, we just made a few mistakes here and there, but [sixth] is great for this team right now."Daytona never ceases to bring several questions to the table

All NASCAR fans had a couple of days to think about how they would change the Chase for the Nextel Cup when Brian France made his non-announcement announcement Thursday that they would change the Chase for the Nextel Cup somehow for next season.

In my world, the best playoff scenarios are the easiest ones, specifically the NFL`s and March Madness. If you win, you advance and if you lose, you go home. It doesn`t get any simpler. Is it any coincidence that they`re the most popular?

It`s also one of the reasons that the World Cup doesn`t translate well in America. For the life of me, I couldn`t get my head around how despite not scoring a single goal on its own, the U.S. just missed making the second round. It sounded like one of those ridiculous youth leagues I`ve been reading about where they don`t keep score. Hopefully one day I`ll get to write a column about that.

Anyway, here`s my idea. Fire up your inboxes now:

The regular season becomes 32 races long. After that, the top 10 drivers advance -- no 300, 400 or 2,000 point window. If you don`t make it, you don`t make it. Too bad, so sad.

The Chase begins the last week of October -- after baseball is over -- at Richmond, a short track. From there, we go to Talladega, a restrictor-plate track, the road-course at Sonoma and finish up at the 1.5-mile track in Vegas.

One of each, with the added bonus of a Las Vegas finale and the wonderful stories that would come with it.

As far as points go, again, simplicity is key. All drivers not in the Chase would work on the same point system as the regular year. For the Chase guys, it boils down to this: The Chase driver with the highest finish gets 10 points, the second-place Chase guy gets nine, and so on down the line. There`s no bonus for leading laps. This would eliminate the ridiculous practice of teammates letting each other lead laps. It`s all about where you finish.

Drivers would start the Chase with one race worth of Chase points according to position. In other words, the man leading the points when the Chase starts would have 10, second-place nine and so on.

The easy point totals also allow fans to easily keep track of what their driver needs to do to win, plus it allows the play-by-play guy to say, "We have six drivers separated by eight points! This rocks! Now down to Matt Yocum."

Just a thought.

...why bother printing a race start time?

This has become sort of a running joke in the office. Play along at home.

Each week, when we build that little schedule on the homepage -- usually on Tuesdays -- everyone in the editorial department takes a look at the scheduled start time for the race. After a good, hearty chuckle, we begin to take bets on what time the race will actually begin.

Price Is Right rules -- closest without going over.

This weekend was particularly laughable. The scheduled time was 7:55 p.m. ET. As the clock struck 7:55, we hadn`t even had the command to start engines.

The ol` $1 bid won`t work here.

Note to tracks and television networks: Whether it`s for business or pleasure, no one likes to have their time wasted.

...did Steve Byrnes really call Dale Earnhardt Jr. a "humble dude"?

The answer is yes. The true comedy here is the use of the word, "dude." Junior seems humble enough. I think it might have been the first time Byrnes had ever said "dude" because his voice nervously got lower as he was saying it, kind of like the first time you ask someone to dance in middle school.

As if that wasn`t awkward enough, Byrnes followed it up with, "good luck, man."

I think he might have been trying to get an invite to the next Dale Earnhardt Jr. victory party. I also don`t think it worked.

...if Boris Said needs more money for his race team, why not sell "Said head" wigs at the racetrack?

These would sell like hotcakes. It would be kind of like the late 90s in the WWE -- or it might have been ECW -- when a wrestler named Al Snow would come to the ring with a mannequin head.

You see, he was crazy.

Anyway, they started selling plastic mannequin heads at the concession stands. One night, all you saw in the audience were people waving these plastic mannequin heads. After Snow had won his match, fans threw them all in the ring. It looked like a snowstorm.

Ah, good times.

...is Entourage the best show on TV?

Yes -- and HBO should have some sort of recourse against FOX for that ridiculous open from Saturday night`s race, like Jeremy Piven should get a free shot on Jeff Hammond, or something.

...is it sad that we won`t hear "Boogity, Boogity, Boogity" again until February?

Uh, no.

By the way, did you hear D.W. ask if that beach ball that found its way on the track had that ridiculous saying on it? How many sneakers went through TVs at that moment?

At least one.

Tags: daytona-beach, sadler, baldwin, nextel,