How do you sum up one of the greatest careers in all of sports history?
One that not only reshaped the way we define a what a driver is but an entire sport.
That’s what Jeff Gordon is to NASCAR and to motorsports history.
In the late 1980’s, NASCAR was a sport trying to make local sports pages on page 8 if at all. Motorsports in American at the time was all about open wheel and not that many people outside of Indy and the deep south cared about motorsports. The sport of NASCAR was dominated by names like Earnhardt, Allison, Elliott, Wallace and Martin just to name a few. They all one thing in common, they were middle aged men that avoided the media. NASCAR was still a sport full of cowboys that most Americans saw as ‘rednecks’ and couldn’t relate. Just like baseball today, NASCAR wasn’t bring in new fans because most kids couldn’t relate. Gordon changed all that.
NASCAR was changing in a big way in 1992, ‘The King’ was retiring and the series was trying to move on. Gordon was racing in what is now the Xfinity series for Bill David Racing in a Ford. Jack Roush called Gordon’s people about the young driver racing for him in cup and it was going to happen until Gordon’s step father, John Bickford, tried to get Gordon’s crew chief at the time to move up with him, a guy by the name of Ray Evernham who Bickford wanted to be part of the deal.
“My drivers don’t get to pick their own crew chiefs,” Roush told Bickford. “I do that.” At that point, Roush changed the course of sports history forever. Bickford said goodbye to Roush and hung up the phone, because it was a package deal. Gordon signed with Hendrick Motorsports and started his first race in Atlanta 1992 during the last race of the season. That race went down as one of the greatest finishes in the championship ever, up until that point at least. Gordon didn’t do great in his first start, finishing 31st that day.
His first full year in cup was a learning year to say the least, a lot of wreaked cars that year but Gordon had a pole and 7 top five finishes that year. What was the problem? Gordon was trying to fit in. He had grown a (bad) mustash in hopes of being one of the good ol’ boys. But it wasn’t working. It was Earnhardt that gave Gordon the nickname ‘Wonder Boy’ and even though Gordon hated the nickname, it stuck. Every 8 year old in the country finally had someone they could relate to. Gordon was a 21 year old rookie trying to make it with the big boys. The sport finally had a way to get new, younger fans to watch. In a sport with grown old men, beer and cigarette sponsors their was finally something different was, in all accounts, an all American without being a cowboy.
In 1994, he got his first of 93 wins at the Coke 600 at Charlotte. a few weeks later, NASCAR went to Indy for the first time, and the kid from down the street won the first brickyard 400. His first 2 wins put him on the map in a big way. His finished 7th in the standings that year to Dale Earnhardt wining his 7th and final title. The next year Gordon won his first title and 7 wins and went on to win 40 races in the next 4 years and 2 more titles. He had done it. He went on a streak that was unheard of in modern sports history. The world was watching and started caring but not just because of what Gordon was doing on track but what he was doing off track as well.
Gordon had started doing interviews that, for the first time in many years, were good. Not just because he knew how to speak but because he was charming, smart, intelligent and most importantly, knew how to sell his sponsors! This was a first in Sports history, a driver that was a sellsman. Sponsors loved him and so did the media. He did talk shows, interviews and commercials that really spoke to people unlike any driver ever had.
Gordon had not only shaped who was watching but who was coming into the sport. Most drivers in the early 90’s had started racing in their 20’s and came into the sport when they where in their 30’s.
Gordon changed all of that.
By the time Gordon had won his third title, most team owners where scouting drivers in their 20s and today, young drivers wanting to have a long driving career start driving by age 5, that’s not a typo, age 5!
In 2001, Gordon had his 4th title and was looking for the next Jeff Gordon and he found it in a young Jimmie Johnson that was trying to knock down the wall in turn 1 at Walktins Glen. Johnson was a young Xfinity series driver that was not setting the racing world on fire but just like Rick Hendrick had done in 1992, Gordon did in 2001 with Johnson. He took a chance on a kid.
Johnson went on to be….Jimmie Johnson, but that’s a story for another day.
Yes, Gordon hasn’t had the on track success in the last 10 years of his career that he had in the first 10 years, but that doesn’t take a thing away from Gordon’s amazing career.
It doesn’t matter what happens today in Homestead in his final start.
If he wins his 5th and final title in his final start or not will not define Jeff Gordon.
Either does his 93 wins, 3 Daytona 500 wins, 5 Brickyard 400 wins, 4 championships, or 13 wins in a single season.
What does define “Wonder Boy” is how he changed auto racing not only in NASCAR but the world in so many ways.
NASCAR will move on after Jeff Gordon but the fans will never forget 24.
#24Ever
