"What's your poison?"

Smoke and Noise #9

A Racetime.com Column by Someone Formerly Known as TFS...

Smoke and Noise is out of retirement for the weekend to sift through the smoke and BS around this weekend's SX showdown in Vegas...

The View from 10,000 Feet....

A great showdown is about to happen in Vegas. Stewart leads going into the last round, and Reed, after a very respectable season, is right in the hunt. There is plenty of controversy.

There is a second story going on, about who will race the nats this summer, and fallout from behind the scenes is poisoning the debate and making it personal, which is unfair to both Stewart and his team manager Larry Brooks. Unfortunately, this is not just typical, it's tradition. It's happened before, and it's happening again.

If you read the moto boards and opinion sources, you would think that all of a sudden, the sport's problems could be narrowed down to one person-Larry! Sure, some recent fussing may have started with what Larry said, or didn't say, but it's gotten completely out of hand, and it was even coming from press at Vegas. "Where is Stewart? He's not here, he sure is disappointing people. Damn that Larry. Why didn't he fire KC? What kind of a manager would taint his rider's title...?"

The teams PR manager responded quickly with a note that reminded media that Stewart's avoidance of the traditional press day was communicated in advance, it was a management decision, and it left a contact number for media, so there was no reason to play this up.

But, it spllls back out to the moto boards the way media spins it, and off we go. The problem is really just Larry.

Just like it was a couple years ago when he was starting out his SX only team with Reed and Ramsey, and Reed was an asshole too. WTF?

The "Bad for the Sport" Test..

Ask yourself what if it were James that were near a decision to change his mind on the summer? You wouldn't be hearing the "poison the well" talk from press and it wouldn't be encouraged on the boards. You would be hearing different, nicer stories and "leave that negativity alone, it's bad for the sport."

It's too bad the sport can't grow up a little bit and stop seeing it's problems in terms of who the dickhead of the week is.

This is dumb because look what happens in a season or two. Now that Chad's flirting with the idea of racing, the previous dickhead has to be rehabilitated and made a bad-ass, and a new dickhead invented.

Larry has to get 2 rounds of it because he's the SX only manager again, and we all know what dickheads they are, huh?

Larry and James deserve a lot more dignity and respect than they are getting. The sport is poisoning itself.