Brad Keselowski is exactly what NASCAR needs right now
TALLADEGA, Ala. - Brad Keselowski is exactly what NASCAR needs right now.
You will have a reaction to that statement. You will either nod in agreement or spit in disgust, and both reactions prove the same point. For every complaint about NASCAR — the drivers have no personality, the races are too boring, the rules are too confusing — Keselowski is your answer. You don't have to like him, but you have to respect him. You have to pay attention to him, and how many drivers can claim that?
Take, for instance, Sunday's race at Talladega. Fans love this race, but the guys who strap themselves into the cars absolutely loathe it. There's no rhyme nor reason to why things happen the way they do here, no one strategy that you can guarantee will even put you in position to win, to say nothing of taking the checkered flag.
Yet here was Keselowski, needing a victory to move on in this year's Chase for the Sprint Cup, a victory to keep a five-win season from being nothing but a year of failed potential. He'd won here twice before, and both times he did what was thought impossible: in 2009, he outdueled veteran Carl Edwards, leaving Edwards pinwheeling into the fence behind him, and in 2012, he beat Kyle Busch head-to-head at a time when no one thought a lone driver could outrun a pack.
On Sunday, he faced equally long odds, and yet he played the race like a chess match, working his way into position and using help from unexpected quarters to win on a day with absolutely no margin for error.
That's the thing about Keselowski. He's doing what certain other drivers — you know their names — used to do: he'll beat you, he'll piss you off, then he'll beat you again.
He's driven Matt Kenseth, the guy who makes Eeyore look twitchy, into a fighting rage. He's gotten Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson and Tony Stewart, former champions all, mad enough to break out the disapproving language ... or, in Stewart's case, the disapproving rear bumper. And the story of his ongoing relationship with Denny Hamlin runs like an "Itchy and Scratchy" cartoon.
Over the last four seasons, his 14 wins are second only to Johnson's 16. But while Johnson is measured, always saying the right thing at the right time, Keselowski talks like he's pulling in hot to a greased pit stall ... he makes his point, but every once in awhile he'll slide right on past it and get himself into trouble.
Depending on your perspective, he's either aggravating or exhilarating, a savior or a sonofabitch. But no matter what, you can't ignore him. He's responsible for two of the greatest NASCAR TV moments of recent years: his exuberant Miller Lite-fueled championship interview at Homestead in 2012, and his WWE-style throwdown with Kenseth last week at Charlotte. For a sport teetering on relegation to niche status, that's the kind of publicity a hundred sponsors can't buy.
But a driver who's nothing more than a walking promo doesn't last long. Keselowski also owns six victories this year, and can lay claim to one of the finest on-track moves of this generation, if not ever: his daring pass of Kevin Harvick at Chicago this year to start the Chase. That was the kind of all-or-nothing, old-school, mash-it-and-go kind of move that Earnhardt, Petty, or Pearson would have admired had he done it to them ... and then they'd do their best to rattle his cage next time around.
Keselowski might ride the momentum of this victory straight on through to a second championship at Homestead, or he may find himself once again on the outs in just three weeks. Either way, he'll be one to watch all the way until his season's done ... and that's exactly the kind of must-see driver NASCAR needs right now.
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Jay Busbee is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Contact him at jay.busbee@yahoo.com or find him on Twitter.
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