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Why Did 1990's NASCAR Fans Leave The Sport? · Kenny Wallace Media

• 0:00
  What's up everybody? Charlie Marlow here want to jump
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  into this debate about NASCAR and losing fans from the 1990s
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  that never came back. So basically, Kyle Busch brought
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  this up last weekend. A lot of people are talking
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  about it. You have the die hard fans of
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  NASCAR, of the Jeff Gordon, Dale Earnhardt, Rusty Wallace, Terry
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  Labonte, Mark Martin, Harry Gant, you name it.
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  Guys from the 90s, mid 90s, late 90s, all of that and our world
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  now today of the 2024 is a lot different fan base of following
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  along. We, I don't feel like we were
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  able to transition a lot of the fans that were fans of those
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  drivers, of the names that I just mentioned into a William
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  Byron fan or into a Kyle fan or into whoever, you know, they
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  kind of probably went away. And I think there's a lot of
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  truth to that. And growing up in Toledo, OH,
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  where I did and I wasn't a NASCAR fan, I think I can speak
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  to to why NASCAR lost a lot of the casual fans.
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  So growing up, my birthday's May 28th, so to me, racing was
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  always Indy 500, right? I'd heard of the Andretti's and
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  Fittipaldi's and AJ Foyd and all that.
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  Didn't know hardly anything about NASCAR, but I do remember
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  early 90s and we were into baseball cards.
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  My dad collected some stuff. I remember the Richard Petty
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  collectible pop bottles or soda, whatever you call it.
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  Glass bottles. I think it was Pepsi.
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  Could be Coke, I'm not sure. But I remember the King.
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  They had the collectible bottles, however many it was.
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  And I'd heard of Dale Earnhardt in the 90s.
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  I'd heard of Rusty Wallace and Jeff Gordon comes on the scene
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  and he had the the Rainbow Warrior car.
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  And he was young and then he had the Pepsi commercials as well.
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  And I think I think this is NASCAR's big problem now is the
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  marketability back then of those guys.
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  They were able to attract the casual fans and you can you can
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  basically talk about Dale Junior then where look this is probably
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  more late 90s early 2000s but Dale Dale Earnhardt Junior, I
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  remember from MTV Cribs and and Budweiser and Dale Earnhardt
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  Junior doing commercials as well and that's where I I don't think
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  NASCAR nowadays they don't have any drivers.
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  I don't want to say that don't have that marketability but the
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  sponsors aren't doing it and the guys aren't out there now.
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  I think they have really good personalities.
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  I I've said all the time, Denny Hamlin, like him or not, is a
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  great personality. And even if he's the villain, he
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  is a great personality. He's funny, he's interesting.
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  Kyle Busch also, who obviously used to be the villain, I feel
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  like now he's the good guy, great personality, funny.
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  Every time he does a media availability, there's something
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  funny in there, there's something interesting.
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  But if you go from basically all those iconic drivers that I
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  mentioned and then go through kind of the 2000s, to me there
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  wasn't anybody that that really grabbed you besides Dale
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  Earnhardt Junior, even even Jimmie Johnson, seven time
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  champion. And I worked in sports my whole
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  life. I worked in sports for 20 years.
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  I'm trying to think if I didn't work in sports would I have
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  known of Jimmie Johnson and and I'm just saying, look, his his
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  profile, his Q rating was not that of Jeff Gordon who was his
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  teammate who had the four championships but wasn't as
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  successful. To me, Jeff Gordon, it was about
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  like he was in the Nelly song. Remember Jeff Gordon with the
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  was it white s s with the navigation And I think look, you
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  might laugh at that, but stuff like that matters and being in
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  commercials and being in songs and all that.
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  And that's why those guys, the Earnhardt's, the Petty's, Rusty
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  Wallace. There was more of a folksy
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  nature back then. Those guys were heroes.
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  They were icons. And so let's think again about
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  that. Dale Earnhardt junior.
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  Jimmie Johnson era. Dale Earnhardt junior.
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  He was the guy, even though he never won a championship, but
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  like Carl Edwards to me was always really interesting.
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  And what's the big part of that, though?
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  The flip Carl Edwards could bring in the casual fan?
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  That's, you might say it doesn't matter.
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  Stuff like that matters. Look, I live in St.
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  Louis, MO. A big reason people know Ozzie
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  Smith. Ozzie Smith was a great baseball
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  player, great shortstop, great defensive player.
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  But that flip, that flip is memorable.
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  When Carl would win a race, he would do the flip.
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  It also didn't hurt what wasn't. Wasn't he on the cover of Men's
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  Health or something like that? One of those magazines with his
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  shirt off? Stuff like that attracts casual
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  fans and for that one probably a bunch of women that weren't
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  maybe into the sport. So that 2000s era to me, and
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  This is why I think Kyle Busch is is spot on.
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  You had all those iconic drivers that kind of all retired around
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  the same time and then you had that era of of Tony Stewart was
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  obviously really good and and really popular but still he
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  didn't. He didn't have the same the same
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  kind of flair of the guys like the Earnhardt's and the and the
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  Jeff Gordon's of the world And then so the drivers now look
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  Joey Logano is a great driver but I don't I don't think Joey
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  Logano and guys these days, Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch.
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  They just, they don't they don't seem to have the same type of
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  iconic stature as those guys from the Seventies, 80s and 90s.
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  What do you think? Even though, look, Logano, Kyle
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  Busch, Kyle Larson, you can make the case that those guys are
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  just as good or better than a lot of the other names that I
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  mentioned. But I'm just talking about from
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  a from a marketing standpoint, they don't have the same juice.
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  And I think about this sometimes when we post our videos with
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  Kenny, and to me, it's about you got to be funny, you got to be a
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  storyteller, you got to be interesting.
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  You know, we did some interviews with with Ryan Blaney and
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  William Byron, two of the biggest names in the sport,
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  young guys up and coming guys, and those interviews didn't
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  really do well. And there's nothing, nothing
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  against those guys. But I just feel like people
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  don't don't know them. They don't have those great
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  stories. They they need to let their
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  personalities come out even more.
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  And they're trying by the way, like, I think those guys do have
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  good personalities. What do you guys think?
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  Do you think the sponsors are the sponsors not doing the same
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  things they used to do in the 80s and the 90s with the
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  activations to get people, whether it's commercials,
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  whether it's, you know, those pop ups at stores where you'd
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  see the driver. We've heard folks like Bobby
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  Labonte talk about that. We're back in the day.
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  You would see these drivers in the grocery store in terms of
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  there to be a big cardboard cut out next to their product or
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  their sponsor and all that. I feel like we don't see that as
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  much anymore to me, the guy who who could be the guy that brings
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  it back. So again, Hamlin's great, Kyle
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  Busch is great. But the key you can make the
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  argument, the key to NASCAR the last couple years of being
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  really interesting is Ross Chastain and being the
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  watermelon man. You got the good nickname and
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  and smashing the watermelons again.
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  It's one of those viral type moments just like Carl Edwards
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  with the flip that people remember and I don't know how
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  you guys think, but last year the whole season turned and it
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  got less interesting when Rick Hendrick called out Ross
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  Chastain for wrecking his cars. If you remember now, I'm not
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  saying it's necessarily good on the track, but it was freaking
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  interesting when he was wrecking Kyle Larson and he's wrecking
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  the Hendrick cars and he's getting in a fight and punching
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  Noah Gregson. And then ever since Rick
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  Hendrick called him out, you saw to me a watered down version of
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  Ross Chastain and the season wasn't as interesting until
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  right at the end when look, he went toe to toe with Ryan Blaney
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  in the championship race, didn't basically let him pass him and
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  it was interesting again. So.
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  So to me if Ross Chastain is in the mix, this version of NASCAR
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  is a lot more interesting. But I do think for these drivers
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  to to be anywhere close to the Earnhardt's and Petty's and and
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  Mark Martin's and Rusty Wallace's of of back in the day
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  and I don't, I don't think they ever really can be either.
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  It's a different, it's a different era of media and all
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  that. But they got to get out there.
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  They got to be interesting on social media.
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  They got to do commercials. That's why I think this Netflix
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  thing was huge and I watched a couple episodes of that.
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  They need to do more of that. They need to do that basically
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  every single year. And I think, you know, have that
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  different guys, different episodes and feature the
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  different drivers. So I I think I think that's
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  going to bring people back as well.
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  But what do you guys think? Are you agreeing with Kyle
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  Busch? Are you agreeing with anything
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  that I said? I just feel like the drivers
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  nowadays, they just don't they they can't grab the casual fan
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  like they could in the 90s to me if if I if I didn't work
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  basically where I'm covering NASCAR and watching NASCAR every
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  week, every day. I don't know if I would know of
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  any of these drivers. So I always like to look at it
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  like this. I think a good gauge is it's
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  kind of ask your mom. I always say like if your mom,
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  who's not a sports fan, has has heard of these people right
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  then, then the sport is doing something to market them
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  properly. Like my mom would know if Tom
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  Brady and Patrick Mahomes back in the day, she had probably
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  heard of Richard Petty, Diller and hard Jeff Gordon.
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  My mom has probably never heard of any NASCAR driver right now
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  currently and you know she's 70 years old.
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  But again, it's about attracting the casual fan.
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  But Kyle Busch was talking about those die hard fans in the 90s
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  and some of them not coming back.
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  So look, if you're losing the casual fan, that's one thing.
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  If you're losing the die hard fans from the 90s, that's a
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  real, real problem. So, all right, a little bit of a
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  rant, a little bit of discussion there.
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  What do you think of what I said?
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  Comment, like, subscribe. Let me know what you think.
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  Reply in the comments. What do you agree with?
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  What do you disagree with? Where am I wrong?
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  Where am I right? What do you think?
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  Again, I'm a 90s kid, grew up in the 90s, All those iconic
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  drivers, the color schemes. Oh, here's another thing.
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  As I'm about to wrap up, I forgot to mention.
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  Look, I'm, I'm clearly not the first person to say this, but
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  another big problem nowadays is obviously the changing of the
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  cars in terms of the color schemes, the rap schemes, the
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  paint jobs, whatever you want to call it.
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  Just being able to watch a race real quick and look and see who
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  that is. Oh, that's Dyl Earnhardt.
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  That's Midnight Rusty Walls. Oh, that's Mark Martin.
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  There's the 43 orange and blue Richard Petty nowadays.
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  The fact that a lot of these cars you have to go.
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  Who is that? Oh oh, what's his sponsor?
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  You'll have 4-5, six different cars.
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  And I think that's also a big problem.
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  Just growing up and seeing Jeff Gordon, Rainbow Warrior.
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  The Black Intimidator #3, Richard Petty with the blue and
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  the orange. Jimmie Johnson, even with the
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  lows, the Tony Stewart Home Depot car nowadays.
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  I feel like for a while you had the FedEx with with Denny Hamlin
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  and now you're not even seeing that as much.
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  You're seeing the Mavis and what was his car the other day when
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  he won. Was it an oil change.
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  See, that's the thing I don't, I don't even remember, you know
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  Chase Elliott with the Napa is usually one that you can point
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  out most races. Joey Logano with the, you know,
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  the, the Penske, the yellow, the Pennzoil.
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  So that's that's another big problem I think is, is not being
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  able to to know what the car is and and kind of have the shirts
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  and all that and have the posters.
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  We're back in the day. You knew exactly the color
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  scheme of your guys. All right, I rambled on.
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  Let me know what you think. Comment, like, subscribe.
• 12:41
  Appreciate it guys. See you later.
• 12:43
  Let me know what you think.