Third class set to be inducted into NASCAR Hall of Fame
Autoracing Betting Lines
01/19/2012 - Charlotte, NC (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Five new members will be enshrined into the NASCAR Hall of Fame on Friday. Cale Yarborough, Darrell Waltrip, Richie Evans, Dale Inman and Glen Wood make up the 2012 class. They were voted into the NASCAR HofF last June.
The inaugural class -- Bill France Sr., Richard Petty, Bill France Jr., Dale Earnhardt and Junior Johnson -- were inducted when the NASCAR HofF opened in May 2010. Bobby Allison, Ned Jarrett, Bud Moore, David Pearson and Lee Petty made up the Hall's second class last year.
Friday's induction ceremony will take place at the Charlotte Convention Center [7:30 p.m. (et)].
Yarborough became the first driver to win three consecutive championships in NASCAR's premier series (now known as the Sprint Cup Series). His string of titles from 1976-78 was unmatched until 2008 when Jimmie Johnson claimed his third series championship in a row. Johnson won his fourth and fifth straight titles in 2009-10.
In a career that began in 1957 and concluded after the 1988 season, Yarborough notched 83 Cup wins, which currently ranks him sixth on the all-time race winners list. Four of his victories came in the Daytona 500.
Yarborough finished runner-up in the series championship in 1973 and '74 and again in 1980. After the '80 season, Yarborough, whose father was killed in a plane crash when he was 11, felt he needed to spend more time with his children and never again pursued a full-time driving schedule.
"I gave up a lot, but I gained a lot more," he noted in his 1986 autobiography "Cale."
Yarborough drove for Junior Johnson from 1974-80, but after Yarborough left Johnson's team, Waltrip took over his seat. Waltrip, nicknamed "Jaws" for his outspoken demeanor during his career, went on to win three Cup championships with Johnson.
"Cale gave me the best advice that anybody could give me, and that was that he was going to leave Junior's [team], and nobody even knew of it," Waltrip recalled. "He said, 'I'm telling you something that nobody knows, and Junior likes you, and he wants you to drive his car. You need to go talk to him.' That was the best advice that anybody ever gave me, because it led to a lot of wins and three championships."
Waltrip won his titles in 1981, '82 and '85. From 1977-87, he finished no worse than fifth in the point standings. Waltrip claimed his first Daytona 500 victory in 1989, driving for Rick Hendrick.
Since retiring at the end of the 2000 season, Waltrip has served as an analyst for FOX Sports and Speed television's coverage of NASCAR.
Evans is the first of the 15 inductees without a connection to NASCAR's top racing circuit. Nicknamed the "Rapid Roman" by virtue of racing out of Rome, NY, Evans niche in stock car racing came in the modifieds. He won nine NASCAR national modified championships over a 13-year span, including eight straight titles from 1978-85. He worked on his own cars -- as many as 100 hours per week -- and almost raced every night of the week.
"Working with the car and working on it in the garage every week is an advantage," Evans once said. "While I'm working on the car, I'm thinking about every lap I rode in that thing. It's not like the mechanic who stood and watched it during the feature and then has to make some decisions."
Evans was killed in an accident while practicing for a modified race at Martinsville Speedway in October 1985. Last week, the New York State Senate adopted a resolution honoring Evans' NASCAR HofF induction.
Inman will become the first crew chief inducted into the Hall. He served as a crew chief at Petty Enterprises for nearly three decades, setting records for most championships (eight) and wins (193). Inman guided his cousin, Richard Petty, to seven titles. He won a championship with Terry Labonte when Labonte drove for car owner Billy Hagan in 1984.
Unlike his cousin, Inman never had a desire to drive race cars.
"I just didn't see me tearing up somebody else's equipment," he said. "I was always pretty well content to work on the race cars and make them better."
Wood and his brothers, Leonard, Delano, Clay and Ray Lee, went from weekend racers to one of the most accomplished teams in NASCAR, with some of the sport's greatest names driving for them. Pearson and Yarborough, as well as Buddy Baker, Neil Bonnett, A.J. Foyt, Tiny Lund and Marvin Panch drove for the Wood Brothers.
"I didn't come here alone; I had a lot of help," Wood said. "There's five of us brothers, and all of those have helped at one time or another. Leonard had been there all along for the whole 60-something years. Of course, we've had so many good drivers too. All of that led to where we are."
The Wood Brothers have won 98 Cup races, including five Daytona 500s, from 1950 to present. In just his second start with the team, Trevor Bayne won the 2011 Daytona 500 one day after turning 20 years old.
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FOOTBALL BETTING : Crabtree's base deal: six years, $32 million
In the wake of the news that the 49ers have signed receiver Michael Crabtree after an extended holdout, there has been not a hint of the dollars to be paid to Crabtree.
And since this means that his agent hasn't leaked the numbers, it means that his agent feels no specific motivation to do so.
Possibly because his agent isn't all that thrilled to have his name on the deal.
So the numbers will come from sources other than Crabtree's agent. And we've gotten our mitts into them.
Per a league source, Crabtree has signed a six-year, $32 million contract. (The total includes guaranteed money, base salaries, and the one-time incentive based on achieving minimum playing time.)
The deal also includes $17 million in guaranteed money.
As reported elsewhere, the deal can void to five years based on performance triggers, wiping out a final year base salary of $4 million. But they won't be easily reached.
The source tells us that, in his first four seasons (including 2009), Crabtree must either qualify for two Pro Bowls, or he must qualify for one Pro Bowl in one year and he must participate in 80 percent of the offensive snaps in a separate year in which the team makes the playoffs.
In other words, if in 2010 he qualifies for the Pro Bowl and the team makes the playoffs and he participates in 80 percent of the snaps, he'll still need to make it to the Pro Bowl or achieve the 80-percent/playoffs in another season.
Since the chances of Crabtree making the Pro Bowl or participating in 80 percent of the offensive snaps this year is roughly zero percent, he'll have three years to get it done.
And it won't be easy. Frankly, he'll be hard pressed to make it to one Pro Bowl in three years with the likes of Larry Fitzgerald, Calvin Johnson, Anquan Boldin, Steve Smith, the other Steve Smith, Hakeem Nicks, DeSean Jackson, Johnny Knox, Percy Harvin, Greg Jennings, Roddy White, T.J. Houshmandzadeh in the same conference for sportsbook betting.
So, by all appearances, it's a six-year deal. And at $17 million in guaranteed money, the per-year guarantee is a tepid $2.83 million per year.
There's another problem with the deal -- it has no mid-tier incentive package. Instead, the additional $8 million that Crabtree can earn (pushing the max value to six years, $40 million) requires the kind of unrealistic, mega-star performances that no rookie is likely to ever achieve.
So while the contract paid to Packers defensive tackle B.J. Raji covers five years and pays $22.5 million, he has the ability (if he's a solid player) to make up the difference between his base deal and Crabtree's five-year, $28 million haul via the mid-tier incentive package in Raji's deal.
And unless Crabtree meets the performance thresholds necessary to void the sixth year, he'll be stuck under contract for another year at a base salary of only $4 million.
There's one other area of concern with the deal. Crabtree, per the source, received no option bonus. Instead, he has significant money tied to a fairly new device known as a "discretionary salary advance," which unlike an opition bonus is subject to forfeiture if Crabtree decides in a year or two that he wants to hold out for a better deal. (We're also told that the 49ers have included language that would make certain escalators subject to forfeiture, too.)
Meanwhile, the deal falls well short of the mark for which Crabtree and agent Eugene Parker were aiming -- the five-year, $38.25 million contract paid by the Raiders to receiver Darrius Heyward-Bey, the seventh overall pick in the draft.
Even if Crabtree successfully voids the final year, he'll make more than $2 million per year less on average than Heyward-Bey.
Thus, as we explained earlier in the day, this is a deal that Crabtree could have done in July, which would have given him a much better chance of making a contribution to the 49ers during his rookie year.
So while the final outcome can be described as win-win, the broader view suggests that it's really a lose-lose situation.
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