It's weird that drivers like Scott Speed and Kevin Conway both competed in the Cup series around the same time, only to have success after leaving NASCAR. The early to mid 2000s were a strange time for random drivers in NASCAR.
That’s the open wheel invasion for ya, it made it seem like anyone could hop into nascar and be competitive and for some they found success but most didn’t until after they left NASCAR. Kinda like how Montoya wasn’t great in NASCAR but picked up some wins, but as soon as he went back to Indycar he started ripping wins again, or Dario Franchitti or Travis Pastrana as other examples of someone who wasn’t successful in nascar but was pretty successful outside of nascar. But it was definitely a weird time to be a nascar fan from 2007-2012 between the random guys joining from other series and the COT combined.
There was a problem where nobody could make it in because the cup drivers monopolized all of the opportunities in the nationwide series and took most of the opportunities in the truck series. There were so many drivers in the cup series (including drivers like Terry Labonte and bill elliott) that ran even part time schedules that there was no room for new blood in the series. It was so bad Conway won rookie of the year by virtue of being the only rookie.
People always call me crazy for this But had scott speed been givin more time to develop, joined a better toyota team like mwr (and spingate dosent happen) scott speed wouldve had a career on par with like bowyer or biffle
I don't even think Red Bull has ever put together two good cars for their NASCAR team. Vickers was a massive struggle in 2011, and even Kahne was disappointing that year, and that was arguably their best year overall. In retrospect it makes sense that Scott would fade back in the races; they're about double the length of any other race he would notably have ran. I'll still meme him for his post-NASCAR shenanigans, but he really did suffer from Red Bull being mediocre every year except 09 for some ungodly reason.
If Scott Speed stayed in ARCA for another year or two, I believe that moving forward with that extra experience would've made him a decent driver (Whether it's with a Mid-Tier Xfinity team or a Somewhat Top-Tier Truck Series team).
Red Bull rushed the hell out of AJ Allmendinger & Scott Speed, both should've run a Xfinity season before running in Cup, in 2008 When Allmendinger started to figure out the Cup Race, Red Bull Fired him after getting a Top 10 at Kansas and then AJ out ran both Mike Skinner & Speed when he went to the Everham 10 Dodge. Then in 2009 & 2010 AJ Further out ran Speed and even Vickers in a bunch of races. Red Bull should've kept Vickers & Allmendinger for 2009 in Cup and had MWR put Speed in a car full-time in Xfinity. Then in 2010 Red Bull goes to 3 cars having Speed in the 82 where maybe he would've run better.
How do you go through this entire video without mentioning that Red Bull did the same exact thing to Allmendinger with even less time to get acclimated to stock cars? Champ Car straight into cup with just a couple of truck and nationwide starts. Even AJ has said he didnt realize they were rushing him directly to cup. They fired Allmendinger for Speed just as Allmendinger was getting acclimated to stock cars. He had a top 10 in his final race for Red Bull before getting fired for Speed. Hell, he had even won the All Star shotnout that year. Theynwould have been better off staying with Allmendinger imo. and look who is still hanging around in NASCAR to this day... Although these shenanigans in NASCAR is really no different than the crap they pull in F1...look at the whole Sergio Perez drama going in right now...and hes an established winner.
