Should Noah Gragson be sanctioned for his actions at Road America?
Absolutely! And it should have been instantaneous. Nascar should have Black Flagged him and parked him. Then had a nice friendly discussion in the hauler. And that should have been the end of it.
But for the love of God! 30 driver’s points, 30 owner’s points AND a $35,000 fine is absolutely ridiculous!
Major inconsistence!
My problem here is, with all the preaching about having an even playing field b.s. that comes from the powers that be. How about you guys start proving that you mean it?
If what Gragson did required this kind of response, Where’s Denny Hamlin’s fines? Where’s Joey Logano’s fines?
Is what Noah Gragson did any more or less bad than the other two? The only difference would be that more innocents got sucked into Noah’s transgression. Although Denny was screwing up the day for many as the day went on.
I personally will give Logano a pass, because at least that was for the win. In my view, it’s called Old School Racing, Bump and Run.
I said at the time that Denny should have been parked, and if anyone deserved a fine, IMO, it was Hamlin.
Look. What Noah Gragson did was wrong, it was very unprofessional and very poor sportsmanship, at the very least. I think can all agree on that.
I try to put myself in his position and mindset, and I think it went a little something like this–
This is a guy (Sase Karam) that is in the race for one reason – The payout
Noah is racing for a Championship. Karam had been roughing up Gragson for a lap or two and he wasn’t going to take it anymore. Period. And in my view, took care of it, (I’ll bet Jimmy Spencer was smiling). I’m pretty sure that what was in Gragson’s mind, is that he knew that two other drivers got nothing for this, at the Cup level, why should he?
My position. The actions of all three is the same and very simply put, was taking another driver out.
Gragson should have been Black Flagged and removed from the race, nothing more, the same as I felt about Hamlin. We can, as I said, have the debate about Logano and Byron. There are some things to debate about that one.
My main concern is with Nascar’s lack of consistency. Their credibility is in the toilet, and on the way to the septic tank, where it belongs!