Burton: Fewer teams best for long-term health of Cup

Jeff Burton was on a roll Friday morning at Michigan International Speedway, and he wasn't even on he track.

Burton was asked about how only a year ago there were concerns about too many sponsors with too many cars and no guarantees of making Sprint Cup Series races, and about how this weekend, for the third time this season, only 44 cars showed up to attempt making the 43-car field for this Sunday's 3M Performance 400.

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I think there was a time in our country where you looked at the auto manufacturers as an empire that could never go away -- and I think today we can't look at it in that fashion, which is sad.
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JEFF BURTONIt was only one question. But he rambled on with his passionate answer.

"I don't think there's any question it's a function of sponsor involvement -- and the sponsor involvement has a great deal to do with the economy," Burton said. "A company has to be 100 percent committed to motorsports in this kind of economy to be able to spend the money that it takes, which goes back to part of the reason that I believe it's not in our best interest to have 48, 49 teams."

In Burton's mind, NASCAR's Sprint Cup Series actually would be fiscally healthier with fewer teams.

"How many cars did we have at Daytona [for the Daytona 500] this year? Fifty or so [actually 53]?," Burton quizzed. "We're having teams shut down. Every time a team shuts down, there is somebody who is left unemployed.

"We put ourselves in a position where with this change of car count, over a three-year or four-year period you go from 49 full-time teams to maybe 44, that's a five-team switch. If you put 60 people on a team, that's 300 people whose jobs are impacted by that."

Burton said he has a simple answer to put an end to all that economic uncertainty, whether the nation's economy is in a slump as it is now or it's when the good times are rolling.

"Our sport would be so much more secure, our employees would be so much more secure, our sponsors would be so much more secure, if we had 43 teams," Burton said. "There is no benefit in having [more than 43] teams. It only creates insecurity for sponsors, for car owners, for crew members.

"We need 43 teams to put on a race. If we have 43 teams that we knew were going to be in the race, then the sponsor's investment is much more secure -- and at a time when the economy is iffy, the sponsors that want to be involved in the sport want to know that they're going to be in the race."

Burton knows that NASCAR has long frowned on the idea of limiting its field to what essentially would be 43 franchises.

"I'm not even saying the F-word," he joked, laughing.

He even conceded that he understands the philosophy behind letting more than 43 cars attempt to make a race on a weekly basis. He just doesn't think it's sound business in the long term.

"The philosophy of having 48 cars all vying for 43 spots, I know that's cool and everything. Or the thought that if you're not good enough, you just go home because you don't deserve to be in the race. But that's not economically sound," Burton said.

"This is a time when you start seeing a negative side of having a bunch of teams. The sponsorships are being spread out over more cars. The cost of sponsorship is being de-valued because they have more choices. There's really no advantage in all that and our sport is less secure."

As Burton and the rest of the Sprint Cup drivers prepare for this Sunday's race in the backyard of America's Big Three automobile manufacturers, Burton's comments cast a long shadow. That significance was not lost on him.

"I think there was a time in our country where you looked at the auto manufacturers as an empire that could never go away -- and I think today we can't look at it in that fashion, which is sad," Burton said. "If you think about how big the American manufacturers are to the economy of America, it's huge. The amount of employment, the things that they do, it's unbelievable. And it's hard to see them struggling because it should be a source of pride for our country.

"They're really struggling hard. I don't think you can take them for granted anymore. ... You think they always will be involved, but they still have to be able to write the checks."

If they had fewer teams to write them to, perhaps that would help.

"Forty-three cars that are assured of being in the field is the best scenario for our sport," Burton insisted. "Professional golf being the exception, we are the only major sport that has to make the investment that we make and you don't know 100 percent that you're in the field.

"Now the top-35 rule is a tremendous step in the right direction. It's way better than it used to be, but it ought to be a 43 rule. I don't know how you go about determining whose going to get the car owners and all. I'm a driver, so I get to point at somebody else and say figure it out. But it's in our best interest to have 43 well-funded teams and sponsors that are secure in what they're doing. That's in our sport's best interest. That's my opinion."