Yeah, Sure, ANYBODY can get better points than Mike when Mike's being given SH!T to race in. What you are all forgetting is that after Dale Sr died, DEI began to focus on Dale Jr ONLY and admitted they screwed Mike over all these years, thus the crew and equipment changes at the begining of THIS season. What happened? Mikey began performing better than Junior. MUCH better because Junior got all the shoddy equipment and team that Mike had all those years after Dale died. Remember, Mike only got to race 1 single race with Dale Sr leading DEI and that was his first win at Daytona. After Dale Sr died, everything changed, and that's when Mike's stuff started going downhill. You seem to be dancing around that fact.
I know this is NOT Junior's fault at all, it's the people who run DEI, and Junior doesn' RUN DEI. He's just another driver who apparently had HIS job threatened after he punted Mike into the wall in Charlotte because Junior made the comment before a race a couple of weeks after that when asked if there was going to be ANOTHER crew chief change for him, he said "No, no crew chief change, frankly I am more worried about a driver change." So someone put Junior in his place about what he did to Mike.
Also, another thing that led to Mike's decision to leave was that when he asked for Tony Eury Jr to return as his crew chief next year, DEI said NO. I guess he's either going back to Junior's car or to Martin's car, but it's just sad that here Mike's FINALLY found someone who understands the way he drives and can set the cars up for him that he can get the job done, and they want to take him away and put him back to their "star".
Anyway, Mike will be better off where-ever he goes. I guarantee you that you WILL see Mike in victory lane more often next year. You know, Mike got those wins and top 10s with the HELP of DEI, but when it comes down to a race, it's the driver driving that car that wins.
