But more telling of Franchitti's move was how quickly the idea by NASCAR owners to bring open-wheel talent to NASCAR's Sprint Cup Series with limited stock car experience at best became a bust.
Franchitti is the third driver to take the reins in NASCAR with intentions of making a long-term career move at the beginning of 2008 to succumb to the economics of NASCAR. In other words, open-wheel drivers with limited experience struggle early in their stock car careers and sponsors just don't want to spend money and time on such a move.
That list includes Franchitti, Jacques Villenueve and Patrick Carpentier, and leaves just one question.
Reed Sorenson isn't waiting for Chip Ganassi Racing to figure out the Car of Tomorrow.
The 22-year-old driver signed a multiyear contract to join Gillett Evernham Motorsports next season, where he'll join Kasey Kahne and Elliott Sadler.
Sorenson said his decision to leave Ganassi, where he began his NASCAR career as a precocious 18-year-old, was difficult but necessary.
"I'm going over here to try to make myself a better racecar driver," Sorenson said during a conference call Tuesday shortly after the announcement. "I wanted to be more competitive and I wanted to have some more opportunities to win races and things like that."
For Sorenson fans, this is great news, but for Patrick Carpentier fans it's probably not.
Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates has to be scrambling to come up something -- anything -- in the way of sponsorship for 2009 with Wednesday's news about the sponsor of Juan Pablo Montoya's No. 42.
Sirius Speedway has learned that Chevron-Texaco will not return as sponsor of Juan Pablo Montoya's #42 Dodge next season. [...]
Texaco-Havoline will not move to another team in 2009, electing instead to end their longstanding involvement in NASCAR. That decision leaves Ganassi Racing in need of at least two new sponsors in 2009, and possibly three. Team owner Chip Ganassi recently parked the #40 Dodge driven by Dario Franchitti due to lack of sponsorship, and there are longstanding rumors that Target may not return to the #41 Dodge currently driven by Reed Sorenson.
Of all the sponsorships one would have expected to stay with NASCAR, the Texaco-Havoline ride is near the top of the list mainly because of the staying power it has had in Sprint Cup Series competition.
Why was JPM in Wrigleyville, you ask? Well, he was the token NASCAR publicity head chosen throw out the first pitch and sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame", in advance of the nearby race. A little cross-promotion, if you will.
Obviously, the best part of that entire clip was the old guy in the stands at 0:44 that covered his ears as JPM led the crowd in singing the baseball anthem, because, well, Montoya isn't exactly Harry Carey.
I'm glad Montoya played along with the promo opportunity -- even though he finished the song like an entire verse ahead of the entire crowd.
Quality effort, Mr. Montoya, that's a Youtube keeper.
After blowing up colorful projectiles in name of freedom on the 4th, hang out with FanHouse for the Coke Zero 400 Live Blog Saturday night at 7:45pm/ET.
The team owner cited a lack of funding as the reason why the No. 40 won't be competing anymore in 2008, effective for this weekend's Coke Zero 400 at Daytona. The team has lacked full-time sponsorship all season, but has seemed to get by with a little help from multiple sources, including Fastenal, Tums, Target, and others.
But if Robby Gordon or Yates Racing can race all season with less than perfect sponsorship packages, how in the world can Chip Ganassi -- a true racing mogul -- not afford to run a team through at least one of NASCAR's crown jewel events?
To me, Ganassi's unwillingness to keep Franchitti in through Daytona shows that he isn't satisfied with Franchitti's performance in his first season in Sprint Cup. Franchitti's stats of no Top-5s, no Top-10s, and an average finish of 34th don't do much in his defense.
Regardless, its still surprising to me to know that Ganassi is essentially giving up on a Sprint Cup program for a guy he knew would struggle. A reason that Ganassi gave last fall when he fired David Stremme from the No. 40 ride was that he felt Franchitti either had sponsorship dollars with him or could bring them in more easily.
Then, it looked like Stremme was the victim, but now its looking like he got out at the right time from what seems to be an imploding Ganassi racing.
Following Sunday's Lenox 301 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, JPM fully admitted that he intentionally spun Sprint Cup point leader Kyle Busch late in the event under caution after the two had bumped on track. Before we go any further, watch below at 0:46:
As you can see, the discontent among the two began when Busch drove JPM up the hill in turn one. The two continued to make contact down the backstretch and when the caution came out for the crash between Clint Bowyer and Sam Hornish Jr., Busch banged into Montoya's drivers side.
David Stremme, the driver who was canned by Chip Ganassi from the ride Franchitti now holds at the end of 2007, is expected to make the start in place of the injured Indianapolis 500 champion for the Sprint Cup Series' Aaron's 499.
Subbing in Stremme won't make a difference in the team's starting position because Franchitti was scheduled to roll off dead last in 43rd from the grid anyways.
It's known right now when Franchitti will be back in the drivers seat, especially given that he isn't competing for anything driver points-wise. Instead, a primary goal of the team right now is to keep moving up in the Top-35 standings to keep the No. 40 in each event.
Knowing that, Franchitti might be able to take at least next week's race at Richmond off without having to worry about qualifying the car or starting the race and could potentially do so at Darlington the week after as the Nationwide Series races side-by-side with the Sprint Cup for those weeks.
UPDATE: Team owner Chip Ganassi said that Franchitti is currently undergoing X-rays on his ankle. Larry Gunselman was also later transported to the hospital. Original: Sprint Cup Series driver and 2007 Indianapolis 500 winner Dario Franchitti was helped to a waiting ambulance after being involved in a drivers-side impact Saturday at Talladega Superspeedway during the Aaron's 312 Nationwide Race.
The impact occurred after Franchitti cut down a rear tire on his No. 40 Chip Ganassi Dodge entering turn 3 on lap 10. Franchitti's Dodge snapped sideways and brushed the nose into the side of Nationwide point leader Clint Bowyer.
The No. 40 then slid down the track -- nearly to a stop -- when Larry Gunselman plowed into his left side.
From video replays, I can't understand how Gunselman didn't slow down any more than he did. There was no tire smoke and no last second attempt to swerve out of the way.
Had Gunselman missed Franchitti, Dario's car likely could have continued in the race. Instead, he hobbled to the ambulance in obvious pain.
For any employee of Chip Ganassi's three NASCAR racing teams, it's a good thing that the owner is over a 1,000 miles away at the IndyCar event in St. Petersburg, Fla.
His words, though, about the performance of the No. 40, No. 41, and No. 42 teams could be well heard in the garage area of Texas Motor Speedway.
"Frankly, there are 46 cars there and if you can't beat three of them, that's pretty pathetic," Ganassi said on Sirius Satellite Radio. "I certainly have all the faith in the world in (Franchitti's) driving abilities. I don't think it's that. The fact of the matter is, we didn't give him a car that was capable of doing it."
Heading into Texas, Juan Pablo Montoya's team is 17th in points, Reed Sorenson's is 26th, and Dario Franchitti -- who didn't make Sunday's race -- sits 37th. Teamwork is the problem, Ganassi says.
"When you say 'this team' you hit the nail on the head – we're not working as a team," Ganassi said. "You can't have guys that are fast and guys that are slow. It doesn't make any sense. These guys, these teams are not talking to each other, they are not working together, they are not using all the resources that are available to them. That's how you end up in a fix like this."
You've got to love this brutal honesty. Ganassi indeed hits the nail on the head himself with the summary of his team. They have frankly been mediocre for a long while and with the sponsorship and racing experience a guy like Ganassi has, he knows when a team is reaching its potential.
And in this case, he knows that his Sprint Cup teams aren't cutting it. It should be an interesting week around the CGR shop.
For the first time since open-wheel racing in America split prior to the 1996 season, the two factions were back together racing on the same track Saturday night at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
It was Scott Dixon, driving for Chip Ganassi Racing, that would ultimately pick up the historic win in the Gainsco Indy 300 following leader Tony Kanaan getting taken out in a late wreck.
Kanaan, who Dixon was catching during the closing laps, got taken out of the event after driver Ernesto Visto lost control and Kanaan couldn't avoid him, damaging his front suspension. From there, Dixon sailed to the win.
Marco Andretti, Dan Wheldon, Helio Castroneves, and Ed Carpenter rounded out the top-5 of a relatively clean race with only two crashes and three caution periods.
Next week, the series heads to St. Petersburg, Fla. for its first street course event of the season -- a race that many of the former Champ Car drivers are viewing as something much more suited to their driving experience.
Dario Franchitti is done with NASCAR, and if you're surprised, then, well, you shouldn't be.
You can now call Reed Sorenson 
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Dario Franchitti
UPDATE: Team owner Chip Ganassi said that Franchitti is currently undergoing X-rays on his ankle. Larry Gunselman was also later transported to the hospital.
For any employee of 
For the first time since open-wheel racing in America split prior to the 1996 season, the two factions were back together racing on the same track Saturday night at 
