Every sport lives and dies off the support of its fans. The same is also the case with NASCAR. However, a big part of fan’s attachment to this sport is to the drivers and not to the teams compared to say a sport like the NFL or the NBA. This was a subject that Jeff Gordon had recently brought up, urging organizations to draw fan loyalty from drivers to themselves.
Advertisement
But according to spotter Brett Griffin, that might be a bit more tricky than it seems. Griffin resorted to the example of Tom Brady’s move from New England Patriots to the Buccaneers to make his point about the old-school fans in the recent episode of the Door Bumper Clear podcast.
Tom Brady’s example brought up in take on teams building fan loyalty
Speaking in the podcast, Griffin touched on the subject of how teams can grow an affinity in the minds of the fans for themselves. And to back it up, he pointed to Brady’s move from away from the Patriots and what it did for the team’s fanbase.
“I think the prime example of this is, in football, Tom Brady left the Patriots and he went to the Buccaneers. Patriot fans stayed Patriot fans, most of them. I’m not saying they didn’t go support the Bucs, but if you’re a Dallas Cowboys fan and Dak Prescott leaves, most of you’re gonna stay a Dallas Cowboys fan,” he said.
“But when you look at our sport, and the debate is, we need fans to stay as fans of a team when the drivers leaves. There are very, very, very few instances where this applies.”
Brett Griffin wonders if NASCAR is mindful of their ‘old school’ fans
Griffin claimed that in his experience, there are only two instances in the past when fans remained loyal to a team regardless of the driver. Those two teams were Wood Brothers Racing and Richard Petty Motorsports.
In the modern era, the spotter claimed Trackhouse Racing is “the closest thing” to that kind of branding. However, there is again a bitter reality in modern-day NASCAR nevertheless.
“If Brad Keselowski sells his interest in Roush Fenway Keselowski (Racing) today, and he leaves, and he goes to Rick Ware Racing, every single Keselowski fan is going to leave and go with him. It’s just the way it is,” he said. The spotter added that NASCAR fans are attracted to a driver’s persona, their talent, or things like the color of their car, that the relationship is between a driver and a fan. “That’s never going to change for the race fans,” he continued.
Griffin concluded his take by claiming that in their bid to create loyalty towards the teams, NASCAR is currently missing the aspect of how the old-school fans have always been.
