“I’m Frustrated”- Despite $400 Million Net Worth Tag, Dale Earnhardt Jr Reveals His Only “Cheaper” NASCAR Miss

For Dale Earnhardt Jr, there’s now perhaps nothing greater than the feeling of being a team owner at JR Motorsports. With that said, Dale Earnhardt Inc. was the perfect Cup Series team for Junior to lead in the future if not for how things chose to unfold. However, now that the veteran is estimated to be worth around $400 million, what’s standing in the way of Junior from picking up a Cup Series charter shortly?

As the negotiations between teams and NASCAR over the charter agreement heat up, Dale Earnhardt Jr spilled the beans on a major regret that seems difficult to fix. Unfortunately, fans of the JR Motorsports boss might have to wait for a long time before they can witness his team’s full-time Cup Series entry.

For Dale Earnhardt Jr, “there’s no way” into JRM’s Cup Series future

The NASCAR world has recently been buzzing with the news of charter sales, and there is a lot that officials have to say about the subject. However, the dilemma and the several risks one faces as a team owner often go unnoticed. In a recent episode of Dale Jr Download, Andrew Kurland brought up how there is no charter deal in the Xfinity Series. Given this, he asked the 15-time Most Popular Driver, “Does that help you see where the Cup teams are and understand their perspective?”

In a moment of vulnerability, Dale Jr shared the aspects of tough luck. “Look, man,” he began, his tone heavy with emotions, “I’m frustrated that I… I don’t know, it’s tough. I wish I had been smart enough to buy a charter when they were cheaper. That’s the first thing I want to say because I know anything I say after this, people are gonna go, ‘Well, you had a shot, you had the chance. You missed your chance, bud. It’s over.’ And I did.”

The last team to purchase a charter was Spire Motorsports, and according to reports, the team paid a whopping $40 million for the same. That’d be a good chunk of Junior’s reserves, making it a tough proposition in the current climate. He added, “There’s no way at the current selling price that I personally am gonna go out and buy a charter myself.”

Interesting Fact: Charter values have gone from $2 million in 2016 to $40 million in just 7 years!

With a mix of regret and what could have been a possible fix, Junior said it is essential for a NASCAR team to be able to own the charter permanently. In theory, this would encourage teams and sponsors to invest more in the sport, seeing the security it provides. Junior hence made his demands clear. He stated, “If I had a charter today, I would want that. If I owned a charter and had one right now on this table, I would want to own it forever.” The thing is, he could’ve had that with Dale Earnhardt Inc., but things didn’t go how they were supposed to.

Founded by Dale Earnhardt, the seven-time champion built DEI to one day watch his children, Junior and Kelley, run the team. But after his tragic passing, his son recalled, “In my mind, I lost all confidence in this becoming what Dad wanted it to be when he died. We could try. But I just knew without him here to help us keep that vision heading that direction, we just weren’t going to hit that target.” In the beginning, though, things weren’t too bad for DEI with Junior and Teresa Earnhardt running the operations.

In fact, the team had a tremendous 2004 season. Dale Earnhardt Jr had 6 wins, 16 top 5, and 21 top 10 finishes in 36 races. And one of those 6 wins came at the Daytona 500 – his first of 2 at the iconic event. Throughout his time with DEI, Junior won 17 races. But one of the most memorable – if not the most – was his 2001 Pepsi 400 victory at the Daytona International Speedway, just 5 months after Dale Sr passed away. Despite the success in those initial years after 2001, 2007 saw a power struggle between Dale Jr and Teresa – one that didn’t end well for DEI.

Junior left the team at the end of the season, and so did Steven Park. And with them, the sponsors left, too. Because of that, DEI faced critical financial problems, prompting Teresa to find funding. After sustaining full-time for two more years, a merger with Chip Ganassi ensued, which unfortunately ended in 2014. And that closed the curtains on DEI, effectively robbing Junior of a chance to have his own team in the Cup Series.

Coming back to the present, although Dale Earnhardt Jr might have missed out on the opportunity to purchase a charter, the JR Motorsports owner may have dodged a bullet in the long term.

Junior couldn’t help but share his doubts over NASCAR’s future

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As things stand, the charter teams receiving permanent status is out of the question for NASCAR executives. Although Steve O’Donnell believes an agreement is “close,” team owners such as Denny Hamlin have stepped forward to dismiss those claims. Naturally, with animosity building between the sport’s officials and the team stakeholders, Junior believes this could be a recipe for disaster.

Now that NASCAR is aiming to expand its financial returns and overall market reach, could things perhaps be moving too quickly? Junior shared his opinion on the DJD, “I’m also a traditionalist in that I am nervous and apprehensive about the direction that we’re going, where the barrier of entry for somebody to compete at this level as an owner is going to be more challenging, financially, maybe, right?”

Despite Junior voicing his support for the sport “prospering, making money, doing great,” some things just aren’t sitting well with the JR Motorsports boss. He concluded, “Hey man, I’d like to see that happen at a nice slow pace. All of the change that is coming in, I’m just fighting against some of that internally.”

After listening to Dale Earnhardt Jr’s gloomy intuition about the sport’s future, do you think that the sport is headed toward an unfortunate future?