Max Jones who is really under the gun, to come up with some companies willing to write those multi-million dollar checks it will take to compete on the Sprint Cup tour this season. If the benchmark budget for a stock-car team is $15 million to $20 million a year, then Yates and Jones will need to find about $30 million to $40 million pretty soon. At the moment, where a sponsor's logo should be on the team's quarterpanels, there is the curious line: "SponsorYates.com." Last season, Mars backed both teams, but the company moved to Joe Gibbs' Toyota operation to back rising star Kyle Busch. And long-time sponsor UPS split the year before, following Dale Jarrett to Michael Waltrip's Toyota camp. But Jones seems confident that things are going to work out, even though the Yateses really haven't had competitive cars in some time. The Yateses' two Fords were on the front row for the Daytona 500 a year ago, but the season went downhill from there. Neither team really caught fire.
-- Winston Salem Journal
Winston-Salem Journal | Yates team in Daytona searching for sponsorship