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It is not what you'd call a shocker, the news this week that Casey Mears will be losing his ride at Hendrick Motorsports come season's end. What is surprising is that Mark Martin will replace Mears. To the NASCAR-challenged, this is like the New York Yankees replacing a struggling, young outfielder with someone like, say, Ken Griffey Jr.
No announcements have been made yet, but the dominoes will soon fall, according to a source close to the situation.
Though he's well-liked personally at HMS, Mears simply hasn't performed. Teamed with crew chief Alan Gustafson, whom I consider one of the top-three crew chiefs in the Sprint Cup Series, Mears has done virtually nothing of note this season.
How slow has he been? He's authored only one top-five run (last week at Sonoma), he's led a whopping total of five laps and he's 24th in points. What makes Mears look even worse is that last season this No. 5 team, with Kyle Busch piloting the car, had one win, 11 top 5s, made the Chase, and finished fifth in the final standings. In other words, this is a championship-caliber team; it's just not getting a championship-caliber performance out of its driver.
Enter Martin. A four-time runner-up in the final standings, Martin will turn 50 in January. According to my source, Martin wants to make one last serious charge at that elusive title, and that's why he wanted to sign a one-year deal with Hendrick, the most dominant team of the Chase era.



Martin poised to follow Earnhardt to Hendrick in 2009 - Lars Anderson - SI.com