Down in my neck of the woods, there's a pretty popular sports talk show
hosted by a sports writer named Paul Finebaum, mostly the conversation is
about Alabama and Auburn football, etc., but yesterday the topic was of
course the events at Talladega.

Paul had several racing journalists on to talk about the situation ... along
with Grant Lynch of the speedway, who made some noises about doing what some
other tracks have done and creating alcohol-free, "family friendly" areas in
the grandstands ... but the topper was an interview with Ed Hinton, who is
now working in Chicago I guess.

Paul usually puts up audios of his interviews on his Web site, and this one
may make it there eventually, but he seems to be a week or so behind in
updating things.

Anyway, shortest version of what Ed said was that Earnhardt fans, for more
than a decade now, have totally misread what Dale Sr.'s attitude was toward
Gordon, and that is the genesis of where we're at now.

He pointed out how Dale Sr. was always picking at Gordon, calling him
"Wonder Boy," poking fun at him playing video games, etc. But he also
pointed out that Dale Sr. was the type where the more he poked and picked at
you, and sometimes downright bullied you, the more he actually liked you.
And that in reality, he legitimately liked Gordon an awful lot.

But the thing is, the Earnhardt fan base got it in their heads years ago
that Dale Sr. really DIDN'T like Gordon because of all the picking and
poking, lighting the fire of their dislike for Gordon, and that the genie is
out of the bottle and probably will never be put back in.

If they ever do put that interview up on the site, I'll post a link to it
because it's really worth a listen, Hinton was really rolling and said a lot
of other good stuff.

Greg Bailey wrote:

I thought it was a given that Earnhardt liked Gordon. They even went
into business together at one point.
A lot of his fans don't like Gordon, but I don't think it has anything
to do with how they think Earnhardt felt about him.