Deserving #48

 The doubters, the diggers, and the dumb don't believe. Hands down, the #48 won the Cup. It takes nothing less then perfection in this league to even come close. And that is exactly what this team brought to the track every week. Sure, your going to find the wall some weekends, but everyone else will too. It is how you race the week after you wreck. It is how you put your car in the top ten for the closing laps of every race. How you give your team a chance to win 36 times. It's perfection, or planning every minute for it. Jimmie Johnson was Mr. Perfect all year.

17 of the first 21 races, he finished in the top 10. DAMN. 3 races into the season, he had 2 wins, and a 2nd place finish. They ended with 5 wins, and an average finish of 9.7 for the season.

The #48 dominated the Superspeedways all year. Not only did JJ win the Daytona 500, he won the Aarons 499 in Talladega. He came really close to winning the second Dega race as well, till Vickers decided to clean the #48, and the #8 in the last lap. His worst finish, in one piece, on a restrictor plate track this year was 9th in the Firecracker 400. (24th place resulted after his wreck with Junior in the 2nd race at Talladega.)

But it was the Brickyard that made it so convincing.  After winning the 2 biggest races in the year, they only have one thing left to do. Out of the ten races in the Chase, he finished 2nd or better in 5 of them. This was, as close to a perfect season you can get in the top level of NASCAR.

Congratulations Mr. Perfect. The 2006 Nextel Cup belongs to the #48 team.