Danica Patrick has a knack of making headlines in the NASCAR Nation. Unfortunately, it has nothing to do with winning races.
The polarizing queen of the sport got entangled with Kasey Kahne on Sunday in Fontana, and there may be consequences. The NASCAR police doesn't really care for drivers scrambling out of their car and gesturing at another driver, as Patrick did in the Auto Club 400.
She had a right to be peeved. A lap down, Kahne tried to tuck in behind her and clipped the right rear of her car, sending her for a spin. It ruined her day, and it may get worse after NASCAR reviews the incident this week during the Easter break.
"We do have a rule in place and want to make sure what were the circumstances around that?" Steve O'Donnell, NASCAR executive vice president and chief racing development officer, said on Sirius/XM NASCAR Radio Monday.
" ... We've got to make sure, first and foremost, rules are in place to keep the drivers safe. And we want to just review everything that took place there and see if there's anything we need to react to this week."
Kahne took to Twitter to try to make amends.
"Feel really bad about what happened today with Danica," he tweeted. "I'm glad she was ok! That should have never happened and that was all on me."
Patrick finished 38th, not a good bookend after a 35th-place finish in Daytona to start the season. In three other races, she has finished 20th, 21st and 19th.
This last one is not on her, obviously, but it's time for Patrick to step up her game. She has 123 Cup starts and has run out of time and excuses after transitioning from the IndyCar circuit. The cars are very different to drive, so Patrick deserved a mulligan.
Now, not so much.
"I still respect what she's doing," Fox NASCAR analyst Larry McReynolds told me at the start of the season. "The thing that I respect about our sport is that it's the toughest in all of motorsports. A top-20 finish is hard to come by. Nobody wants it more than she does.
"But this is her third crew chief in essentially three years. I think everybody feels we have to see some progress. Is that winning? Is that a Top 5? To me that jumps over. To me progress is clicking off more top 15s."
Progress. Simple as that. In three full-time Cup seasons, Patrick has finished 27th, 28th and 24th in the points standings. She is 29th after five races in 2016.
That's not progress by any measure.
Patrick is great for the sport. She moves the needle. She draws huge interest from a diverse fan base. But if she started to compete and win races, she would become the modern-day version of Dale Earnhardt Sr.:
The driver everyone loves or hates.
Of course it's silly to compare Patrick to a NASCAR icon at the moment. But she does have the polarizing part down already. Imagine if she became intimidating on the track.
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