Formula 1: Should Mercedes re-sign Valtteri Bottas or promote Esteban Ocon?

Should Mercedes bring back Valtteri Bottas for a fourth consecutive Formula 1 season, or should they promote Esteban Ocon to the works team?

One of the focal points of the 2019 Formula 1 summer break is the situation at Mercedes-AMG Petronas Motorsport as it pertains to who Lewis Hamilton’s teammate will be next year.

Valtteri Bottas has been Hamilton’s teammate since the 2017 season after he replaced Nico Rosberg, who retired after winning the 2016 championship, but he has found himself on the hot seat through the first 12 races of the 21-race 2019 season.

The 29-year-old Finn is not only in his third consecutive season driving for the Silver Arrows, but he is in his third consecutive contract season driving for the team.

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Last July, he signed a one-year contract extension that contained an additional one-year option that Mercedes have not yet confirmed whether or not they will pick up for the 2020 season.

Esteban Ocon, meanwhile, is a Mercedes junior driver who is currently the team’s reserve and test driver after losing his ride with Sahara Force India (now SportPesa Racing Point) following two seasons driving for the team when Canadian billionaire investor Lawrence Stroll led a consortium to purchase the team and replaced the 22-year-old Frenchman with his son Lance.

As Mercedes team principal and CEO Toto Wolff has stated, there are pros and cons to retaining a veteran such as Bottas and there are pros and cons to hiring a young gun such as Ocon, especially from within the organization.

But with all things considered, the choice should be clear. Mercedes should bring Bottas back for at least one more season.

Simply put, Ocon is not ready. What he showed in his two seasons driving for Force India was nothing special. He was beaten by teammate Sergio Perez in both seasons, and now Perez, who hasn’t been beaten by a teammate since the 2014 season, is sitting behind Stroll in the driver standings. And let’s face it. Stroll has talent, but he would not be where he is today if not for his father’s deep pockets.

Even Mercedes have subtly hinted that this is the direction that they would like to go. Wolff urged Renault managing director Cyril Abiteboul to sign Ocon as Nico Hulkenberg’s replacement for the 2020 season to “restore his gentleman image”.

The two sides had a handshake agreement to send him there ahead of the 2019 season before Renault backed out of this agreement to sign Daniel Ricciardo to a two-year contract when he made the surprising decision to leave Aston Martin Red Bull Racing.

He wouldn’t offer Ocon to Renault if he truly had his heart set on replacing Bottas with him next year, period.

Meanwhile, Bottas, despite two crucial mistakes in the last two races that likely cost him the little chance he still had to challenge teammate Lewis Hamilton for this year’s championship, has made massive improvements over the course of his three-year tenure at Mercedes.

He won two of the 2019 season’s first four races and has recorded nine podium finishes through the first 12, and he has not dropped out of the top two in the driver standings all season long after finishing in third place with three victories in the 2017 season and fifth with none last year.

Mercedes are still by far the top team in the constructor standings as the five-time reigning champions, and they have a clear number two driver in Bottas who is capable of both winning races and serving as a solid team player, as he demonstrated on multiple occasions throughout Hamilton’s 2018 championship run.

Why fix what isn’t broken?

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Should Mercedes bring back Valtteri Bottas for what would be his fourth consecutive Formula 1 season driving for the team in 2020, or should they promote Esteban Ocon as his replacement?

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