FanSided 250: Was NASCAR snubbed?

By Asher Fair | Dec 10, 2019

FORT WORTH, TEXAS - NOVEMBER 03: Kevin Harvick, driver of the #4 Busch Beer/Ducks Unlimited Ford, and Erik Jones, driver of the #20 Sport Clips Toyota, lead the field to turn one at the start of the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway on November 03, 2019 in Fort Worth, Texas. (Photo by Sean Gardner/Getty Images) /

NASCAR was not represented in any way in this year’s edition of the FanSided 250, which ranks the top 250 fandoms in sports and entertainment.

The fourth annual FanSided 250 was revealed earlier today. This list is a massive a huge compilation of 250 fanbases in the world of sports and entertainment that are ranked from #250 all the way up to #1 by FanSided, the parent network of Beyond the Flag and hundreds of other sports and entertainment-based websites.

Prior to today, NASCAR had been represented in some way on this list every year. In 2016, the NASCAR fanbase itself was ranked all the way up at #71. Despite the sport’s recent decline, it climbed to #24 in 2017, and Dale Earnhardt Jr., who announced his impending retirement toward the start of the 2017 season, was ranked #17 among sports figures at #203 overall.

While Earnhardt remained on the list in 2018 at #19 among sports figures and #225 overall, NASCAR dropped completely off the list.

More from NASCAR

Now in 2019, nothing and nobody NASCAR-related were anywhere to be found.

Was America’s most popular motorsports series snubbed?

After dropping from #24 to completely off the list last year, it was no surprise to see NASCAR not represented on the list. Earnhardt isn’t the only recent retiree; he joined other successful and popular fan-favorite drivers such as Carl Edwards, Tony Stewart, Jeff Gordon, Greg Biffle and Matt Kenseth who have recently hung up their helmets.

Earnhardt, meanwhile, had a chance to be in the rankings still, even two years after his retirement. He still competes in one Xfinity Series race per year, and he is still involved in the team ownership of Xfinity Series team JR Motorsports. He also serves as an analyst for NASCAR on NBC.

But at the end of the day, he isn’t what he once was as far as his involvement in the sport, so despite the fact that he was the 15-time reigning winner of the Most Popular Driver Award upon his retirement, he really had no reason to be in this year’s FanSided 250, especially given how close he already was to completely falling out last year.

With the past aside, however, NASCAR was still snubbed.

FanSided 250

Fansided250 Logo

Where does your fandom rank?

See 2019 Rankings

The sport saw an uptick in viewership for quite a few events from 2018 to 2019 in the midst of a lengthy decline. It wasn’t much, but it was a step in the right direction and illustrates that while NASCAR has lost many of the hard core fans it had worked so hard to gain over the years, it may very well have found its market share and audience size.

That alone should be enough to land it comfortably in the top 250.

Additionally, there are still popular drivers competing in NASCAR despite the retirement of Earnhardt — at least to the point where you’d expect them to be ranked ahead of fanbases of Alcorn State and North Carolina A&T among other teams and athletes, many of whom I personally have never even heard of.

Chase Elliott has long been dubbed the next Dale Jr. in that he has ties to the sport’s past that other drivers simply don’t have, and that has proven to be the case since Earnhardt’s retirement. Elliott has won the last two Most Popular Driver Awards, and on paper, he is pretty much slated to win them every year until he retires. The fact that he started winning on a regular basis in 2018 and now has six wins to his name certainly doesn’t hurt his case, either.

But it’s not just Elliott. Finishing in second place in the Most Popular Driver Award voting was 2019 champion Kyle Busch. How does Rowdy Nation not crack the top 100, much less not even make the FanSided 250, after Busch was crowned champion for a second time?

Next. Top 10 NASCAR drivers of all-time. dark

NASCAR and its drivers may have gotten the short end of the stick in previous FanSided 250s. But for the sport and everyone tied to it to be completely left off of this year’s edition illustrates a total snub.