NASCAR: How a change in Jimmie Johnson’s plans would affect the driver market

Jimmie Johnson recently stated that he now has “no clue” regarding retirement after the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series season. What would a change in his plans do to the driver market?

The coronavirus pandemic has left many NASCAR fans scratching their heads about what could be next for the sport, which saw just four race weekends go down before the 2020 season was brought to a screeching halt prior to the scheduled race weekend at Atlanta Motor Speedway for the Cup Series, Xfinity Series and Truck Series.

Aside of the obvious questions about when the season will resume and when the world in general will get back to normal, one common question asked by NASCAR fans involves seven-time Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson.

Fortunately, the 44-year-old El Cajon, California native had an answer to that question, although his answer further illustrates just how uncertainty these times are.

The question is this: will he still retire after the 2020 season, irrespective of if and how the rest of the scheduled 32 races play out?

With Johnson having “no clue”, it’s almost a given that nobody else has much of a clue either. As he stated, “we will all be smarter in the weeks to come”.

Let’s say that Johnson does come back in 2021. There have literally been dozens of drivers linked to his seat behind the wheel of the #48 at Hendrick Motorsports next year, most notably Team Penske’s Brad Keselowski and Chip Ganassi Racing’s Kyle Larson.

Wood Brothers Racing’s Matt DiBenedetto, Go Fas Racing’s Corey LaJoie and Joe Gibbs Racing’s Erik Jones have also been discussed. Stewart-Haas Racing teammates Clint Bowyer and Aric Almirola are both pending free agents, and the idea of promoting a driver such as Noah Gragson or Justin Allgaier from the JR Motorsports Xfinity Series team has been floated.

However, in regard to Johnson returning and not needing to be replaced next year, this “huge impact” on the driver market is nothing more than an illusion.

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At the end of the day, only one of these drivers (or perhaps a separate driver) is going to replace Johnson. So even if he does return in 2021, the only plans that will be directly affected are those of one other driver.

Of course, whoever may have replaced that one driver won’t be able to do so now, and that could cause a chain reaction in itself. But even still, many of the aforementioned teams won’t be looking for replacements anyway unless one of their drivers leaves for another team. Would a team such as Team Penske or Chip Ganassi Racing really be looking to replace Keselowski or Larson if they haven’t signed elsewhere?

There could be 100 potential replacement candidates for Johnson, and this wouldn’t change that. Perhaps the would-be 2021 replacement would still replace him behind the wheel of the #48 Chevrolet in 2022.

This may not be possible, however, if this driver is one of the top-tier Cup Series free agents (such as Keselowski or Larson) and that driver ends up signing a long-term extension with his current team, or even a multi-term deal elsewhere. Keselowski and Larson have both been rumored to several possible landing spots.

This is really the only scenario involving Johnson returning that affects the entire driver market beyond a simple one-year extension for Johnson.

Jimmie Johnson returning in 2021 would reverberate throughout the NASCAR world, but far more so because of the fact that he would be unexpectedly spending another year in the series, not because it would shake up what we thought the driver market would look like.