This discussion may have happened two weekends ago now, during IndyCar's most recent race at Portland International Raceway, but considering the fact that we are now at the Milwaukee Mile and there is still no clarity on Will Power's future, or lack thereof, with Team Penske beyond next weekend's season finale at Nashville Superspeedway, it is worth bringing up again.
As Power, Penske's lone IndyCar champion this decade, delivered the team their first win of the year to solidify himself as their top driver in this year's championship standings (and in dominant fashion) at Portland, Fox Sports announcer Townsend Bell pondered the problem facing Penske.
The decision surrounding the No. 12 Chevrolet, if we are to assume it hasn't yet been made behind closed doors, is believed to be down to Power or David Malukas, the young A.J. Foyt Enterprises star whom Power ironically lapped en route to taking the Oregon win.
So what is Bell's solution, which he admitted to thinking of "in the shower" in the days leading up to the race?
Sign both and send Scott McLaughlin to NASCAR.
Bell specifically referenced the success of Shane van Gisbergen, who has now won four road and street course races in a row. While other Australian Supercars drivers have tried their hand at NASCAR and had no such success, McLaughlin is the only one whose resume rivals van Gisbergen's.
Before coming to IndyCar in 2021, McLaughlin won 56 Supercars races and three championships. Van Gisbergen is also a three-time champion, and he also recorded two runner-up finishes behind his fellow New Zealander. He owns 81 victories in the series.
Van Gisbergen became the first driver to win on Cup debut since 1963 when he won on the streets of Chicago back in July 2023, and McLaughlin was pumped for him.
Unlike van Gisbergen, who got his first taste of full-time NASCAR competition in last year's Xfinity Series before moving up to Cup full-time in 2025, McLaughlin has racked up plenty of oval experience in IndyCar as well. He is a two-time oval race winner, an Indy 500 polesitter, and even an IndyCar oval points champion.
Perhaps he'd be even quicker to adapt to NASCAR than van Gisbergen, having racked up the additional benefit of past oval success after adapting relatively quickly to an entirely different form of racing in IndyCar.
Of course, this probably isn't going to happen. But if it did, that would probably mean the end of Austin Cindric's time with Team Penske.
Bell did not explicitly name Cindric, but put two and two together. Joey Logano isn't going anywhere, and neither is Ryan Blaney, the only other driver to win a championship during the Next Gen era. Team Penske also won't be adding a fourth full-time car (perhaps a part-time entry is possible, though).
Even before the three-charter limit for teams not named Hendrick Motorsports and Joe Gibbs Racing was put in place, they were never serious candidates to expand from three to four cars.
Cindric has been viewed as being on the "hot seat" ever since his father Tim was fired by the team in the aftermath of their Indy 500 attenuator scandal in May, even though he won at Talladega Superspeedway to clinch his third playoff spot in four years. He is also a former Daytona 500 winner who remains under contract through 2026.
Roger Penske himself has poured cold water on any Cindric replacement rumors, so unless Team Penske either reverse course or add a non-chartered (open) full-time car for McLaughlin (which isn't happening), there's no way he's leaving IndyCar after 2025 just because the team can't make up their minds between Power or Malukas.
And it goes without saying that Josef Newgarden is set to return to the No. 2 Chevrolet on the IndyCar side also, eager to bounce back from what has been an abysmal season.