Much has been made about Team Penske's disastrous 2025 IndyCar season. Whether it's their second major cheating scandal since last year, their wide range of uncharacteristic and unforced driver errors on the race track, mechanical issues, strategy issues, or getting caught up in other drivers' miscues, this season did indeed look poised to become their first winless season this millennium.
But in race 15 of 17, Will Power made sure that didn't happen, delivering the team a much-needed victory at Portland International Raceway on Sunday.
Power has been Team Penske's top driver in the championship standings all year long. But entering Portland, only Dale Coyne Racing rookie Jacob Abel, who is a distant last place in points with no top 10 finishes, had led fewer laps this year, if you can believe that. He had led zero; Power had led four.
But Power, now sixth in points after making the 2025 season his 16th winning season over the past 17 years, proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that he's still got it.
And while he may have ended Team Penske's "nightmare" season, he has just sent them into another.
For several months, the assumption is that Power will not be back behind the wheel of the No. 12 Chevrolet next year, and depending on who you ask, that is still the case. Given the tone of Power's post-race interviews and press conference on Sunday, he might well have already been shown the door.
The team have long been linked to A.J. Foyt Enterprises' David Malukas. Foyt's team has a technical alliance with Penske's, and it was said before the year began that Roger Penske himself helped orchestrate that deal that led to Malukas, who has tested for Team Penske before, landing the No. 4 seat for 2025.
The fact that Malukas showed up to Portland in a car sponsored by Gallagher, a primary Penske sponsor, only led to further speculation.
But after sharing the second row with Malukas, Power lapping him en route to leading 78 of 110 laps around the 12-turn, 1.967-mile (3.166-kilometer) natural terrain road course in Portland, Oregon – and then demanding over the radio that he hold up Christian Lundgaard and Alex Palou – was an almost poetic element of what was one of IndyCar's most exciting race finishes of the year.
Power is the second-longest tenured driver in the series behind Scott Dixon, the 45-year-old New Zealander who said in 2016 that he had somewhere between four and six years left in the series. Skip ahead six years to 2022, and he said he had probably around five years left. Come 2052, maybe he'll be down to four.
The point is, Power clearly still has what it takes to compete at a high level, and replacing him now, just to secure a younger talent who probably isn't leaving his current seat for anywhere else if Penske doesn't snatch him up anyway, now officially feels like it just might be a mistake.
It's nothing against Malukas. I know there are a lot of fans who feel the Penske links are making him a bit overhyped, but we've seen the talent from day one. He's been on the podium at some point every year he's been a full-time driver, most notably finishing second in this year's Indy 500 after missing last year's edition of the "Greatest Spectacle in Racing".
He's 10th in points, placing him four spots ahead of teammate Santino Ferrucci and ahead of both of the other Penske drivers, Scott McLaughlin and Josef Newgarden.
And let's face it: Malukas beating Zak Brown's McLaren team on a regular basis, and showing them he is indeed an "A-Level Driver" following the whole Alex Palou lawsuit claim, after being senselessly released before ever making a start last year would be kind of hilarious, and that's an opportunity Penske can undoubtedly give him.
Sometime down the road, that is. But is it one that should already be on his way for 2026?
That's where the question lies, and it's where Penske's real nightmare begins.
It's clear, even after Townsend Bell's wild McLaughlin-to-NASCAR pitch (which would actually be interesting to see), Power, now 44 years old, is the only driver Team Penske are considering moving on from.
Newgarden is obviously safe, even for as much as it feels like he's simply been cursed this year by the ghosts of attenuators and push-to-pass buttons past, or something like that. Nothing has gone his way lately – at all.
This could very well be Power's final month ever in the No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Chevrolet. The season's final two races at the Milwaukee Mile and Nashville Superspeedway next weekend and the following weekend could very well be his last not just with the team, but in the series.
But you better believe this is a team now reminded, if not haunted, daily about the line Power essentially delivered to their new leadership in Portland, turning Penske's one dream moment of 2025 into yet another nightmare: hold up, wait a minute; y'all thought I was finished?