by Ryan McGee

6 wins, 16 top fives, 21 top 10s, 5th in points

Sun., Feb. 20, 1 p.m. ET Speedweeks TV schedule NASCAR on FOX schedule More NASCAR

You know you are The Man when you finish fifth in points and yet you are still pulling down more headlines both during and after the season than the four guys ahead of you in points combined, which means that Dale Junior is The Man.

Let's see ... he won the Daytona 500 for the first time. He set career single-season Cup bests for wins and top fives, tied his personal record for top 10s, as well as earning $7.2 million, also a personal best.

He also set himself on fire, dropped an s-bomb on national television, released a best-selling DVD, did a TV special for 60 Minutes and starred in TV commercials for Nextel, Budweiser, Wrangler Jeans, NAPA and Enterprise Rent-A-Car.

Did anyone happen to notice that the dude still hasn't won a Cup championship?

Why He Will Finish 5th

The No. 8 Budweiser team that rolls into Daytona this year is not your father's Bud team ... nor is it Dale's father's Bud team. For the first time in his big league racing career (including his two Busch Series championships), Little E will be going to work without the assistance of cousins and co-crew chiefs Tony Eury Jr. and Sr. Pops (who has moved to the front office, while Eury Jr. is now calling the shots for DEI teammate Michael Waltrip). The reaction from fans and NASCAR insiders alike is just further proof that Earnhardt is the biggest star in the sport today. Never has so much of a ruckus been caused by a crew chief move.

Sliding into the Eurys' very high-profile position atop the pit box is one of the sport's most low-profile veteran mechanics, Pete Rondeau. Rondeau very quietly took over the helm of Waltrip's team in October when the 15 crew was shaken up by the DEI brass. Now the guy who was recently second banana on one of NASCAR's most invisible teams — the #77 Jasper Engines machine — is suddenly running the Greatest Show in Racing.

"I think the whole deal is just going to cause me to grow up a little bit," Junior said during preseason testing at Daytona. "With Tony Jr., I could just talk however I wanted, whether it was stupid or rude or whatever, he was family. With Pete, there is already a difference in my approach. When we talk, we listen to each other. We don't yell at each other and all of that."

If the Bud team finally wins it all, Pete Rondeau will be carried across NASCAR Nation on the shoulders of Junior's fans. But if they fall short once again, expect a few moving vans to be sent to his house free of charge.

Welcome to the big time.

The All-Telling, All-Knowing Stat: 20.2

Earnhardt's average finish over the final five races of 2004, and that includes a win at Phoenix. Before that miserable stretch, he was sitting second in points behind eventual champ Kurt Busch, a mere 24 points from the promised land. (Of course, if he hadn't said s— live on NBC at Talladega he would have had 25 points back and actually been in the lead, but that's a whole different story.)

Fantasy Lock: Talladega

Are you kidding me? Do you even need to ask? Just in case you haven't actually ever watched NASCAR or just recently got electricity in your home, here are the numbers. In eight starts since 2001, Junior has won five times, including four in a row between '01 and '03. His worst finish was eighth, the other seven times he was first or second. If you're scoring at home, that's an average effort of 2.1.

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Ryan McGee is the managing editor at NASCAR Images and Senior Producer of NASCAR Nation on SPEED Channel. He can be reached at his e-mail address: rmcgee@foxsports.com.