Anything Goes in ‘Silly Season’

It’s called the “silly season” and it gets sillier and sillier, according to Robert Yates, owner of the Winston Cup cars driven by series champion Dale Jarrett and Ricky Rudd.

Also according to Todd Parrott, whose rumored departure as Jarrett’s crew chief prompted Yates, Jarrett and Parrott to try to put out a fire Saturday.

“It seems like the ‘silly season’ starts earlier every year,” said Yates in scotching a rumor that Parrott was leaving the team to join Felix Sabates, who owns the cars driven by Kenny Irwin and Sterling Marlin.

That’s the nature of silly season, see. Rumors. Raids. Defections, real and otherwise.

In this case, Parrott was seen talking with Sabates after the April 16 race at Talladega, Ala., and a reporter put two and two together and came up with, well, five.

Or, in this case, a lifetime contract for Parrott, who was assured of perpetual employment in conversations with Yates on Friday night and Saturday morning.

Not that he was going anywhere, mind you.

“It’s just that I don’t want to lose sleep at night worrying about Todd leaving,” said Yates, adding that he didn’t need the distraction of employment matters when a crew is preparing a car for an upcoming race.

“People are always trying to cherry-pick teams, and we worked hard to grow the cherry tree,” Yates said.

The rumor was fueled by Jarrett’s failing to win since the Daytona 500, and by his 17th-place finish at Talladega, fueled by a lack of fuel. When Jarrett ran out of gas midway through the race and had to coast halfway around the 2.66-mile tri-oval, he had words on the radio for Parrott and life in general.

Those radios are easily dialed in by anyone with a scanner, and thousands carry them to races these days.

“We’ve learned not to take it personally. If you heard everything that goes on in the huddle at an NBA game or on the sideline of an NFL game, you’d be flabbergasted,” Jarrett said. “ . . . Fans need to know that . . . when they’re listening [on the radio] they shouldn’t take everything at face value.”

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If you’re planning to listen to today’s NAPA Auto Parts 500 on the radio, get ready for some disappointment.

Blame the Lakers.

And the Angels.

KMPC (1540) will broadcast the 11 a.m. race, beginning with prerace coverage at 10:30 a.m., but at 12:30 p.m. will leave the race because of contractual obligations to the Angels.

Not that the station is the Angel flagship, mind you. Instead, it’s the “spillover destination” for Angel baseball when it is bumped from KLAC (570) because of Laker broadcasts, which have contractual priority.

The Lakers play at Sacramento today in Game 3 of their first-round playoff series.

“We went to the Angels because we wanted to carry the race,” a KMPC source said. “They refused to let us out of the contract for this.”

Even in its truncated state, KMPC will be the only radio station in the Los Angeles market to carry the NAPA Auto Parts 500.

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Talk about moving fast. By the time the final Winston Cup practice was over--about 90 minutes after the end of the Auto Club 300 Busch race, the Busch garage was cleaned out. Not a car, wrench or tire was in sight as the final 18-wheeler pulled out of the infield tunnel, heading for Richmond, Va., and Friday night’s Busch race.

Staff Writer Shav Glick contributed to this story.