HE’S NOT UP TO SPEED

When things go wrong with a baseball team, the manager is the one who is probably fired; in football it’s the coach who is let go.

In motor racing, the driver usually gets the boot.

But what if it’s all family, the way it is with Dale Earnhardt Jr. The owner of car No. 8 is Teresa Earnhardt, widow of the legendary Intimidator and Junior’s stepmother.

Things could hardly be going worse for Earnhardt than they have through the first 15 races this season. He is in 17th place in Nextel Cup points, 503 behind leader Jimmie Johnson and 133 behind 10th place Kevin Harvick, the last spot eligible for the 10-race Chase for the Championship.

Worse, in 4,856 laps this season, NASCAR’s most popular driver has led only five.

Now 30 and no longer the happy-go-lucky kid with the magic name, a rock band persona cheered every time he stepped outside his Budweiser hauler, even he is feeling the heat.

“Hopefully, there ain’t no driver changes,” he was quoted as saying -- only half jokingly -- on his website. “That is all I am worried about.”

Teresa isn’t talking.

The situation probably won’t get any better today.

For the Dodge/Save Mart 350 at Infineon Raceway, one of two road races on the 36-race Nextel Cup season, Earnhardt will start 10th in a 43-car field. In five previous races on the 1.99-mile twisting hillside course once known as Sears Point, Earnhardt has never finished better than 11th.

Ahead of him today as they head through the curving left-hand first turn will be the Hendrick Motorsports pair of Jeff Gordon and Johnson on the front row. Gordon, a four-time winner and defending champion, qualified Friday in a track record 94.325 mph.

Through all the turmoil, which included changing crew chiefs for the second time this year four races ago, ramming teammate Michael Waltrip in the Coca-Cola 600 and seeing his chances of making the Chase frittering away in a series of disappointing finishes, Earnhardt has maintained a Pollyanna attitude.

“My team’s happy and I’m happy,” he said Saturday. “We’re getting into a comfort zone, if you will, and have gotten to the point where we’re bringing cars to the race track we can work on and improve.

“We had a great car at Charlotte, we had a decent top-15 car at Pocono. Last week we had just outside a top-10 car but could never get track position at Michigan. We’ve got a car that’s very competitive.”

But the fact sheet says 33rd at Charlotte (Lowe’s Speedway), 33rd at Pocono and 17th at Michigan.

In a move that startled even insiders at DEI, Earnhardt fired crew chief Pete Rondeau after only 11 races and replaced him with Steve Hmiel, who had been the team’s technical director. Rondeau had been a surprise choice himself when Earnhardt took him from teammate Waltrip’s car and sent Tony Eury Jr. to run Waltrip’s No. 15.

The Eurys are young Earnhardt’s uncle and cousin and had been hand-picked by his father to run the No. 8 car.

“Pete and Junior got along good, but I’ve been sitting in the pit box for the team for the last four years and just listening and we felt like there just wasn’t the best communication between them at the race track,” said Richie Gilmore, DEI vice president, who said the final decision was his -- after consulting with Teresa and Junior.

Said Earnhardt: “Me and Pete were real, real good friends, still are great friends, but we didn’t really click on the radio on Sunday. During practice we struggled a little bit too, so I needed to find someone who is a good match for me as far as my terminology of what it takes to get our cars running fast.”

Five days later, on the track at Lowe’s in the Coca-Cola 600, Earnhardt lost his cool or his ability to control his high-bred racing machine in tight quarters when he came up behind Waltrip and appeared to punt him off the track and cause a five-car accident.

Eury Sr., who became DEI’s director of competition after leaving Earnhardt’s car at the end of 2004, was livid.

“I don’t know what’s with him and Michael, but I do know we don’t need that,” he said after the race. “DEI has enough problems.”

And for probably the first time in his career, after six Nextel Cup seasons that have brought 15 wins and six poles, Earnhardt heard boos from the crowd.

Earnhardt bristled at the reaction.

“If you’re not in the race car, you don’t know what the hell is going on out there,” he said. “I can’t expect everybody to understand what was going on at that moment at that time.”

In the end, no matter who the crew chief is, it’s results on the track that count and DEI has not performed to its past. Since the senior Earnhardt’s death at Daytona in 2001, the team has won at least three races a year. This year, its best is a second at Phoenix by Waltrip and a third at Daytona by Earnhardt.

With only 11 races left to make the top 10 and qualify for the Chase, Earnhardt is 17th and Waltrip is 14th. Never fear, says Earnhardt.

“We want both teams in the Chase and I think we’re up to the challenge,” he said with a straight face. “I’m happy with the way the two teams are communicating right now. It’s better than I ever remember it being.”

And how about today and Infineon’s 12 tricky turns?

“I’ve won on every kind of track except a road course, so it’s the one last piece I need to fill in to complete the package. I owe a lot to Boris Said, Ron Fellows and Andy Pilgrim. Those guys helped me a lot with my road racing skills.

“I’m still amazed how Boris works the brakes and the throttle at the same time through the turns. I mean, I do it to an extent, but at the end of the day I’m still an old-school driver where the gas means go and the brake means stop.

“I bet if you were to put a camera in Boris’ floorboard, it’d be like watching “Riverdance.”