These bets are gonna be the end of me. Still, this is a long term one, I do give Ham and Nico a couple more years together.
The BAR was his own fault. Schumacher >> Hakkinen >>>> Villeneuve, IMO. Villeneuve made very hard work of the 1997 WDC in what was by far the best car. In a car ridiculously superior to the rest of the field, keep that in mind. The guy he lost to the first year was Damon Hill, who doesn't exactly have the best rep, deserved or not.
Very good point - actually excellent point - Pironi or Watson should have been WDC that year... but luck is a strange thing.. it deserted Pironi and went to Rosberg. If it had not been for The Swiss GP - held in Dijon that year - It would have been Pironi ...by a hair.
Very true. Villeneuve followed Pollock regardless of reality. BAR could have been great, but they just did not have the engineering right. I think the fame went to Villeneuve's head - he wanted to be a rock star - I have is one album - its crap... but he's done what he wanted to do... not many can say that. regardless I respect Villeneuve - won Indy, won F1 ... you cant be that bad if you do that!
Exactly. Every time I got to Indy and see the huge posters hanging outside the stadium of the greats who conquered both worlds, it gives me an extra appreciation: Villeneuve, Andretti, Clark
+10000. While not the most overrated, JV should have wrapped up the WDC a lot sooner, and Patrick Head said on numerous occasions that JV made winning that title harder than it should have been. Actually it should be Schumacher > Hakkinen > insert 10 drivers here > JV. He was never good in the rain or at Monaco. JV also constantly attempted passes that resulted in him outbraking himself and getting repassed. I was at Indy 2000 and the radio commentator wasn't even surprised when this happened there for the umpteenth time in his career. A big factor in him being on the pace right away in '96 was several thousand miles of preseason testing, much like Hamilton had prior to Alonso arriving at Macca in '07. The latter has since proven himself far more competent in an F1 car than JV however........
Early in his career I would have said Button. Actually had the miracle of 2009 not happened he would have been out and just a footnote in F1 history. Since then I will give him credit for finally maturing into a very good driver whose skills seems suited to the cars/tires of today. Robert Kubica is one that comes to mind that had quite a bit of hype, too bad about his injuries. We will never know if he would have been another Button or bounced out in a few years. In the 90's, definitely Michael Andretti. I would say after his disasterous year in F1 he was never quite the same driver after that, even in Indycars. If I could throw another name out, Jarno Trulli is another recent driver that won exactly ONE race, yet had a long career. He never quite lived up to his potential or the (usually competitve) cars around him. For those ragging on Damon Hill, remember he had podiums in other cars besides Williams. He almost won a race for Arrows/Yamaha for Pete's sake. That would be like Caterham winning a race today. They weren't even second-tier at the time.
Alesi, Trulli, and Fisichella. All three were disproportionately highly regarded relative to their statistics. All three were consistently outpaced by their World Champion teammates. All three only won one race each. Regardless of whether or not certain drivers won the WDC due to the car, they still had to beat their teammate. So in a sense, they weren't that overrated. Truly overrated drivers have little to show for the praise that was heaped on them during their careers, so that should automatically discount those who won titles because they still had to perform over the course of a whole season. Anyone who has ever raced competitively for years knows how draining that can be. Actually, with this in mind, let me add Frentzen to my list based on '97.
