Everyone wants Labonte

On Monday, the NASCAR rumor mill was buzzing with the DEI-Ganassi Racing merger. For me the big news wasn’t so much the merger as were the whispers that Bobby Labonte was on the verge of inking a deal to run the #8, which would bump Almirola (also a former JGR driver)  into a 4th, unsponsored car (probably the #41, I imagine). They also announced a few other pending moves:

Almirola out of the #8 and into a 4th, unsponsored car (probably the #41).
Bobby Labonte into the #8
Montoya still in #42, but switching to Target sponsor
Truex still in the #1, but needs a primary sponsor for 15 races
Max Siegle (President of DEI) out.
John Story (VP of DEI) out.

And then, today, almost all this goes out the window with the announcement that Hall of Fame Racing and Yates Racing have merged, and, perhaps more importantly, inked a deal with Labonte to drive the #96 Ask.com Ford.

In a nutshell:

Bobby Labonte will be running the #96 Ask.com car.
HoF will switch from Chevy to Ford.
Current driver stable:
HoF: Labonte
YR: Kvapil
YR: Gilliland
YR: Menard

Predictions: I think Kvapil may well be out of a job. Menard comes with his own sponsor, and YR in heavily invested in Gilliland as the youth of the company. They only ran 2 cars last year, didn’t they? I don’t see them being able to jump to a 4 car team even with the merger.

As far as Labonte, I wonder if any other teams are going to claim he driving for them? Given his history with Chevy and DEI, I find it odd that he chose to go with Yates. But what do I know. I drive a Pontiac.