Matt Humphrey – Orlando Sentinel

Today we pause to remember the life, legacy and legend of the late Dale Earnhardt, who died nine years ago Thursday following injuries sustained on the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500.

The most stirring Earnhardt tribute I ever read came from former Sentinel reporter Ed Hinton, who wrote this obit the night Earnhardt passed:

From the grandstands, he was beheld as superhuman. And somehow when the fans came close to him, to talk or touch him, they never could quite humanize him. They were skittish. They would grasp their autographs gratefully and hurry away, careful to keep their distance once more.

But if you knew him, really knew the complicated, enormously gruff but deeply compassionate man (oh, how he hated it when his big heart showed in public), risen from the textile mill town of Kannapolis, N.C., with a ninth-grade education . . . if you really knew him, then Ralph Dale Earnhardt was so very, very human, so deeply of the commonfolk who loved him.

Here is Hinton’s complete tribute to Earnhardt, which was first published Feb. 19, 2001:

More…

Jay Busbee – Yahoo Sports

No matter how promising a young Chicago Bulls basketball player might be, he’ll never wear the number 23. Same thing with rookies for the Yankees and Broncos and the number 7, or a Lakers kid and the number 32. Icons wore those numbers, and closed the door on anyone ever doing so again.

NASCAR has its own icons, drivers who fundamentally altered the way the sport runs. And yet not only are their numbers not retired, they’re still very much in use. Richard Petty’s famous 43 has passed from driver to — let’s be charitable — less-than-Petty driver for years. And now, the most famous number in NASCAR — the black No. 3 of Dale Earnhardt — is returning to the track every single week.

More…