An Open Letter To Jack Roush

Dear Mr. Roush,

First of all, I have been a fan of yours since the days when you and Wayne Gapp were the scourge of the Pro-Stock circuit in the NHRA! then you went into road racing, then to NASCAR. I have followed your teams week after week! Mark Martin, Jeff Burton, Kurt Busch, Matt Kenseth, Greg Biffle, Carl Edwards, and anybody else who climbed into one of your stock cars were the ones I cheered for! And I bought their diecasts! You see Mr. Roush, I have approximately 900 diecasts, of which 700 or so are NASCAR, and of those, about 80% are of your drivers. Oh, those Team Caliber cars were so detailed! Better than anything Action could produce! The Owner's Series were second to none! And even the Preferred Series were far superior to the Action Elite Series! Then there were the "special finishes". The steel finish and gold finishes of 2001. The dark chrome finishes of 2002 and 2003. The pearl finishes of 2004. Then you outdid yourself. You brought out those nickle finish cars in 2005 and the copper finishes in 2006! You even threw in a few "colourchrome specials" along the way! Yes, you should see my collection, Mr. Roush! I even have one car that you personally autographed for me at your museum in Livonia last year! I guess since you took over Team Caliber, it stood to reason that these diecasts would be the best.

Then came the sale of Team Caliber to Motorsports Authentics in 2005!

Well, Mr. Roush, as I began to acquire any 2006 cars, including those beautiful copper-finish cars, I thought that it wasn't as bad as I thought. And I thought it was going to be pretty bad! I mean, anything that Brian France, half-owner of Motorsports Authentics (Bruton Smith of Speedway Motorsports Incorporated is the other half-owner), gets involved with usually ends up as a joke of its former self. Take NASCAR for instance. But, the name "Team Caliber" was still there, though later in 2006, that slowly disappeared, being replaced by the Motorsports Authentics name. But, thankfully, the quality was still there.

Then came the "seasonal specials" in December 2006!

Mr. Roush, I acquired both Mark's and Carl's Christmas cars, and I also received the "Christmas Special". Now, this particular car was a colourchrome special Owner's Series in 2002, 2003, and 2004. It was slightly demoted to the Preferred Series in 2005, but it was still a colourchrome car, and it was still highly detailed, and still a high quality diecast! But, these three 2006 Christmas cars were so disappointing! No colourchrome finish, no great detail, very poor quality! I can't begin to tell you how disappointed I was in those cars, and I was not looking forward to 2007, collecting-wise. To date, I only have 1 single 2007 1/24th scale diecast, and it's of Carl Edwards' #99 Office Depot car. And yes Mr. Roush, I was totally disappointed. I mean, by now, I would have acquired at least half the cars out there for your teams! I do have a number of 1/64th cars, but it's not the same anymore. Even the selection is pathetic! There are hardly any Busch cars available, and the 1/64th cars are becoming few and far between. Many cars are only available in the 1/24th size!

But wait! I happened to see one of the cars from Checkered Flag Motorsports! And Mr. Roush, I was impressed! Apparently, this company was started up by some of the people who were responsible for Team Caliber when you owned the company! The detail was there! The special finishes were there, though somewhat buried, giving you a random change of acquiring one! The cars are worth buying, though the only drivers available are Mark Martin, Sterling Marlin, Robby Gordon, and Kenny Schrader.

And this brings me to the purpose of this letter...

Please, Mr. Roush, could you give us collectors some very serious consideration and sign a contract with Checkered Flag Motorsports to create and distribute your team cars? All of your team cars! All of your Busch cars! All of your Cup cars! And please, Mr. Roush, your Trucks! And do it in both scales! The 1/24th scale cars in the Preferred Series, and the 1/64th's even if the 1/64th's were "Pit Stop" only, as they were since 2004, they were still a quality product! Then I would gladly be ordering the cars in! after all, then they would be worth collecting! And if you rememeber, the Team caliber boxes had the saying, "Anything else is just a toy!". Well, Mr. Roush, I hate to say it, but the Motorsports Authentic diecasts are just that, toys!

Would you at least think about it for 2008, Mr. Roush? Please?

Thank you,

Just sign me,

Ken, An avid, although disappointed lately, diecast collector