Johnson to snap Hendrick out of doledrums

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MARTINSVILLE, Va. -- Five races into the 2008 season, the most surprising story so far isn't who won the Daytona 500 (Ryan Newman), who has won the most often (Carl Edwards), who is winning the points (Kyle Busch), what foreign automaker finally won (Toyota) or who has had the best winning combo (Richard Childress Racing's 1-2-3 showing at Bristol).The biggest story is who hasn't won. And that story can't be written without the words "Hendrick" and "Motorsports" appearing together somewhere in the sentence. Hey, at least Hendrick is appearing in something; the organization certainly isn't appearing in Victory Lane.The current version of HMS has a big problem on its hands. From a competitive standpoint, the racing group was the Harlem Globetrotters over the last few years. But now winless, they've transformed into something more closely resembling the Washington Generals.Hendrick drivers had combined to win three times by this point one year ago, then went on to finish a close 1-2 at Martinsville Speedway's half-mile that's flat down the straight-aways but slightly tilted in the corners, looking like an LP that was exposed to the heat too much and warped.If you were making a highlight reel of last year's best finishes and decided to open at the shortest tracks, putting the two epic Daytona endings in second and third, the clips would start with the jostling finish of the Goody's Cool Orange 500 at Martinsville Speedway. The last few laps counted down with Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon leaning all over each other and creating friction over the airwaves as well as on the track.Gordon, a seven-time Martinsville winner, is a solid favorite to solve HMS's problem in two days. He has led 22 of his 30 starts at the tough track -- a whopping 2,466 laps -- and is as anxious as ever to win, sitting 14th in the championship points standings and ready to make a move.Then there's Dale Earnhardt Jr., the new kid on the HMS block who said only one thing has kept him from collecting one of those grandfather clocks, the speedway's cool trophy. "Honestly, what has been between me and Victory Lane (in the past) is Hendrick Motorsports," admitted the No. 88 driver this week.Earnhardt led the most laps here last year in this race, actually holding the point as the skies let loose with Southern spring showers. When the clouds cleared and the .526-mile layout was dried, however, his Chevrolet didn't handle as well and he finished a respectable yet disappointing fifth.So who solves the Hendrick Motorsports problem this Sunday? Simple: Johnson.In the last two years, it's been Johnson who has answered the championship bell. He finally reached the top of the mountain in 2006 and then put together a title run for the ages last year when he won four straight races when it counted the most in the Chase.When owner Rick Hendrick needed a young driver to improve his racing stable, it was Johnson. When his crew chief was expelled from Speedweeks for cheating in the lead-up to the Daytona 500 and the team needed a leader, it was Johnson.On Sunday in southern Virginia, with the organization stumbling through a sub-par season and seemingly mired in normalcy -- at a track where HMS has dominated like no other -- it will be Johnson again to the rescue.Problem solved.(Bill Whitehead covers NASCAR for Scripps Treasure Coast (Fla.) Newspapers, The Stuart News, Fort Pierce Tribune and Vero Beach Press Journal. E-mail him at wwhitehe@ircc.net.)