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Actually Stewart has 3 championships. He won the World championship while Carmichael took the AMA (in 06 I believe). Say what you want but the "World" Championship took more "consistency" to win sooooooooooo.......Stewart has 3 "CHAMPIONSHIPS" IN SUPERCROSS.
wanna bet her didn't get that million dollar bonus for the "world" championship?
RC said openly his season started in January.
I think re-sorting your list with “wins” taking priority over “titles” makes more sense. Just my opinion.
What's the end goal of competing in a championship series?
Gathering the most wins or winning the championship?
The manufacturers spend millions to go racing for titles. What's displayed on the semi trailer doors?
Wins are nice, but championships are what matter the most in all sports.
McGrath doesn't get introduced as the 72 time supercross winner. He gets introduced as the 7 time champ having won 72 main events.
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Wow! what is it about James Stewart that gets people all in a twist if you say anything negative about his accomplishments. People are baggin on Chase Sexton right now, because of some of the mental mistakes he's making, but put him on Adderall, so he can react and think quicker and at the speed he's racing he might be able to compensate for those mistakes that put him on the ground and be the points leader in Supercross right now and have beaten Eli Tomac for the 2022 Motocross championship. Rules are rules and if fans don't like them, maybe the AMA and FIM should make everything is legal so everyones on a level playing field. James Stewart almost seemed Super Human at times and I think Adderall was a big part of his success, take it away from him and he's more like his brother Malcolm and a middle of the pack rider. Bubba was willing to take the chance of using an illegal substance to give him an edge at success, but he got caught and it's always going to be a stain on his accomplishments. No harm in discussing what he did that got him banned for 16 months, because if it's ignored people will continue to cheat.
These arguments get a bit crazy. I mean I can come on here and say Reed was 17 points away from 2 more titles, or he was 2 ACLs away from zero (RC 2004, James 2008).
I agree with Mav, titles matter much more than wins. If Tomac manages to win this title and eclipse James in the win column, is he more successful? I'd say yes. If he does not get this title and retires with 2 and 48+ wins I'd say James and Eli would be equal and one could easily make the argument that both underperformed in championship terms. And I say this as a big fan of both guys.
If Tomac ends up walking away with 2 450SX titles and 48 wins, I'd personally rank him ahead of James based on their championship results over the course of their careers.
The same amount of titles, and a similar amount of wins, but Eli had a better SX career.
Hmm you said if Eli ended with 2 450SX titles and 48 wins. Meaning if basically his career ended tomorrow.
I highly disagree. Stewart would have same titles, more wins, higher win percentage (far less starts). More wins in a single season against more notable riders in the history books. Beating better riders for titles (RC, Reed, etc).
You are a reasonable guy, I know you aren't a Stew fan and that's fine. But if you wanna bring up the stats, bring them ALL up. Don't cherry pick. Even with worse seasons, the win % is higher, he had more wins in an individual season, same titles with less starts and the competition was far more notable (add their titles and wins together and compare with the current field).
what separates RC4,CR22 & JS259 is that they are all top 5 most SX wins while racing each other....
other than The King....
think of all these riders and title winners, history makers etc.. but to have 40+ wins in an era of RC4, Stew and Reed. wild
That’s what’s insane. 2 of them without 1 of the others might both make a run at McGrath.
I always like the Reed/Stewart debate. They were fierce rivals and had nearly identical careers, as far as wins and championships go. Many immediately say Stewart over Reed. It’s not quite that simple. Let’s compare:
Championships: 2 each
Wins: Stewart 50, Reed 44
Championship Finishing Positions:
03: Reed 2nd
04: Reed 1st
05: Reed 2nd, Stewart 10th
06: Reed 3rd, Stewart 2nd
07: Reed 2nd, Stewart 1st
08: Reed 1st, Stewart 23rd
09: Reed 2nd, Stewart 1st
10: Reed 17th, Stewart 20th
11: Reed 2nd, Stewart 4th
12: Reed 12th, Stewart 7th
13: Reed 5th, Stewart 10th
14: Reed 14th, Stewart 4th
15: Reed 4th
16: Reed 5th, Stewart 32nd
17: Reed 9th
18: Reed 13th
19: Reed 15th
20: Reed 16th
Reed has top 5 championship finishes before Stewart entered the class and after he left it.
H2H Championship Wins:
Reed 7 (5 excluding 2015 and 2016), Stewart 5.
Podium Championship Finishes:
Reed 8, Stewart 3
It’s more of a debate than people realize. I get both arguments. It just doesn’t make sense to me that many just don’t even think twice and put Stewart ahead of him. Longevity and being there every year has to count for something.
Dungey definitely didn't have a better SX career than RC or RV.
Carmichael and Dungey both raced the same amount of years in premier class SX (2007 was a retirement tour and he didn't race a full schedule, doesn't count). In those years, Carmichael won 1 more championship and won 14 more races. Not sure how in any way, shape or form Dungey's record is better. The only thing I guess is the podium streak, but when he's bested by Carmichael in titles and wins the podium streak doesn't hold any weight.
Villopoto raced 2 less 450SX seasons than Dungey and won just as many titles, as well as 7 more races. Additionally, Villopoto won those titles directly against Dungey, so it's not like you can argue that Villopoto had an easier path or anything. If anything, Villopoto had the harder path. All 4 of his titles were earned with Dungey, Stewart, and Reed in the 450 class. Only one of Dungey's titles were against that field (and Stew and Reed were hurt all year), and the other three came against Roczen and young, ridiculously inconsistent Tomac. Not saying he didn't earn them, but I'm just making the point that there's no way Dungey's titles mean more than Villopoto's.
Was always a Reed fan and it could definitely be argued that he had just as successful a career as Stewart. But almost every time those two faced each other in their primes, Stewart was the better rider. I was always watching from the perspective of "will Reed find some way to beat Stewart" rather than "Reed should really win tonight but we will see".
Where did Mav’s post go with the incorrect stats to discredit Stew and my post pointing out the incorrect stats?
Die hard reed fan and i agree. stew was on another level.. but i always say... Cooper Webb is the modern day reed.
also too.. reeds 03 rookie season could of changed the whole history books
Curious as to why you say Stews 07 was easily the greatest of all time compared to MC in 96 and RC in 01? Margin of victory? I agree it’s an all timer just curious on your thoughts on it
Reed was the one left behind in 06 when the 4 strokes took over. He was right there them both in 05 (and with RC in 03) and never really was on the 450. Not till 09 anyway when he got on the Suzuki. Not sure if it was the Yamaha or just he himself not adjusting as fast as Stewart or Carmichael. I wish we could have gotten a few more years of those guys on the 2 stroke.
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I’m guessing he meant to say “one of” in there before the greatest. I just don’t see how that season can be argued to be above either of the 2 you mentioned.
RE-POSTING.
I didn't save it so had to redo it.
I made an error in the number of races Eli completed vs the number of potential races he could've attended. I put down the right amount of races, I just didn't correct the number of races he attended before posting.
I also made an error in the number of Top 10 James has. I previously wrote 112 when it's 101.
You wanted me to compliment James, and that's easy. James did amazing things on a motorcycle and he was a joy to watch. Now we get to enjoy his insights on Bubba's World. I believe we're getting him full-time for outdoors with Weege, so the broadcast stepped it up a notch.
James Stewart:
2x 450 SX Champion (2007 & 2009)
Completed 122 races out of a possible 201 races.
76 Podiums
50 wins
2nd - 15x
3rd - 11x
Top 5 - 87
Top 10 - 101
Most Wins in a Season: 12 in 2007
Number of Seasons: 11, including 2015
450 Career Points Scored: 2260
Eli Tomac:
2x 450 SX Champion (2020 & 2022)
*Includes up to Oakland 2023
Completed 149 races out of a possible 159 races.
87 Podiums
48 wins
2nd - 23x
3rd - 16x
Top 5 - 111
Top 10 - 135
Most Wins in a Season: 9 in 2017
450 Career Points Scored: 2951
Number of Seasons: Currently in 10th
Including the 4 races he did on the opposite coast when he was on a 250:
Completed 153 races out of a possible 163 races.
Top 5 - 112
Top 10 - 137
450 Career Points Scored: 3003
I didn't discredit him. I made a simple clerical error. It happens.
Also, one got caught cheating and got arrested for impersonating a police officer. That rubs some people the wrong way. Me, I don't care. We all do stupid things, myself included. I never got caught, so I never got arrested.
Mav I’m yankin your chain.
I always appreciate the bench racing with you. Always keeping it respectful regardless if stance.
We disagree on this. That’s fine, we’ll both sleep fine tonight. I’m a massive ET fan and a massive JS fan but being a kid through JS7’s career, maybe I’m bias towards him in a direct comparison. But such a fan of both of these legends.
Is that you James?
The facts are that he tested positive for the PED Amphetamine and when he came back from the ban with a TUE for a limited amount of the drug he couldn't keep it on 2 wheels. I give credit where it's due, he was fast and had massive cajones. He did a great scrub. I just don't accept the fact that he's the most talented or whatever. If he was that talented, he'd have been able to go fast without ragdolling himself down the track so often. I believe he had issues concentrating for a whole moto which is why he turned to Adderal which increases focus and reduces anxiety and impulsivity. Great for someone's mental game in a sport like this.
I didn't like the Reed incident, the cop impersonator incident, the PEDs issue but that has nothing to do with the facts about his career.
James never beat RC for a championship.
2007 SX. He dominated RC. Who, while yes was in his final year, still came back to win outdoors. He was still in top form (remember, be retired in his prime).
He won 5 of the 7 races RC competed in that year. RC winning the other 2. James was ahead in points when RC bowed out of the series.
Fun Fact: James only beat RC 3 times outdoors. The most successful guy to beat RC outdoors was Windham who did so 7 times.
They don’t call RC the GOAT for no reason…
Windham had many many more starts vs RC outdoors than James did.
08 James vs RC would have been a fun battle I believe. Maybe throw in 2015 Tomac and we have a party.
Everyone know that RC was only race a limited number of races that year. He was not racing for the Championship.
If you want to play that games RC would have won the 450 outdoor championships that year, but only raced a limited number of races. He won the first 5 races and was leading the Championship when he stepped away. He did come back to Millville and won that race also. Bottom line he said he was race a limited number of races and that’s exactly what he did in both series.
The sad part as fans was watching them retire. To think that James, RC and Chad had all those win and raced against each other. How many more wins could they have had if they didn’t have to race each other.
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