I agree 100% with everything you've said. You made good, factual points. All of those drivers you mentioned took a long time to mature. And many of them did not have good equipment during a large part of their careers. Both Marlin and Michael Waltrip fall into those categories. I also agree that Dale Jr. being, "who he was", has helped him along the way as well. Just as Chase Elliot would most likely not be where he is, if it weren't for his fathers past on track performance and influence. You could probably add Marco and John Andretti, along with Al Unser Jr. to that list. And it certainly doesn't hurt Austin Dillon that Richard Childress just happens to be his grandfather.
But the point being is, somewhere along the way their skill level developed as drivers to where it matched the equipment they were given. And as a direct result they started to perform. And started winning, and finishing in the top ten on a consistent basis. That has never been the case with Danica. It didn't happen for her in the beginning of her open wheel career in Toyota Atlantic. Where she had excellent equipment provided to her for 2 years and 24 races by Bobby Rahal. And it never happened in Indy Car where she had some of the best equipment on the track from Rahal / Letterman and Andretti / Green. 2 of the top teams that ranked right under Penske and Ganassi. Except of course for her one and only fluke win in Japan, when Helio ran out of gas in the final stages of that race.
In NASCAR this disaster continued. I'm not going to post her dismal record here yet again. It's out there if anyone really cares to look. There is no doubt winning in racing takes a certain amount of luck. It also takes tremendous skill. Especially at the top levels when you are handed good equipment race after race, and are expected to extract the very most out of it. She simply has not. She has proven she has been handed fast race cars, and can on occasion qualify well on an empty track. Her first year in Indy Car, (2005), she managed 3 pole positions, but never again after that. 3 poles in 115 races. Again, all with top shelf equipment. At Daytona she again got the pole in 2013. And at least came out of it with one of her few top ten finishes, by finishing 8th that year. Qualifying well makes you a fast driver in a quick car. It does not make you a winning racer.
One area I don't begrudge her in the least is her earnings. They of course don't reflect her on track performance, but they don't have to. Her marketability has been excellent. At least up until now. She made a fortune with Go Daddy. She looks great on camera, and can act reasonably well in staged, scripted commercials. Actors are well paid, so there is zero reason she shouldn't be as well.
But as far as her racing career which is coming into it's twilight. I can't think of another driver in recent memory, who has had better equipment throughout her entire racing career. And has performed so consistently poorly with it over such a long period. Venue after venue. Year after year. Race after race. And in wreck after wreck.... For almost 2 decades, and still kept her job. And again let's be honest. A large part of that is because she is a very attractive, and a extremely marketable woman. Which again is fine. But that's no more reason to try and tell me she's a good racer, and beyond criticism. Any more than being black automatically made Barak Obama a good President. And while it's perfectly OK to like, and "stick up" for both. People need to be honest enough with themselves to at least do it for the right reasons.
