Theo

I've never seen this before, a legend before you retire?
Surely that should be after the race on Sunday.

Holypuck

I'll probably get a lot of flak for saying this but I think he is a legend indeed.

He had a pristine career and only bad luck didn't allow him to clinch at least 1 premier class title.

Theo

Certainly is when you look at some of the people who have been made Legends

Iamapony

Okay, well pristine if you ignore him taking out Hayden, when his teammate was fighting for the championship. And you ignore that he took himself out in P.I. when he was fighting for the championship. Otherwise, I will only give him a one/half "pristine" since he had all of HRC on his side and couldn't ever get the job done. As far as other "legends" go, he is as good as some already there. So if you are grading on some fan curve then, yep he belongs. Pretty soon that section will be bigger than the NFL Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.

Holypuck

He did not take out Hayden on purpose. He was a rookie that year and made a mistake, which is a common thing for rookies.

Never in his racing life was he "hard" on a rider and IMHO a single incident does not influence a 15+ year racing career. And believe me I was (probably the only person in Italy ) really rooting for Hayden in '06 and vividly remember how pissed I was when it happened...

However. Every year except 2018 (so we are talking from 2001 to 2017) Dani has won at least one race per season. That alone makes a career pretty fucking pristine in my opinion

michaelm

While obviously not deliberate (it pretty much kiboshed his slim mathematical chance for the title apart from anything else) it was an absolutely ridiculous attempted move though. Back in the day I blamed Puig for charging him up pre-race.

Holypuck

Of course, but again: is it enough to stain his career? Cmon guys

michaelm

I agree, he was one of the more honorable guys out there over his career as a whole. Stoner was the cause of a crash that took out several riders the same year, crashing in a corner which took out following riders, but was pretty much a paragon for respecting fellow riders during races anyway after that, so I can’t really condemn one and exonerate the other.

Jumkie, a great and prolific poster who sadly no longer engages in the forum was the ultimate Hayden tragic, and took a long time to recover from that Pedrosa torpedo on Hayden, but even he softened towards Pedrosa in recent years.

AntG

An accident, a racing accident, that's all there was to it, I wouldn't give a damn if my teammate was fighting for the title, a racer wants to win. That's where I lost respect for Colin Edwards, he was a ferocious racer when racing with guys like Foggy and Bayliss, then got a top ride in GP and was happy just to kiss ass and roll out funny quotes for the journos.

Pedro's a great racer, 125cc 2x250cc champion, one of the best riders never to win the big bike class who maybe in a weaker era may well have won several.