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FORT WORTH – Dale Earnhardt Jr. finished the 2007 Samsung 500 at Texas Motor Speedway and climbed out of the car.

Kyle Busch's car.

In one of the strangest twists in a downer of a year for Earnhardt, his No. 8 Chevrolet had already been knocked out of the race when the crew for Busch's No. 5 Chevy completed repairs to that car.

And then no one could find Busch.

Junior gladly hopped in and later talked about enjoying the experience with Hendrick horsepower. It was a day that would foreshadow his much-detailed move from Dale Earnhardt Inc. to Hendrick Motorsports.

This afternoon, Earnhardt starts the race on the pole after turning in a lap of 190.907 mph in qualifying Friday. Perhaps more significantly, he comes to TMS as the leader of the Hendrick stable of racers.

Two-time defending Cup champion Jimmie Johnson is 10th in the standings. Four-time champion Jeff Gordon is ninth. Casey Mears is a distant 27th.

Earnhardt, with five top-10s in six races, stands fourth, just 69 points out of the lead.

In his final year at DEI, Earnhardt was a wreck waiting to happen. His 12 top-10s were his fewest since his 2000 rookie season. The nine Did Not Finishes were his most ever.

On top of that, his team was penalized 100 points during the season for an improperly mounted rear wing. He finished the year out of the Chase in 16th place.

Maybe the reason NASCAR's early-season TV ratings are up 5 percent over last year is Earnhardt's regular place among the leaders. What Earnhardt (and NASCAR) really need is for the new driver of the 88 car to find his way to Victory Lane.

As important as it is to accumulate points and secure a spot in the 12-driver Chase for the final 10 races, it's still about winning. And Earnhardt has gone 68 Cup races without a win, the longest drought of his nine-year Cup career.

TMS would be a fitting place to end the streak. Earnhardt picked up his first Nationwide win here in 1998. He got his first Cup victory here in 2000.

"I can't really put my finger on anything," Earnhardt said. "The car's really good. It could be a great weekend for us."

And since Hendrick Motorsports is clearly overdue for a win – its drivers won half of the 36 Cup races last year – why not let Earnhardt prove his worth by delivering it?

"Junior's run really well this year," points leader Jeff Burton said. "He's probably been the top-performing Hendrick car so far as seen by me. Their wins are coming, there's no question about that."

Critics regarded Earnhardt's decision to move to Hendrick as a mistake, suggesting it would expose his weakness as a driver. If he couldn't perform for Hendrick, he wouldn't achieve success anywhere.

I never understood the rationale for that point of view. Do Junior's fame and celebrity presence exceed his rate of success?

Of course they do. He must have inherited a huge percentage of his father's fans after the seven-time Cup champion died at the 2001 Daytona 500.

But this is not the Anna Kournikova of NASCAR. He won back-to-back championships in what was then the Busch Series. He has won 17 Cup races, including six in 2004.

From 2003 through 2006, two drivers finished in the top five in points at least three times.

One is named Jimmie Johnson. The other is Earnhardt.

He was a consistent performer until 2007, when inexplicable engine failures along with the burden of divorcing himself from DEI simply overwhelmed him.

Now he's back doing what he loves, wheeling race cars into top-10 finishes.

One driver who isn't surprised is his new teammate Johnson.

"I can remember points in last season and years past where that 8 car has been up front and strong and has had some quirky things take place [to] take him out of shots to win races," Johnson said. "I think he's on par.

"There has been less mistakes being made and he's able to capitalize on those strong runs."

Finishing off a strong run in Victory Lane would punctuate what appears to have the makings of a perfect marriage between driver and owner.