We're fast coming up on the ten-year anniversary of Dale Earnhardt's death at the 2001 Daytona 500. And while NASCAR can be accused of focusing too much attention on -- and continually profiting from -- the fallen icon, that doesn't mean we shouldn't take a few moments to consider what we lost when we lost the Intimidator.

So here's the deal. We'd like you to share your thoughts with us on where you were and what you were doing on that fateful day. Drop us a line at jay.busbee@yahoo.com and we'll compile them for a future post. It was one of the darkest days in American sports history, and the wound is still raw a decade later for some fans, but let's take one more look back and see if we can put it all into perspective, ten years on.

The European Tour has handed down its decree on the Elliot Saltman cheating case, and the verdict is: death! No, wait, a three-month suspension. Sorry, I was way off.

Saltman, an up-and-comer who won his European Tour card for 2011 in last year's Q School, was facing accusations of cheating when marking his ball on the green. Saltman would mark his ball one way, then when replacing the ball, align it with the marker in slightly different fashion in order to move it closer to the hole, according to accusations made by two of his playing partners in a September qualifying tournament.

Saltman protested his innocence, saying that he agreed to the charges at the time because he was in "shock" and "didn't want to be labelled a cheat." But the Tour did exactly that, saying in a statement that Saltman "committed a serious breach," according to the AP report.

We've railed before about the absurd overreaction of golf's ruling elite when infractions are an issue -- disqualifications for

[WARNING: Satire/absurdity alert. If you're one of those humorless types who wants nothing more than to gripe about how NASCAR's not like the good ol' days, skip this post and wait for the next one.]

Dinosaurs. Racing. Both cool on their own ... but how cool would they be together? Adam Jacobi and Join Bois, a couple writers at SB Nation, consider the idea of Dinosaur Racecars with one of the most ridiculously funny posts you'll read this offseason. Consider this exchange:

Bois: We already have NASCAR, F1 racing, rally racing...the list goes on. Is there really a market for yet another motorsport?

Jacobi: [Dinosaur racing]'s not just "another motorsport;" it's an evolution, if you will, of all motorsport. For example, you're a fan of natural science, yes? Which includes geology, magnets, and the food chain.

Bois (laughs): Certainly! Who isn't?

Jacobi: So, if Kyle Busch and a dinosaur had to fight each other because they were hungry and they wanted to get into the racecar, the dinosaur

Editor's note: Yahoo! Sports is counting down the top 20 drivers of the 2011 season. The order was determined by a survey asking five NASCAR journalists – Jay Busbee and Jay Hart (Yahoo! Sports), Jenna Fryer (Associated Press), Dustin Long (Landmark Newspapers) and Nate Ryan (USA Today) – to predict the final standings for the 2011 season. The countdown will conclude on Feb. 11 with the unveiling of the No. 1 driver.

(Getty Images)

2010 statistics

Finish	Poles	Wins	Top 5	Top 10
13	1	0	7	11

The countdown

No. 20: David Reutimann | Career stats

No. 19: Kasey Kahne | Career stats

No. 18: Mark Martin | Career stats

No. 17: Revealed Jan. 18

2010 finish: 13th

Our 2011 predictions:
• Jay Busbee: 18th
• Jay Hart: 10th
• Jenna Fryer: not ranked in top 20
• Dustin Long: 14th
• Nate Ryan: not ranked in top 20

2011 outlook: This time last year, Mark Martin was coming off one of the finest seasons of his career, a year in which he came from semi-retirement to challenge Jimmie Johnson

Tiger Woods won the Canadian Open in 2000, but hasn't played in the event since 2001. That's a state of affairs that the Canadians would dearly love to change, and they're taking to the social media waves to do so.

As Canada.com notes, organizers of the RBC Canadian Open, scheduled for later this summer, have encouraged fans to send Woods messages begging pleading encouraging him to come play at the Shaughnessy Golf & Country Club.

The primary issue for the RBC Canadian is one of scheduling: falling just one week after the British Open, it's a long flight from the U.K. to Vancouver, Canada. Still, that hasn't stopped tens of thousands of Canadians from "tweeting Tiger" to get Woods out to Canada.

Woods hasn't yet publicly acknowledged the campaign, and there's no word yet on whether he'll play. But this opens up a whole new world of public pleading, doesn't it? Get enough people together, and you can guilt celebs into coming to your birthday party/wedding/bar mitzvah! Social media, we

It's almost time for the season to begin, and that means dusting off some of our regular features No sport offers up a more bewildering array of souvenir crap memorabilia than NASCAR, and They Make It digs deep into the corners of the Internet to bring all that strangeness to light. Today: it's always time for Earnhardt.

The item: The double-Dale Wrangler clock. It's Dale! It's the other Dale! It's Wrangler! What more do you need, huh?

The deal: Commemorating Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s victorious run this past summer at Daytona in the Nationwide race, this prize clock ... uh ... tells time. Beyond that, well, you're out of luck.

This little item continues the morbid fascination that NASCAR has with the Earnhardt-Daytona connection. Expect to see much more of this kind of thing in the coming weeks, as we near the 10th anniversary of Earnhardt's passing.

The hat tip: Longtime reader KingGeorge spotted this beauty at his local MegaLoMart. Got some bizarre NASCARiana for us to check out? Email

Worst episode of "Lost" ever.

Say this for the HSBC tournaments: They know how to stage some photo ops. A few weeks back, we had our favorite golfers getting all samurai on each other, and Tuesday, we've got the gang on a boat.

Left to right, that's Martin Kaymer, Paul Casey, Lee Westwood, Phil Mickelson, Jose Maria Olazabal, Louis Oosthuizen and Graeme McDowell. Who's going in the drink first, lads?

On Monday, we saw Joey Logano skating, and Tuesday, we present Juan Pablo Montoya on the golf course. Won't these guys get behind the wheel of a car already?

Montoya teed off at the Doral Golf Resort and Spa to promote the upcoming Daytona 500. (Had you heard about this? Big race in Florida, apparently. Huh.) Anyway, Montoya competed against local media in a golf skills competition, and apparently sank a 20-foot putt, which ain't bad.

Montoya's a driver who's almost as good as he thinks he is, and considering how good he thinks he is, that's saying something. He's won the Rolex 24 at Daytona, the Monaco Grand Prix and the Indy 500. But Daytona remains elusive, and he wants it, badly.

"It would be pretty cool," he said. "I’ve won all the big races except that one. I’m pretty good on restrictor plates and our cars are pretty good. Jamie (McMurray) won last year, and at Talladega, I’ve had so many chances at winning those races. It’s matter of giving yourself a chance. That’s all I ask