Former NASCAR driver Jeremy Mayfield’s life is damned close to scraping rock bottom these days, but one team owner in the ARCA series is interested in throwing him a life preserver in the form of a ride. This idea has been met with public support on various message boards and Facebook, but apparently ARCA officials have not been 100% receptive to the idea and there is the potential hiccup of a possible prison sentence for Mayfield, which would make it damned hard to drive a race car. The man behind this idea is Roger Carter. Ideally, he wants Mayfield to serve as the meat in the seat for him at Pocono in June. Meanwhile, Mayfield’s 450-acre estate is set to be auctioned off due to non-payment of his mortgage in the coming weeks. Talk about two ends of the life spectrum happening at the same time. A shot at a potential career revival and hop versus impending financial ruin and in theory, homelessness. You literally cannot make this stuff up.

It is pretty amazing to think about, but Mayfield started 433 races over a 16 year span in NASCAR. People seem to forget that the guy was in the sport at a very high level for that amount of time. It wasn’t like he was a driver for a couple years on start and park teams. The man was running with the big dogs and did it for a lot of years. It is also amazing that 16 years of competition at the highest and richest levels of stock car racing can all be evaporated in less than three years away from the sport. Remember, it was in 2009 that Mayfield failed the drug test and his life went every which way but up.

The big hang up in this whole process is the fact that Mayfield is facing nine felony-level charges. Eight of those revolve around stolen property and one revolves around drugs, specifically Methamphetamine. ARCA does not want to grant Mayfield a competition license until his legal troubles are settled, which only makes sense. Yes, they would grab big headlines if they agreed to license him now, but they would also look like total yahoos to do it and then have the man get convicted of the charges being levied against him. Carter claims that he will not make a big stink if ARCA denies Mayfield a shot at a license.

It will be very interesting to see what happens with Mayfield and the nine felony charges. If he goes to prison it would complete one of the most amazing life collapses in modern racing, certainly one of the most public. If he is acquitted of all charges it certainly aids his case and claims against NASCAR and could potentially start a cool and movie-script worthy comeback for Jeremy Mayfield. As we have said in the past. Only time will tell.

Link: ARCA Owner Offers Mayfield Ride at Pocono