Long, Strange Downfall

Former NASCAR driver Jeremy Mayfield’s problems just keep getting worse. This week, a Catawba County grand jury indicted the Kentucky native on charges of felony possession of methamphetamine.

The indictment comes just a week after police raided Mayfield’s home and found the drug, 69 guns and $100,000 in stolen goods. Deputies say they found 6 baggies of meth in his home during the Nov. 1 search, which was conducted seeking stolen property.

Despite the fact that authorities claimed to have found stolen property there, they did not charge him with that.

Police are working now to figure out if Mayfield knew the items were stolen and he had something to do with it. The authorities say all 69 guns have been logged and are being checked against lists of stolen property. In addition to these potential theft charges, Mayfield is also facing tax problems. Catawba county tax officials say Mayfield owes more than $82,000 in back taxes on his four properties.

At one time, Mayfield was one of the young guns that NASCAR was looking toward to replace legends like Rusty Wallace and Darrell Waltrip. He was brash, young, full of fire and charisma, and he could drive a little, too.

He hung in, won five races in 433 starts and finished in the top 10 in points three times. He could have been collecting paychecks and logging laps for the past three years, but a failed drug test (for meth) derailed those plans.

Now he's broke and likely to never live normally again, let alone do anything in racing.

The worlds of football, baseball and basketball, as well as boxing, are eife with examples like this. A kid with talent gets a taste of the good life, lives it up for a few years and then crashes, usually hard, in a sea of drugs, IOUs and other traps.

Mayfield drove and talked his way out of a ride with Penske, due mainly to his rivalry with Wallace, and it was downhill from there. At Evernham, he was well on the way to rebounding from that disaster, only to fall into another one.

It's a shame, and I hope he gets the help he needs. Meth is a wicked drug to get hooked on, and even harder to get off of. I wish him the best, and wonder about what might have been.