Jeff Gluck

USA TODAY Sports

Over the years, Front Row Motorsports general manager Jerry Freeze has gotten many phone calls from aspiring drivers seeking his advice.

They ask him: What’s the best path to make it to the Sprint Cup Series?

“Man, I wouldn’t know what to tell you anymore,” Freeze told USA TODAY Sports. “It’s so different than any other sport. Talent alone is only going to get you so far as a race car driver. That’s sad to a degree.”

In an era where drivers increasingly land rides based on how much money they can bring to a team, it’s often disheartening for those who have only their talent to offer.

But all is not lost. For proof, look no further than the driver Freeze and Front Row owner Bob Jenkins hired to drive the team’s No. 38 Ford: Landon Cassill.

12 Questions with Landon Cassill

Cassill, 26, is somewhat of an anomaly in today’s Cup Series. He’s a throwback in the way he’s steadily moved up the ladder, catching the eye of team owners who believe he can maximize their cars’ performance.

“Back in the day, if you were lucky enough to be a young man and drive a 25th-place car, you were in heaven," Mark Martin once said. “That's the best car you could ever dream of getting. If you rode around in that car and drove it better than it should, everybody would say, ‘Damn, that car is driving better than it should!' And then you got hired after five years of riding around and not wrecking it.”

That’s how it’s worked for Cassill so far — although he certainly didn’t plan it that way. A Hendrick Motorsports development driver as a teenager, Cassill never got to take over one of the megateam’s coveted Cup seats. Instead, he began driving for start-and-park teams, his only goal to get the car into the race each week with a good qualifying lap.

When he finally got the chance to race, it was with underfunded organizations like Phoenix Racing, BK Racing and then Hillman Racing, where he’d driven for the past few seasons.

But despite an average career finish of 30th, he was respected by those paying attention. Despite only one top-five finish in 187 starts (fourth at Talladega Superspeedway in the fall of 2014), results like a 19th at Martinsville Speedway (2014) and a 14th at Pocono Raceway (2015) in what should be a backmarker car made people notice.

In 2014, Dale Earnhardt Jr. tweeted he thought if Cassill got a shot with a good team “he would get it done.”

Freeze said industry insiders would often say, “That kid in the 40 car, you’ve got to watch him.”

“We knew that because we were racing him all the time,” Freeze said. “And he was outrunning us pretty much all the time, too.”

So when NASCAR’s soon-to-be-revealed charter system made it look like Hillman would be left without a guaranteed spot in the field this season, Cassill attracted interest from multiple teams. Front Row, making a large financial investment in a new technical alliance with Roush Fenway Racing, opted to go for talent over money.

And the team wanted Cassill as its driver.

“We finally decided to just completely go down the path of what’s going to be best for this race team,” Freeze said. “The marketability side, the spokesman, the ambassador he can be, he’s got the whole package.

“He didn’t necessarily bring wheelbarrows full of money to drive the race car, but usually the guys who are doing that are not as competitive as guys like Landon. If we were really going to take a step forward to make Front Row more competitive, it became an easy decision.”

The deal came together so late (just last month) that Front Row is still working on sponsorship for the Daytona 500. But it has a driver Freeze believes it can build a program around, and the alliance with Roush should only help.

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. trusts that Roush will right the ship in 2016

As a result, Cassill now gets to move up the ladder another rung. No, Front Row isn’t Hendrick or Joe Gibbs Racing, but it’s a mid-level team on the rise.

And given how many decisions were driven by economics during this offseason — perhaps more than ever, given the impending charter system — Cassill said his new agreement is a great source of pride.

“One of the most exciting things about this deal with Front Row is it turned out to be a very competition-related decision in its purest form,” Cassill told USA TODAY Sports. “They called me because they wanted me to drive their car. It makes me know I’m at a place I’m wanted, and it’s the best opportunity I’ve had in the Cup Series.”

Over the years, Cassill has seen drivers leapfrog him in their careers because they had money, and that was difficult at times. He realized he was on a challenging path, and it would be much easier to be squeezed out of a ride if he didn’t perform.

But that he was able to make a living as a professional driver — getting paid to race, not vice versa — left him feeling like it “validates my life’s work,” he said.

“I don’t have any regrets,” he said. “I’m proud of what I’ve accomplished so far and to be able to make a living for my family doing this. The journey I’m on is going to be even that much sweeter when I reach victory lane.”

And really, isn't that how it should be?

Follow Gluck on Twitter @jeff_gluck

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