o much drama predicted! Yet so little will happen. Adam Cianciarulo’s entrance in the 450 class for 2020 has set the tee for a few tantalizing stories, including: “Can Ken Roczen and Adam Cianciarulo Remain Friends While Racing the Same Class?” “Can Adam Cianciarulo and Eli Tomac get Along as Teammates?” “Will Cooper Webb Be Out for Blood Against Adam Cianciarulo?”

Guess what: these are non-stories. Nothing is going to happen.

As my man Steve Matthes said during our Monster Energy Racer X Supercross Preview Shows, “What is this, Teen Beat magazine here?”

Everyone loves the gossip a little too much, and thus predicts crazy things. Usually they point to some moment in history where it happened before—drama between teammates and training partners—and predict a little bit of history repeated.

It’s okay to use history as a guide, but if you want to be accurate, you have to use all of the history. Using selective memory of high-profile incidents and forgetting about the non-stories leads to incorrect predictions.

Let’s start with teammates not getting along. Okay, we have a few examples: Jean-Michel Bayle tried to stop Jeff Stanton from winning the 1992 AMA Supercross Championship while they were both on Team Honda. And Mike Kiedrowski once ghost-rode his bike into Kawasaki teammate Mike LaRocco. But for each of those examples, I can name literally a dozen teammate combos every year that featured zero friction at all—even situations where teammates battled for race wins and titles. Take the mighty 1980s Team Honda or Monster Energy/Pro Circuit Kawasaki’s massive run of success. Lots of teammates, lots of race wins, lots of riders focused on the same prize racing for the same team. No drama. Johnny O’Mara and David Bailey remained best friends and teammates while racing for championships. Ricky Johnson and David Bailey went 1-2 in all the major championship fights in 1986 as teammates, and while not best friends, never an ill word was heard.

In 2007, Pro Circuit teammates Ryan Villopoto and Ben Townley won the West and East Lites Supercross Championships. A collision course in the Motocross Lites National Championship came next, and many predicted drama would ensue. Oddly, the two ended up becoming even better friends as the season went on. Yet once Cianciarulo’s move to the 450 class was announced, people immediately gravitated to the magnetic Stanton/Bayle storyline instead of the non-story RV/BT tale.

Then there’s Aldon Baker’s lineup, predicted to implode every season. When Roczen joined in 2014, pairing him with Villopoto seemed like pairing a match with gasoline. They battled for wins at the highest level in AMA Supercross without any problems. Preseason 2018, we heard of Baker’s Factory alpha-dog drama between Marvin Musquin and Jason Anderson, but both riders are still part of the operation. Webb brought all sorts of baggage last year thanks to all the mental abuse he heaped on Musquin in their 250 days. They had one incident at Houston, when Marvin bumped Cooper and Cooper became incensed with payback. Then it was back to normal—same team, same place every day.

It’s impossible to tell a non-story, so tales of drama tend to outweigh all the times when nothing interesting happened at all. When a superstar quarterback gets hurt and a backup has a few decent games, NFL analysts bring up Tom Brady replacing Drew Bledsoe and becoming the GOAT of quarterbacks. But what about the hundreds of times the backup came in, played below average, and faded into obscurity? That’s much more common and thus much more likely to happen again. In the NBA right now, Philadelphia 76ers guard Ben Simmons is known for outstanding skills but horrible long-range shooting. What comes next are stories of Magic Johnson working tirelessly on his jump shot and turning a weakness into a strength. Hey, it worked for Magic! But it also surely did not work for hundreds, maybe thousands, of would-be NBA superstars who tried, tried, and tried to shoot better but simply couldn’t.

Nothing wrong with using history as a guide, but when history actually indicates something won’t happen, nothing is what you should expect. Sorry, Teen Beat is going to have to search out stories elsewhere.