CONCORD, N.C. -- Love it or hate it, Nextel Cup is now stuck with it for at least the upcoming season.

And there were probably as many opinions voiced Tuesday when NASCAR announced its new points system as there are components of the plan. On one hand, there's those who think the so-called "chase for the championship" will take the sport to new heights. On the other hand, some think it could be the biggest blunder the sanctioning body has made in a long, long time.

Speculation has grown from a murmur to a crescendo over the past weeks as everyone involved in stock-car racing anxiously awaited the big change. Would it be a playoff? Would it be a championship series like we see in other pro and college sports? Would it be something that fans will embrace or abhor?

The issue has even divided race teams themselves. At Dale Earnhardt Inc., Dale Earnhardt Jr. is against the move, while teammate Michael Waltrip is a proud spokesman for the new system.

"I'm not in approval of it personally," Junior said. "But once a decision is made, it doesn't do anybody any good for me to go any further than that. I'm curious about it as far as how it is going to work out. I look forward to seeing what the end result is.

"The only thing personally that is important to me is that by the end of the day, if I win a championship, how it's going to be compared to the championships that my father won. Is it the same? Is it better? Is it not as good? And, too, at the same time, it's going to be difficult for a lot of (the media) to point out who would have won if the system had stayed the other way. So, basically in the fan's minds, you're going to have two different champions."

The irony is that Earnhardt Jr., who has become an icon in the sport in just four years, is believed by some to be a key reason NASCAR surreptitiously made the change in the first place -- to give Little E and others such as Jimmie Johnson, Ryan Newman and Kurt Busch a chance to win a title that has up to now proven elusive to these so-called young guns.

Waltrip, on the other hand, has nothing but praise for NASCAR's move.

"I'm definitely in favor of it," Waltrip said. "People ask how this is going to change strategy. I don't think it's going to change it at all. We line up and race hard every week. In Matt Kenseth's situation, he changed his plan late in the season. He was smart and had to get home to win that championship. He did it perfectly. Maybe (under the new system) that would get thrown out, or would definitely get thrown out. He wouldn't be able to do that (under the new system). But if you're 90 percent of the other competitors, you're going to race the same way every week. You've got to be the best."

Press Waltrip to come up with a negative to the new proposal, and he doesn't really see any.

	Teammates Junior, left, and Waltrip don't exactly see eye-to-eye on NASCAR's new title plan.

"After thinking long and hard about that and talking with several of my competitors, the only downside that I've been able to gather is it's new, and as a whole, people are scared of stuff that's new and different, so they're freaking out about it a little bit," he said.

But Junior is singing a much different tune, saying that the change is partly a knee-jerk reaction to Matt Kenseth's season in 2003, when he won the Cup title with uncanny consistency but won just one race.

"Yeah, I think that's probably true," Junior said. "Obviously, the core of this decision, the core of this change, comes from everybody's opinion about last year's points race. I think that has a lot to do with it. Whether that's right or fair, that's just the way the rule works.

"It's a big change, and it may work out and it may be something great, maybe (it will be) everything they say it will be. But I guess we'll just have to wait and see. I liked things the way they were. I would have changed a few things, but this is pretty huge, kind of like a wipe the slate clean kind of deal. Sometimes, that's a pretty big risk, I think."

Earnhardt Jr. also is uneasy from a historical standpoint; clearly, he's thinking about yesterday as much as he is today or tomorrow.

"You've got people that have written that if they had this system over the last 20 years, how many championships wouldn't have been won or what not," the younger Earnhardt said. "I didn't like that because Dad (the late Dale Earnhardt) wouldn't have won as many championships, so that kinda bothered me.

"When we go out over the next 10 years with this system, and however they may tweak it here and there, and whoever wins so many championships, I think they should be credited and applauded as champions. Hopefully, everybody will just respect what they tried to achieve during that year, no matter how they had to do it, no matter what kind of system they had to use."

If Earnhardt Jr. finds himself having a 2004 season like Kenseth had last season, he definitely would not want the points structure messed with. But with Tuesday's announcement, the driver of the No. 8 Chevrolet doesn't have a choice.

And neither does anyone else.

"Call me a pessimist, but if I have a 400-point lead after 26 races, I'd be pretty upset if I can't hang on to that," Junior said. "We've been so used to doing it the way we've been doing it for so long that it affects your frame of mind. You go out there putting one race together at a time to build up the biggest amount of points you can build up. This is going to force you to change the way you approach winning the championship."

Perhaps the biggest question among team owners and drivers polled thus far during this week's annual NASCAR Media Tour in Charlotte is whether or not the new system will decrease the value of the Nextel Cup championship -- where a driver who may have won the title under the old system won't necessarily be able to do the same under the new system.

For instance, if one applies the new plan right now to last year's results, the winner would have been Jimmie Johnson, followed by Jeff Gordon, Newman, Junior, Harvick and Kenseth.

"That's what I'm curious about," Earnhardt Jr. said. "You set it up however you want to set it up. Forty-two of us go out there and try to go after it, and you crown one guy. And if they crown me next year, I'm going to be as excited about it as at any other time, regardless. Personally, maybe, there's not a difference. But what are the fans and media going to do to it? How are they going to either applaud it or criticize it? Regardless of what Matt wants to say or what I say at any time, the media and fans have an effect on how you feel about it."

Waltrip, on the other hand, feels the new system will eliminate points racing, much as what Kenseth did in the final third of last season. Rather than go all-out for the win, he seemed to be content to wind up with a top-10 finish in most races, if for nothing more than to protect his points lead. The plan worked, and that's why Kenseth is defending Cup champion heading into the new season.

"People race too hard today to think you're going to points race," Waltrip said. "I don't even know what that means anymore. This plan not only addresses people not point racing, it makes it more important to race hard every lap."

So you see, the split on this issue runs deep -- even among teammates.

Jerry Bonkowski covers NASCAR for ESPN.com. He can be reached at Motorsportwriter@MSN.com.