Sorry but too long post to read before going to work, but I´ll say this, even if by definition he´s an employee, he´s not a usual employee, he´s the star of the team. If you can´t cope with this sorry, I know you don´t like Alonso at all, but he´s the star of McHonda project like it or not.Phil wrote: ↑31 Aug 2017, 01:48Oh dear...Andres125sx wrote: ↑30 Aug 2017, 17:07Error. He´s not a single individual, he´s, unquestionably, one of the best 3 drivers on the grid, the best of them for many people, so you can´t take it as a simple employee.
employee
ɛmplɔɪˈiː,ɛmˈplɔɪiː,ɪmˈplɔɪiː/Submit
noun
a person employed for wages or salary, especially at non-executive level.
synonyms: worker, member of staff, member of the workforce;
employer
ɪmˈplɔɪə,ɛmˈplɔɪə/Submit
noun
noun: employer; plural noun: employers
a person or organization that employs people.
synonyms: boss, manager, manageress, patron, proprietor, director, managing director, chief executive, principal, president, head man, head woman;
One applies to Fernando Alonso, the other unquestionably to team McLaren and Honda. To put it into simpler terms; One entity (the employer) employs the employee in exchange for a service. This service includes driving an F1 car as well as satisfying sponsors, promoting the sport etc. For that the employee (the driver) receives a salary. In the case of Fernando Alonso, this salary is apparently as high as $40M/year.
Winning races and championships are a common goal both employer and employee share. It's rather doubtful this is in the contract any driver - yes including Alonso - signed. There may be performance (-exit) clauses for both parties as well as what happens in case one party breaches the contract. The performance clause may be a bit tricky, as I assume that Honda being a newcomer would know it's a bit of an unknown to predict how well they'd perform etc. Even so, I'd assume there would be some performance clause in there at least as of season 2 or 3, making sure that a certain WCC position is reached by point X, Y and Z and if not, that the driver has an exit clause he can trigger, similar to what Vettel used to switch to Ferrari in 2014.
The notion being put forward that Alonso is some kind of victim because Ferrari or McLaren-Honda supposedly promised a golden future is laughable. No team can promise championships. How could they? It's anyones guess. At best, educated guesses were made based on reasonable expectations etc. Hamilton was lured to Mercedes, a team performing no better than a distant 5th at the time (they not even had half the points of Lotus-Renault in 4th). He still went to Mercedes, not because he was "promised" anything, but because he wasn't happy at McLaren and he had faith that the things Mercedes (Ross Brawn) showed him showed promise. It was a gamble, one that payed off.
Alonso went to McLaren in 2007 for similar reasons. He also went to Ferrari later, because everyone knows that the Scuderia is perhaps the greatest name in F1. Ferrari is synonymous to F1 as it is vice-versa. And over the years, they have been a steady, consistent performer, even when not a WDC winning team. The point being; teams don't make promises. They dream and invest and hope that it all pays off. In the most basic sense though; the team is the employer who decides who drives in their team and pays a salary for that and other things. If no team is willing to employ Fernando Alonso, his "ability" or gift of being the greatest is worth zip, nada, zilch, nada... nothing. So yes, Fernando is a simple individual, an employee of a team that employs thousands of employees.
Err, the contract was evidently terminated by mutual agreement, because the team and Alonso no longer wanted to continue after what happened. As for what happened, well, it's rather well documented if you'd bother to read up on it. Basically things turned very bad when the driver started to blackmail his team/boss which is pretty much a big no-go. So yes, things turned very sour so instead of being able to drive the 2008 McLaren as planned and perhaps win another championship (or be runner up, who knows), he chose to go back to a team that was nowhere.Andres125sx wrote: ↑30 Aug 2017, 17:07I really can´t imagine what Mclaren did in 2007 with Alonso, but it should be quite severe for him to prefer going to Renault when he had a valid contract with McLaren for 2008...
One can argue many things about what McLaren did or did not do wrong back then with their star-driver, but it's rather summed up easily into that McLaren did produce a WDC winning car the year after and one driver was there to win it (Hamilton) and the other somehow burned his seat and was not. The loser in 2007 and 2008 was no other than Fernando Alonso.
To make matters worse - things didn't go much better at Ferrari. They did at first, but after 2012, things started to go very sour there too. One just has to ask themselves why on earth Fernando Alonso would have even considered going to McLaren in 2015 when it was evident that McLaren was a team going backwards. 2013 and 2014, both with Mercedes engines, showed the shortcomings of those cars and there was nothing engine related about that. And he chose that team over the team that was consistently in the top 3 how many years in a row (yes, with the exception of 2014).
The matter of fact is that Ferrari wanted and needed change. Alonso didn't fit in, he had to leave. And the only high budget team that had an opening was McLaren that showed some promise with Honda jumping in. If he had been smart, he'd have waited a year and tried to get an opening at Mercedes either when Hamilton or Rosbergs contract came up for renewal (Hamilton was to the best of my knowledge on a 3 year deal from 2013-2015, not sure about Rosberg). RedBull was never going to be interested as a result of their in-house driver development program. Yet Alonso jumped to McLaren, go figure...
I'm willing to bet the bridge at Ferrari was so burned that he had no other choice but to leave and either take a year out or go for the next best thing - a seat at McLaren.
Fast forward to today and the attitude is still there. Strangely, not only prevalent in Alonso himself, but his fans too. The "attitude" that the star driver deserves a championship. The fact that he is not in a team capable of doing so is fuelling his and their frustrations over the perceived injustice. And with it, in the process of burning yet another bridge. I wouldn't discount Honda coming good at some point if they somehow retain that partnership with McLaren, but I'm rather doubtful Alonso will still be there. Either he will have left by his own ultimatum (Him or Honda) or Honda will at some point realise that they'd rather have a professional driver who does not humiliate them at every opportunity.
As I said numerous times - his ability to drive a F1 car fast is beyond doubt. But to feel sorry for him... well, with that attitude. I certainly don't. Not when you consider that he has only himself to blame for the race seats he has ended up with over the years. When Vettel wins this years championship (he might), it will be a severe blow to Fernando and already will turn out to be the 2nd championship winning seat he lost due to his temper and attitude.
Last but not least: I am very certain that Fernando Alonso is not bound to McLaren-Honda by contract anymore. Given this is his 3rd season, I'm fairly confident there are exit clauses that have been already triggered by the subpar performance so far - at least since end of season 2. This means that Alonso is a free man. He is not forced to stay with McLaren. If he was that wanted because everyone accepts he is "the greatest ever" - why the hell hasn't he already been grabbed by any of the top 2-3 works teams (Ferrari/Mercedes/Renault)? His speed is clearly undisputed. Each of those two/three teams have two seats - each had an opening just this and next year. Why is Alonso not with any of them, if not for his character? Because he believes in McLaren? Yeah, right...
And about McLaren in 2007, you´re saying yourself the rupture was by mutual agreement.... right.
And you´ve never wondered the reason a driver like Alonso would prefer to drive a poor renault instead of the best car of the grid?
Because in 2007 it already was the best car, Kimi won only thanks to McLaren screwing up his own season supporting a rookie with no experiece who made understandable mistakes for a rookie.
But hey, you´re saying yourself it was by mutual agreement, but keep saying he did receive a fair treatment in McLaren.... so you think Fernando Alonso is some sort of retarded who prefer Renault 2008 better than McLaren 2008 even when he had a valid contract with McLaren...
Be serious Phil, your antipathy towards Alonso is blinding you. You know Ron Dennis paid Hamilton career since he was 12, don´t you? You know McLaren was willing to have a british champions after decades without one, don´t you? You know this is F1 and politics play a huge role, don´t you?