Dale Earnhardt Jr. is sticking with Washington's NFL team, which is searching for a new identity.
Earnhardt affirmed his allegiance a day after the franchise announced it was retiring "Redskins," the club's moniker since 1933, and replacing it at some point with . . . something else.
"I'm all for it," the NASCAR Hall of Famer said Tuesday on his "Dale Jr. Download" podcast.
RIVERA: A clear favorite is emerging as the replacement to Redskins
Junior spent about six minutes offering his superfan perspective of the upcoming "big, big change" and talking about how the rooting experience was affected by the previously unheeded calls for the nickname to be changed to something not racist toward Native Americans.
"I'm ready for this conversation to no longer be part of my experience as a fan of the team, and the debate over this and the frustration over it and how it affects the franchise," he said. "It's a dark cloud over it all the time and it's not going away. And it's hard to continue to support the franchise when this is part of the conversation."
HAISLOP: Why it might take a while for team to announce new nickname
But support the franchise Earnhardt will. He has "invested" in it for decades and isn't looking to go elsewhere now.
"Leaving a team like that is one thing, but then you've got to find another team. It's not just as easy as just walking out the door and saying, 'All right, I'm done with this.' But then you've got to find another team," Earnhardt, 45, said. "Nothing out there, really, has that appeal to me."
He also said he won't get attached to a nickname until the team announces the change. Red Wolves, Redtails and Warriors are seen as the top replacement options.
"I'm not going to sort of fall in love with one, and I'm just going to wait, because nobody really knows what the name's going to be. I don't want to really like one and find out that it's the other," he said.
