giraurd wrote:Sorry to drag on, but why does the driver the rookie is facing *need* to be comparable to Button, when Magnussen was further off Button than the examples I named to their benchmarks?
For what it's worth, we also can't know for sure whether Button was performing up to his normal standards in 2014 or not - remember how awful he was compared to Hamilton when struggling with balance?
First, Magnussen was only further off in total points - in terms of single lap pace, he was right up there. Points are, of course, only handed out on race day, which is where the experience gap between Magnussen and Button always came to the fore, especially since Button's strength was always in race pace. And anyway, in the case of Perez and Kobayashi, the gap between them in points was very similar to Button and Magnussen's - Perez scored 46% of Kobayashi's 2011 score, and Magnussen 43% of Button's score.
And second, we have clear evidence that Button is at least good enough to give Alonso a run for his money in 2015 - as he was most of the time against Hamilton. While his first half of 2014 was a bit suspect, he did have to step up his game towards the end of the season to be able to fend off Magnussen.
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