Why F1's driver market is boring compared to MotoGP

Daniel Ricciardo is going to Mercedes, Kimi Raikkonen is out of Ferrari, Max Verstappen is leaving Red Bull for Sauber, Formula 2 leader Lando Norris is headed to Toro Rosso, Charles Leclerc is moving to Renault and Artem Markelov is joining Force India.

Something akin to this would be happening were the Formula 1 driver market as exciting as what's going on in MotoGP for 2019. Well, it is if you allow a few broad-brushstroke correlations to be drawn between certain drivers/riders and teams.

Four of the six drivers in F1's big three teams are out of contract at the end of this year, yet right now the smart money is on all of them being in the same place in 2019. The big three's line-ups will probably be the same for a third consecutive season. There's a word for that: stagnation.

Why? There are multiple reasons, some of which lie in the cautious mentality of the teams, some of which are down to the nature of the current generation of F1 cars, and because of the strong divide between the haves and the have-nots in contemporary grand prix racing.

Firstly, teams tend to be conservative on driver choices. It's a case of 'better the devil you know' being more appealing than risking a 'grass is always greener' appointment. For every inspired piece of recruitment, there are cases of drivers who underachieved when given a big chance.

It's also a more comfortable existence to have a clear hierarchy in your team, which is effectively what Mercedes and Ferrari currently have. Indeed, one of the main arguments Red Bull is using to persuade Ricciardo to sign on the dotted line is 'why go to one of those teams to be number two?'.

But this is the easy option. While there are some infamous cases of two big-name drivers causing problems in teams - Williams in 1986-87 with Nelson Piquet and Nigel Mansell being the obvious example - there are also times when it has succeeded. Crucially, it needs strong and bold management.

Very often, teams favour the line of least resistance. In Ferrari's position, bringing in a new second driver, particularly a young charger such as Leclerc, risks destabilising Sebastian Vettel.

You can understand the reluctance to take that risk, although it's always seemed strange that teams spend vast sums on every fraction of a performance but sometimes stint when it comes to the bit in the cockpit that has to extract that high-cost potential from the car.

Nigel Mansell didn't move to Onyx as a result of Stefan Johansson's 1989 Portugal podium, but there were more viable options than there are now

From a team boss's perspective, finding a driver who can slot in at a high enough level to take points off the established team leader's rivals without upsetting them is shooting for a narrow window. And when you've got a solid banker already in that position, it's no surprise many eschew taking the risk that a change could lead to a driver causing them problems either by over or underachieving. But it is certainly disappointing.

The second factor is that current grand prix cars are hugely complicated, with a vast array of unseen set-up options within them. For drivers to master the intricacies to the maximum requires a season of experience. In simpler times, adaptation was less complicated.

This is particularly relevant when it comes to drivers moving from the midfield to large teams. As Valtteri Bottas explained in a recent interview with Autosport: "Changing teams was a bit bigger than I expected." He cited the range of set-up changes, ones that can be made multiple times during a lap to optimise the car, as a big part of that.

It should be noted when it comes to the MotoGP comparison that many riders have had difficulties when they have moved between makes of bike. But this is just one factor, and MotoGP lacks the confluence of factors on top of this that makes movement less free.

There's also the question of the sheer lack of options in F1. This will be the fourth time in six seasons that Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull lock out the top three in the constructors' championship.

And while in the first year of that period Lotus (as it was before Renault took over again at Enstone) was knocking on the door and capable of winning a race, the divide between that trio in the rest has since widened. So immediately, if you are a top driver who fancies a move, options are very limited.

During the 69 seasons of the world championship, on average six different makes have claimed podium finishes during a season. This year and last year, only four teams have done so.

That's low even by the standards of the V6 hybrid era, with the first two seasons hitting the average half-dozen. But go back to just a few years earlier and things are very different: in 2008 and '09, there were respectively nine and eight makes on the podium.

The record is 10, first achieved in 1978 and repeated in 1989. Both of those are seasons history remembers as dominant, for Lotus and McLaren respectively, yet there was tremendous variety.

In 1978, podiums went to Lotus, Brabham, Ferrari, Tyrrell, Wolf, Ligier, Fittipaldi, Arrows, McLaren and Williams. In 1989, it was McLaren, Williams, Ferrari, Benetton, March, Brabham, Tyrrell, Arrows, Dallara and Onyx (pictured below).

To match that in 2018, all 10 of the teams on the grid would have to make the podium. That's unlikely given the stranglehold of the big three, which effectively means that in a straightforward race the best result possible for seven of those teams is seventh.

Yes, Nigel Mansell didn't move to Onyx as a result of Stefan Johansson's 1989 Portuguese Grand Prix podium, but there were more viable options than there are now for a top driver.

To return to the MotoGP comparison, there are myriad destinations that give you a realistic shot at good results. Even if you can't land a manufacturer ride, there are satellite teams that will allow riders to piece together good campaigns - and more than the promise of a stack of finishes in the bottom half of the top 10.

At LCR Honda, Cal Crutchlow has won three grands prix in the last two-and-a-half seasons, while the Pramac Ducati team has given riders the odd podium and is strong enough this year to be third in the teams' standings. And at Tech3 Yamaha, Johann Zarco has been a fixture in the top six of the championship for the past season-and-a-half.

On top of the three big teams - Honda, Yamaha and Ducati - there's an emerging KTM, the improving Suzuki and a sixth works operation in Aprilia (albeit one that would be a huge risk for any big-name rider to join).

While in F1, only three teams give you a cast-iron shot at winning races, MotoGP offers wider choice. Even though only Honda and Ducati have won so far this year, there are others knocking on the door. Yes, those two teams would be at the top of most MotoGP riders' lists, but there are more alternatives worth considering should you want a move.

Granted, you can argue a rider can have a larger impact on the competitive equation than a driver in F1. But often that manifests itself as a strong rider failing to adapt to the challenges of a different bike and falling back rather than one elevating a team beyond where it should be. The laws of physics, after all, apply even to the greatest.

But in F1, there are only three teams worth being in for a world championship calibre driver right now. And of the chasing pack there's currently only one that you might consider throwing your lot in with as a long-term bet - Renault. Even then, that's a long shot.

Stories about the driver market remain among the most engaging in F1, but there are not enough such stories to go around

There's a final, hidden, factor. The unseen hand of the proverbial 'men in smoke-filled rooms' manipulating driver moves in the background was once a powerful force in grand prix racing, but there's been no sign of Liberty Media having an appetite for pulling strings to facilitate such transfers.

Bernie Ecclestone was never afraid to play his part in moving some of the chess pieces to keep the F1 grid fresh. The classic example was in 1994, when following the tragic loss of Ayrton Senna he moved mountains to bring back the one established 'big box office' driver still racing - Mansell.

Stories about the driver market remain among the most engaging in F1, but there are not enough such stories to go around - even among the smaller teams.

At the start of this season, 18 of the 20 drivers were in the same car at the start of this season as they were at the end of 2017.

That means the only drivers in unfamiliar places we've got this year are Sergey Sirotkin at Williams and Leclerc at Sauber - albeit with the caveat that Toro Rosso's driver line-up changed towards the end of last season, with Carlos Sainz Jr moving in at Renault.

The last time there were so many drivers in the same car was from 1989 into 1990 - but with 20 teams on the grid in the second of those years, that's a much smaller proportion. Plus, over the winter between those two seasons, world champion Alain Prost left McLaren and took the number one to Ferrari.

So now F1 has the problem of a less fluid grid, along with drivers hanging around far longer than they used to do thanks to a combination of many coming into F1 younger and the welcome lack of accident and injury.

Not every year can be a 2010, or a 1996 - when six of the seats in the top four teams from the previous campaign changed hands - but F1 needs more driver movement to keep itself fresh.

For that to happen, F1 needs to tackle its problems of the inequality of funding and the unprecedented chasm between the elite few teams and the rest. Now, more than ever, sports stand or fall on the stories they generate, and driver moves in F1 are a huge part of generating such interest.

Even this season, when we've had three different teams win races and Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes are often covered by a few tenths, has been criticised for supposedly being boring.

That criticism perhaps says less about what we're actually seeing, and more about the feeling that fans are seeing variations of the 'same old' every weekend. That's what makes what could be termed 'freedom of movement' so important.

Teams and races are important - and Red Bull's switch to Honda power next year is a welcome change - but for a large proportion of the fanbase the drivers are the stars.

Amid all the arguing about rules, money and races - some of which do have an impact on drivers moving around - F1 needs to remember that, to many, the drivers are the stars. Especially with one of its handful genuine box office megastars, Fernando Alonso, flirting with other categories and his F1 future far from certain.