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BRISTOL, Tenn. -- Casey Mears will drive for Richard Childress Racing next year, as the NASCAR Sprint Cup team expands and alters its driver lineup.

Mears has a three-year contract to drive the No. 07 Jack Daniel's car for Childress. Clint Bowyer, who has raced the No. 07 since 2006, will drive the No. 33 Cheerios car for Childress next season, as the organization goes from three to four teams (Jeff Burton and Kevin Harvick are the other two drivers).

Mears will keep the car owner points for the No. 07 car that Bowyer earns this season, meaning Mears will have a guaranteed starting spot in the first five races of next year. Bowyer's new ride won't have enough car owner points to be guaranteed a starting spot in the first five races of next season.

Car owner Richard Childress, though, hinted that Bowyer's team won't have to face that. That would mean Childress acquires the points for another car. Childress also wouldn't detail crew chief lineups but Bowyer's crew is not expected to move with him next season.

Where the points for Bowyer's team will come from next season could be Dale Earnhardt Inc. Childress and DEI share an engine program and one possibility would be for Childress to buy one of the DEI teams and use that car's points for Bowyer.

With no sponsor yet for the No. 01 team of Regan Smith, questions of if the U.S. Army will remain with the No. 8 team of Aric Almirola and if Paul Menard will be back, DEI might not field four teams and could sell the points from one of those teams to Childress.

NEW HOME? Speedway Motorsports Inc, has completed its due diligence on the acquisition of Kentucky Motor Speedway but the deal is not complete yet.

"We are in the deliberation process right now," said Marcus Smith, chief operating officer and president of SMI.

Smith said "it is possible" for SMI to not complete the deal and walk away from it.

REPLACEMENT FOR STEWART: Joe Gibbs Racing is expected to announce Monday that Joey Logano will replace Tony Stewart in the No. 20 car next season. Stewart will leave the team after this season to drive for his own organization, Stewart Haas Racing.

Logano has run a limited schedule for JGR in the Nationwide Series since he turned 18 earlier in the year, and is expected to make his Sprint Cup Series debut in September at Richmond.

WORKING TOGETHER? The joke along teams at the back of the garage is that it's the mergers and acquisitions section, a reference to all the talk of teams selling to investors or merging.

"Just about everything you can imagine in this garage, people talking to people," said Tom Garfinkel, co-owner of Hall of Fame Racing, of all the possibilities.

So, what about Hall of Fame Racing?

"We're evaluating all our options for next year &ellipses; to be able to build a great team and be competitive in the future," Garfinkel said.

Garfinkel said that the team would like to remain with Toyota "but as we look at other team situations, some of them require different manufacturers and so we're having those conversations as well."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Contact Dustin Long at 373-7062 or dustin.long@news-record.com