I think the points more or less tell the story. The period after Spa was obviously very telling. Nico lost too many battles.
Beyond looking at the points totals, one has to adjust to take account of certain outside influences:
1. Double points mean the gap is 25 points bigger than it would normally have been. Adjust by 25 points towards Rosberg
2. Hamilton was unlucky in having to start from the back in Germany and Hungary, whereas Rosberg was always able to start from his grid position (except at Singapore, which counts as a DNF, and therefore doesn't count since the DNFs effectively balanced each other out over the season). However, in such a dominant car this is not as big a disadvantage as it might appear because, frankly, getting past the rest of the field, except your teammate, over the course of an hour and a half should be child's play in that car. But I reckon it led to a 14 point swing against him in Germany, where he had the pace to win, and would have led to a similar swing in Hungary had it been a normal race. Adjust 24 points towards Hamilton (14 for Germany and 10 for Hungary, on the basis that he'd have beaten RIC and ALO starting from the front row).
3. Rosberg would have won in Hungary if not for the outrageous misfortune of being in the last corner when the SC was deployed, and having to do a whole lap at SC speed. Adjust 13 points towards Rosberg.
I make no adjustment for Monaco and Spa as there were no outside influences - it was between the drivers. So I conclude that Hamilton deservedly won the title and Rosberg deservedly lost it. I think the margin wasn't huge. I also think the criticism of Rosberg failing to overtake Hamilton is a little harsh - if you're quicker than somebody, you shouldn't need to overtake them. You should be ahead. If you look at the races Nico won, that was the case, and if you look at most of the races he lost, he was slower. If you're behind somebody and you're slower, then you're not going to pass them regardless of how good or bad your racecraft is. The only time Nico should have passed Lewis. and was out-raced, was Bahrain, and I agree with much of the criticism there. Lewis did have to get very robust to keep his place there, though, and anybody who doesn't see the connection between events there and at Spa is not paying enough attention, as far as I'm concerned.
I'd also make the point that, insofar as the current ease of passing with lower downforce, higher top speeds, bigger braking events and Super Mario Flap rewards race pace over qualifying pace, this has played very much into Hamilton's hands. Anyone who got outqualified by his teammate would simply not have been able to win eleven races under the regulations as they were four years ago.
And one final point; I think the way the team handled the two drivers was interesting. When Hamilton ignored a legitimate team order in Hungary, the clout he and his management have within the team became obvious, so much so that the team ended up apologising to him rather than vice versa, and this one incident showed to the outside world a glimpse of what Rosberg had, perhaps, been up against all along. We can't be sure without inside knowledge, of course, but it seems like what Lewis wants, Lewis gets, and that's only set to continue into next year now that he has won the title with them. I didn't think the team responded appropriately to what I saw as Hamilton's obstructive behaviour during the race in Hungary, which only benefited Fernando Alonso, giving Ferrari our best result of the year (thanks for that, Lewis). And I didn't agree with their absolutely ridiculous reaction to the Spa incident, which I thought made a mountain out of a molehill, as compared with their reaction to Hamilton leaking the content of a private meeting about the incident, where the team's non-reaction rather made a molehill out of what I would have thought was quite a serious breach of etiquette. None of these things affects how I evaluate the season in terms of how the two men drove, but I can't help thinking the team has got its preferred outcome from the battle between its two drivers.
It's extremely dangerous for any driver who is paired with a more illustrious teammate, who has a more impressive CV and a bigger pay cheque and a higher profile, that a perceived "natural order" will quite readily establish itself, and become self-fulfiilling to a certain extent. Rosberg's determination over the past two years to keep coming back and getting results, and his refusal to roll over, have impressed me, but it was always going to be hard for him to establish any kind of perceived natural order in his favour. Now that he's lost the battle this season, I fear the rot has set in and he will find it incredibly difficult to take results off Hamilton hereinafter, even occasionally, because frankly, there are now senior elements in the team (I'm not necessarily saying Niki Lauda) which actively don't want him to. It's a small step from here to the Mark Webber situation where you'd have Hamilton's side of the garage cannibalising Nico's race car for parts...
Edited by redreni, 24 November 2014 - 22:17.