Did You Notice? … Kyle Busch is living through an all-out implosion, cratering less than two years after switching NASCAR Cup Series teams to Richard Childress Racing.
The latest calamity for Busch came at Pocono Raceway on Sunday (July 14) with his race coming to an end with a little extra help from Corey LaJoie entering turn 1.
Whether Busch blocked a little too much or LaJoie was a little too trigger happy is a whole other conversation altogether. Either way, the wreck simply put an ailing Busch out of his misery, spending much of the day a 30th-place car on speed.
The future NASCAR Hall of Fame driver appeared deflated, refusing to engage on any controversy surrounding LaJoie while exiting stage right as quickly as possible.
“It doesn’t matter what I think,” Busch said. “… Sometimes, some don’t lift. Kamikaze.”
Busch had the look and feel of a driver who’s mentally checked out. And why shouldn’t he be? Busch has endured five DNFs in his last seven starts, easily the worst stretch of his NASCAR career. The two-time Cup champion has spiraled downward from over 30 points above the playoff cut line when this began, after Memorial Day Weekend at Charlotte Motor Speedway, to over 100 points behind it.
Consider this trend: in 20 years of racing Cup full time, Busch has only had six seasons of five or more DNFs. Two of those six are now from his time with RCR, where he’s failed to finish a whopping 11 times in 57 starts (a DNF rate of 19%).
When Busch has avoided trouble, the speed just hasn’t been there. He has only two top-five finishes: a fourth at Dover Motor Speedway in May after winning the pole and a third (by inches) at Atlanta Motor Speedway back in February.
You wonder if the second race of the season might have been a game-changer for Busch. He led 28 laps and appeared to make the winning move on Ryan Blaney mere seconds from the finish line. But Daniel Suarez got to the outside of both of them, making it three-wide coming off turn 4, and the No. 99 car had just enough momentum to inch ahead.
If Busch prevailed there, he would have extended a NASCAR record streak of 20 straight seasons with a win. It would also have taken the pressure off a RCR outfit that’s struggling to keep up this season by securing them an early playoff spot with their pack racing program.
What a difference those few inches can make. Busch has only led 91 circuits since that event, on pace for the fewest laps led of any season in his Cup career. The previous record, 241, was set during his first year behind the wheel with RCR.
Sure, Busch won three times that season. A win at Auto Club Speedway in February 2023, just his second race with RCR, felt like pure adrenaline mixed with revenge after Toyota and Joe Gibbs Racing chose to move on. His second victory, at Talladega Superspeedway in April, was his first at a pack race in almost 15 years. His third, from the pole at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway last June, felt like legitimate speed: 121 laps led from the pole.
But that type of Gateway run has been an aberration, not the norm. As 2023 wore on, the team lost its magic, exiting championship contention during a Round of 12 where Busch finished no better than 20th. Chemistry with crew chief Randall Burnett, a holdover from the Tyler Reddick era, has seemed to flounder throughout 2024.
It hasn’t helped teammate Austin Dillon is far worse: no top-five finishes, no laps led, 32nd in points (but with a multi-year contract extension in hand). Big changes are expected to the program after Competition Director Andy Petree chose to retire a couple of weeks ago.
Those changes come with a healthy dose of skepticism. RCR has been playing sloppy seconds behind HMS at Chevrolet for well over two decades. Some of its best years since Dale Earnhardt Sr., where it has looked championship caliber (2013, ’22), the driver who led the team there (Kevin Harvick, Reddick) departed for another team the following year. A team that once had one of the best resource pools in NASCAR now struggles to remain among the middle class.
They’re also expecting Busch, used to top-tier equipment his entire career, to remain patient when the plan back to respectability is long. It’s a driver who’s matured through the years but struggles to keep his head in the game when it’s a difference between battling for 20th versus 25th.
Perhaps the only thing going for both sides is a dearth of other options. Hendrick Motorsports, Team Penske and JGR, in theory, have all 11 of their drivers now signed to long-term deals. Unless 23XI Racing would one day make room, it’s hard to see Busch making anything better than a lateral move should he jump ship.
RCR also needs the sponsorship Busch’s name brand does bring. Austin Hill and Jesse Love, while talented, don’t carry the once-in-a-generation level of talent Busch provides.
So, both sides prepare for the long slog of the summer and fall. The focus should be on finding any way to extend Busch’s record streak another year. There’s always 2025 … I guess?
Did You Notice? … JD Motorsports’ NASCAR Xfinity Series bankruptcy looms as a warning sign? A team that’s raced, on and off, for 40 years and been around consistently in the series since 2002 may not field an entry the rest of the year after filing for Chapter 11.
As sad as the situation is with JDM, it used to be that someone else would be ready and willing to take its place. Whether or not JDM deserves to fade away, laying off employees and potentially closing its shop, another owner would swoop in and start their own racing dream.
But here’s the problem in 2024: that’s not happening. As I’ve written about in the past, attracting new blood has been a problem in the sport’s lower series and only one part-time outfit, Rette Jones Racing, has debuted independently in NXS this year (technically, the next-closest thing is Viking Motorsports and Matt DiBenedetto, in a partnership with RSS Racing).
It’s an issue for the sport’s second- and third-tier divisions that hasn’t been improving for a couple of years now. If a team isn’t tied to a Cup operation, or heavily supported by a manufacturer, it struggles to either remain competitive or simply stay afloat in a world where costs are inflating.
Just like in the Cup ranks, where the worth of a charter is determined by who’s interested in purchasing them, the value of a series deflates when it fails to attract interested investors. What incentive right now is there from a business perspective to invest in the Xfinity Series if you’re guaranteed to lose money or not contend for wins as an independent program?
It’s the same type of argument Michael Jordan has made when he was bold enough to say “NASCAR is going to die” if the sport is not improved. The revenue stream model currently being negotiated also needs to make its way down to Xfinity, the Craftsman Truck Series, even the ARCA Menards Series, in order for the payroll department to keep cutting checks.
Even if NASCAR could continue to inch its way toward Formula 1 territory, utilizing five to seven main teams in NXS and Trucks, there has to be a way it can better support what have become its feeder series financially. Major League Baseball doesn’t expect the minors to make the same type of revenue. But it has a business model built to ensure they stay afloat.
Did You Notice? … Quick hits before taking off …
- It’s July and it seems so much of NASCAR Silly Season has happened already. The best ride left available, it feels like, is Front Row Motorsports’ third car where a reunion with Zane Smith makes too much sense to me. It would solve the Trackhouse Racing problem (four drivers, three charters) and reunite Smith with a team he won the Craftsman Truck Series championship with in 2022. We’ll see.
- Corey LaJoie avoided further punishment after Sunday’s very public bump-and-wreck with Kyle Busch. But it feels like LaJoie is suddenly under a microscope in a way he hasn’t been before. Carson Hocevar’s success has chipped away at his “underdog that could” image. Other incidents, including with former champ Jimmie Johnson, have led to others thinking he’s too aggressive. The arrival of crew chief Rodney Childers next year raises the stakes to make-or-break. Will this be an inflection point where LaJoie adjusts his style a bit?
Follow Tom Bowles @NASCARBowles
The author of Did You Notice? (Wednesdays) Tom spends his time overseeing Frontstretch’s 40+ staff members as its majority owner and Editor-in-Chief. Based outside Philadelphia, Bowles is a two-time Emmy winner in NASCAR television and has worked in racing production with FOX, TNT, and ESPN while appearing on-air for SIRIUS XM Radio and FOX Sports 1's former show, the Crowd Goes Wild. He most recently consulted with SRX Racing, helping manage cutting-edge technology and graphics that appeared on their CBS broadcasts during 2021 and 2022.
You can find Tom’s writing here, at CBSSports.com and Athlonsports.com, where he’s been an editorial consultant for the annual racing magazine for 15 years.