As the Onion Peels... And Its Impact on Kyle Busch
|
|
As
I watched the 2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Championship Awards ceremony,
it was hard not to think back to the first trophy Kyle Busch was presented in
Nashville. How can anyone forget his
2009 Xfinity Series win at the Nashville Speedway? The trophy that night was one of the coolest,
most respected and coveted trophies in the sport-a Sam Bass custom designed
Gibson Les Paul guitar.
Let’s just say Kyle made quite an
impression that night in Victory Lane.
Ten
years have passed. A lot has gone on
since that night. A lot has
changed. A lot more change is to come.
With
Seven-time Cup Champ Jimmie Johnson announcing that the 2020 season would be
his final full-time Cup season, Frank Buhrman’s
recent article entitled What’s
the Right Age To Quit NASCAR and Thanksgiving Day passing of a
long-time family friend I became a bit reflective while watching the show. Reflecting on things like life... work...
racing.
A
friend once tried to explain things to me with the following analogy. It was long before Forrest Gump’s mom gave
the world hers. His went simply, “Life
is like an onion. We start in the
middle. Safe. Protected.
No end in sight. But as time goes
on, layer after layer gets peeled away.
Before we know it, we can see through that outer layer. That’s where we are now. Too soon after, we are the outer layer.”
He
didn’t have to finish... I got the
picture.
I
prefer Momma Gump’s “box of chocolates” life assessment to my friend’s onion,
but unfortunately there is a lot of truth in his analogy. In life, I’ve had to say good-bye to too many
friends. I’ve seen it at work as more folks around me are calling it a career.
That
got me thinking about the NASCAR “onion”.
Truthfully,
we see it in racing as well, most recently Jamie McMurray, David Ragan and Paul
Menard stepping out from behind the wheel and Jimmie Johnson announcement for
the 2020 season. The Jamie, Paul and
David outside layer is peeled away, exiting with a total of ten career Cup
wins.
That
puts Johnson, age 43 on the new outside layer of the NASCAR onion. He has made it known that this “layer” will
be pulled away next season. With it will
go at a minimum seven Championships and 83 wins... maybe more, depending on how
his final season goes.
It’s
only natural to ask... who is next? And
to take it a step further what impact will all this have on the sport and on
the 2019 Cup Champion Kyle Busch?
When
you look at that “onion”, there are at least four distinct “layers.” In the next “layer” you find Kevin Harvick,
who like Johnson is 43, Ryan Newman 41, Clint Bowyer and Kurt Busch are
40. Martin Truex Jr. is 39 and Denny
Hamlin is the baby at 38. Looking at
that list, those drivers in this outer layer account for half of the 36 wins
this season, with Truex winning 7, Hamlin 6, Harvick 4 and Kurt Busch 1. Three of the 2019 Championship Four came from
this layer. This layer also includes the
2004, 2014 and 2017 Cup Champions.
Then
there is a big gap before we find the next layer of Brad Keselowski and Aric
Almirola-35 and 2019 Cup Champion Kyle Busch and Michael McDowell are 34. This layer accounts for another eight wins,
with Busch having five and Keselowski with the remaining three. This is the layer we find the 2004, 2014 and
2019 Champions.
There
is another gap and the next “layer” starts with Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. at 31
followed by “The Twenty-Somethings”, led by Joey Logano and Austin Dillon-29,
Daniel Hemric-28, Daniel Suarez, Matt DiBenedetto, Ty Dillon, Corey Lajoie-27,
Kyle Larson, Alex Bowman, Chris Buescher-26, Ryan Blaney and Bubba
Wallace-25. This group accounts for five
wins, with Logano taking two and Larson, Bowman and Blaney winning one each. The 2018 Cup Champion, Joey Logano is in this
layer.
The
inner “layer” of Chase Elliott, Erik Jones-23, William Byron-22 and Justin
Haley-20 make up the final five wins of 2019, with Chase winning three, Erik
and Justin getting one apiece. Elliott
and Jones qualified
So
going forward, what does it all mean?
2020 should look a lot like this season since it is the final year for
this generation/iteration of the car.
Yeah, Chevy brings a new body.
Hopefully, Ford will get a better handle on things but unless things
change, maybe drastically, it’s going to be hard to wrest control from Joe
Gibbs Racing and Toyota.
That
should suit the 2019 Champion just fine.
2021
has been promised to be a new game, new car, new schedule, bringing more
competitive racing. It’s hard to see
that change bringing any falloff in Kyle Busch’s future. He hates the current horsepower/aero
“packages” used this season and yet went out and won the regular season
championship, won five races, including the Miami-Homestead finale to give him
the championship. He led the most laps
for the season. If the 2021 car is any
better, any more to his liking, it’s going to be scary to see what he does
going forward.
So
back to the onion. What happens when
that next layer starts to peel off in maybe 2021, 2022 or 2023?
This
season, that outer layer was Kyle Busch’s main competition. The only drivers to win more than Busch (5)
came from this layer, Martin Truex, Jr. (7) and Denny Hamlin (6). Harvick (4) was on his heels. The closest driver to Busch in laps led was
Martin Truex, Jr. who led 211 fewer laps than Busch’s 1582. Keep in mind that over 1/3 of Truex’s laps
led came in a single race-Fall Martinsville.
And even when Kyle hit his 21-race winless streak, only Martin Truex Jr.
outran him, finished higher than him 19 races to 17. Denny tied him 18-18. Kevin lost to him 17-19 races.
So
when they weren’t beating him to the Checkered Flag, they weren’t outrunning
him for position either. And right now this group is his closest
competition. What happens when this
layer of the NASCAR “onion” is eventually peeled away? Who becomes his competition? Who fills the voids created?
Naturally,
you would think it would come from those in the new outer “layer” Kyle’s
“layer”. Of those, Brad Keselowski was
the only one who is even close. But he
won two fewer races, led a third fewer laps (and over 40% of those laps led
coming at Spring Martinsville) and in 36 races he was outrun by Kyle 2 to
1.
On
the surface, the next layer that includes 2018 Cup Champion, Joey Logano looks
formidable. Upon closer review however,
Kyle won the same number of races as the entire “layer” Logano-2, Ryan Blaney,
Alex Bowman and Kyle Larson with 1 win apiece.
You would have to add together the laps led by the top three in this
“layer” - Logano (899), Larson (529) and Blaney (422) to exceed Kyle’s 1582
laps led this season. And in head to
head competition, Logano was his closest competitor, outrunning him 14 out of
36 races, followed by Larson (12), Aric Almirola (10), Bowman (9), Blaney (8),
Austin Dillon, Daniel Hemric and Daniel Suarez (7).
The
inner layer of Chase Elliott, Erik Jones, William Byron and Justin Haley showed
some promise as together they produced the same number of wins as Kyle-Chase
(3), Erik and Justin one each. However,
the entire group-Elliott (601), Byron (233), Jones (172) and Haley (1) led less
than 2/3 of the laps Busch did. Head to
head found Elliott finished ahead of Kyle 11 times, Byron 10, Jones 8. So this layer has some work to go before they
become the challenge.
As
they say, past performance is no guarantee of future results, but if this
season is any indication, as we go forward and as the outer, most competitive
layer eventually gets peeled away, the future only looks to get brighter for
the #18.
Editor’s
note: This article was written before the banquet but held until afterwards in
case anything changed on Thursday night.
Remember
this Thursday night when NASCAR presents the Championship trophy. A lot has changed over the last decade since Kyle
Busch was presented with his first trophy in Nashville shown above. Many “layers” have been stripped away since
that night. Layers that included -
Jeff
Gordon 93 wins, 4 Cup Championships
Tony Stewart 49, 2 Cup Championship
Bill Elliott 44, 1 Cup Championship
Mark Martin 40
Matt Kenseth 39, 1 Cup Championship
Carl Edwards 28
Dale Earnhardt, Jr 26
Terry Labonte 22, 2 Cup Championship
Bobby Labonte 21, 1 Cup Championship
Jeff Burton 21
Greg Biffle 19
Kasey Kahne 18
Jamie McMurray 7
Jeremy Mayfield 5
Michael Waltrip 4
Elliott Sadler 3
Robby Gordon 3
Brian Vickers 3
David Ragan 2
David Reutimann 2
Juan Pablo Montoya 2
Marcos Ambrose. 2
John Andretti 2
Paul Menard 1
Scott Riggs 0
Sam Hornish, Jr. 0
David Stremme 0
Scott Speed 0
Travis Kvapil 0
After
that night in Nashville, as those layers were stripped off, Kyle Busch added
the following to his record - 41 Cup wins.
5 Straight Championship Four appearances. 2 Cup Championships. No more Trophies destroyed.
As
time goes on and the NASCAR “onion” gets peeled over the next decade or so,
chances look good that what we saw Thursday night is a sight that will be seen
again and again and possibly again, much to the delight of Rowdy Nation, before
the inner “layers” rise up to challenge or Kyle’s “layer” is finally peeled
away.
For
the rest, unfortunately, they’ll be getting what you always get when you mess
with an onion... lots of tears.
Congratulations
Kyle Busch 2019 MENCS Regular Season and Playoff Champion.