March 21st, 2010 
Journo It’s now been eight races, since Steve Addington gave up the reins of the #18 team to Dave Rogers. In that time, Kyle Busch has not done a whole lot. And while the season is still young, and Busch’s and Roger’s Cup partnership is still relatively new, I have to wonder if Kyle isn’t beginning to have regrets about letting Addington get away.
Dave Rogers took over last November in Texas. Since that time Busch has scored two top-ten finishes; a respectable eighth at Homestead and ninth yesterday at Bristol. His average 13.5 finish is better than last season as a whole, but looking at this time last year, Busch had already scored a win and two top-fives.
For his part, Steve Addington, who joined Kyle’s brother Kurt this season, guided Kyle to 12 wins, 26 top-fives, 33 top-tens and three poles in 2008 and 2009. So far, in his first five races with the #2 team, he has racked up one win, two top-fives, three top tens and one pole with Kurt Busch.
While the two brothers only sit three positions apart in the points, they seem to be worlds apart in the momentum they have started the season with. Kyle has consistently run in the middle of the pack and through the first five races of this season only led 66 of 1,566 laps completed. Compare that to Kurt Busch’s 441.
Certainly there are other things one could factor into the success of these two drivers, but the one thing that binds the two and that marks the major change in both organizations is Steve Addington.
While it’s easy to be a Monday morning quarterback (or crew chief if you prefer) on these things, the fact of the matter is, he’s proven he is effective with more than one driver.
Stepping away for just a moment, it’s been well documented that Jimmie Johnson and Chad Knaus were at odds at the end of the 2005 season. A come to Jesus meeting with Rick Hendrick helped work out their issues. Since then, they’ve become an unstoppable force in the sport.
I wonder if this sort of thing was tried at Joe Gibbs Racing. Despite the troubles they had last season, it’s hard, in my mind at least, to justify booting the guy who led your team to 12 wins, out the door. Perhaps a meeting would have helped smooth over some of the tensions at JGR. Unfortunately we’ll never know.
Hopefully though this will serve as a lesson to Kyle and to JGR to not be so quick to get rid of the one who ‘brung ya.’ It’ll be interesting to see how the #18 team reacts to their situation and whether they can keep Kyle a dominate force within the sport. Only time will tell.
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This is a tough one. Kyle is a tough one. Blame Kyle all you want for stubbornness etc but I firmly believe that Kyle/Steve were not going to win a Cup championship, ever. And if that was an absolute, a change had to be made no matter what. That’s the point of this game; yes winning races gets you up there, but what about the bad days? There was no middle ground. I have a hard time believing Coach & JD Gibbs didn’t try some kind of sit down with them before making such a drastic decision.
I approved of Dave as new 18 CC, he’s not as experienced but very smart. Its true this may be a learning year but now Kyle has time to “age” with him, get things right/consistent to lead to a championship.
Kyle won Cup races with Alan/5. He’s won a NNS championship & truck races, different people & crews, so I won’t buy that he won’t win in Cup again without Steve like the haters are crowing.
I’m VERY happy to see Steve win with the #2, but there again, it remains to be seen if there’s anything more than that.
It’s way to early to start on the Crew Chief. Kyles in the top 10, he’s loosened up a bit. I think he’s driving great, give it time. JGR knows how to win races & championships.
I completely agree with DD & Kevin. This was Dave Rogers 8th race with this car. IMO he deserves time. He was second to NO ONE in Nationwide and I’m hoping in a year or two he’ll be just as good in Sprint.
I hated it when JGR chose to replace Addington (then again I hated it when they let JJ Yeley go – wanted KB in 4th car). I think Addington got intimidated at some point and became so “job scared” that he stopped being the Crew Chief and let Kyle make the decisions. KB needs someone that will stand up to him when necessary. I would love to see him with Zippadelli, but that will probably never happen.
Looking forward to later in the season to see how they develop!
I just hope that things work out for Kyle and he doesn’t end up like Jeff Gordon who got Steve Latarte and still hasn’t produced. Jeff’s been up there, but I don’t think Latarte can get it done. I think Kyle has enought talent and enough time to get hooked up with someone who will take him all the way. Kyle Busch will most likely go down in history as one of the top drivers in NASCAR.
Richard Petty has said, “Winning is 90% car / 10% driver!” (In the “old days” RP said “80% car / 20% driver). Either way, the crew chief plays the dominate role in “great race results!” Kurt’s comment about Steve Addington being “the winning factor” in the Busch brothers’ success is right-on! (Has anyone taken notice of the vast improvement in Matt Kenseth’s performance since Todd Parrot became his crew chief?)
The driver can certainly “screw-up” and wreck a great car, but no driver can make “a bad car” go-fast, at least for the long-run! (Kyle Busch and Tony Stewart are the rare exceptions to the rule… the ones who occassionally get better results than the cars deserve.)
Few drivers and crew-chiefs ever develop the “total trust in each other” that is necessary to create “the magic chemistry” needed to achieve consistent excellence that leads to dominate performance.
Kyle’s loss is Kurt’s gain! The combo of Kurt and Steve will finally give JJ and Chad a run for their money!
I’m not sure if this is crew chief-related or not, but I think the Bristol race showed a new, maturer race car driver in that #18 car. He qualified terribly, was terrible in every practice session, and started off the race just hoping to stay on the lead lap. He even got caught up in a wreck along the way. But at day’s end, he came home 9th. A year ago, he probably wouldn’t have made it to the halfway point with a car that bad, wrecking and then storming off somewhere.