2010 hasn’t been smooth sailing for the Joe Gibbs Racing teams of Kyle Busch and Denny Hamlin. Hamlin this weekend showed his recovery from ACL surgery is going to be tough if even just for his own stubbornness; and for the second week in a row Busch was denied a win because of a bad late race pit call.
After the race at Phoenix Kyle Busch was fuming mad. His anger at his situation kept him from doing any post-race interviews, and it was probably all for the best. Fox attempted to interview him, but he brushed them off in what, according to a producer, was TMZ-esque video. They elected not to show it. Had it not been for a late race pit call by Dave Rogers though the TV cameras may very well have been interviewing Kyle Busch in victory lane.
I’m not one to be a Monday morning crew chief (and I know it’s all to easy to do), but what a call? Dave Rogers brought Kyle Busch in for a four tire stop with what everyone knew would be a G-W-C finish. He admitted later he knew the #39 and #24 were taking two tires. And while he couldn’t have foreseen getting bottled up on pit road, he should have known two laps wasn’t going to be enough for four tires to matter. The track position, especially at a place like Phoenix, is what was important and with his call he ensured they lost theirs.
To make matters worse this is the second week in a row a pit call by Rogers has cost them the chance at a win. In Martinsville, Rogers elected to bring Busch in behind teammate Denny Hamlin with just six to go. Where Mike Ford was in a tough spot with Denny Hamlin, Dave Rogers was not with Kyle Busch. It was apparent by the time Kyle made the move to pit road that no one of significance was following them in. Ironically it was this pit call that ultimately put Kyle in a position to get wrecked and allowed Denny the chance to win – the first Gibbs Cup win of the season.
I wrote a few weeks ago asking if Kyle had any regrets letting Steve Addington go. The past two weeks have proved to me that my question was justified. Rogers is certainly putting the team in position to win, as is Kyle, but he’s snatching the opportunities back with bad calls. Kyle may not have ended up winning either of these past two weeks but he never had a chance to prove otherwise because of the pit calls.
With the way he has run you’ve got to wonder how long it will be before Dave Rogers gets sent down the river. We’re reaching a point where Kyle is going to be less trusting of Rogers’ pit calls and that’s a problem. We saw how quick they were to get rid of Steve Addington last season and he had four wins and led them to a 13th place finish in the points. All I have to say to Dave Rogers is, good luck.
I also had to question the call this weekend to let Denny Hamlin stay in the car the whole race. It was almost frustrating to watch him run like he did when he had a backup driver itching to get in the car. He had to be in pain and there was no reason for him to finish what was a long race. I can’t imagine driving 378 miles a week after major surgery on my knee.
It was almost like Hamlin felt he needed to prove something to somebody. I know it sucks to get out of the car, but if you’re in pain and running poorly why risk aggravating the injury? If I’m JD Gibbs I would have told him to bring the car in. There were plenty of opportunities for them to come in and make a switch without losing much ground. They just never took it.
The silly thing is the move could have helped them in their championship bid. Instead they finished the day in 30th, two laps down. He was outrun by underfunded Bobby Labonte and Scott Riggs and just barely outran the underfunded and underpowered Front Row cars. We’ll see if he thinks better of it next week.
I know we’re still early in the season and generally speaking Kyle Busch and Dave Rogers’ relationship is still young, but some of the things that have happened this season have me scratching my head. They’re both great teams and they’re more than capable of winning every week, but doing stuff like they’ve been doing is not going to help them down the stretch.
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