NASCAR: Harvick Solves His Pit Crew Woes, Or Did He?

Marvin Gentry-USA TODAY Sports

It was announced Tuesday afternoon by Stewart-Haas Racing that Kevin Harvick and Tony Stewart were going to swap pit crews for the chase. This doesn’t come as a complete surprise given how unhappy Harvick has been with with pit crew for the majority of the 2014 season. In fact, after the race in Richmond Harvick made it clear during his post-race interview that something was going to have to change with the No. 4 team if they were going to compete for a championship. Flash forward a few days and that something wound up being pretty much the entire No. 4 team.

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While it goes without saying that Harvick and his team haven’t always been on the same page this season, swapping them out for the No. 14 crew might not be the answer.

For starters the No. 14 crew hasn’t had a stellar season themselves in 2014. Stewart’s early struggles in his return from injury and then the Kevin Ward Jr. tragedy were the main factors in Stewart’s poor season. However there were a handful of races this season where Stewart did have a strong car and he didn’t have a better finish due to mistakes on pit road. The miscues between Stewart and his crew were fewer than that of Harvick and his crew but you also have to consider the fact that Stewart didn’t run up near the front nearly as much as Harvick did.

Another layer to this move is the fact that the No. 4 pit crew was put together by Crew Chief Rodney Childers who will still be holding that post with the No. 4 team. One cannot overlook the impact that this will have on Childers during the chase. Harvick fans are going to hope that Childers will view this as a blessing and take full advantage of it in an effort to win a championship. However what happens if Childres view this as a slap in the face? Even if Childers isn’t offended by the move, what happens if the communication between him and his new crew isn’t there or takes a couple of races to develop?

Looking into the future one also has to wonder what happens next season. If the No. 4 wins a championship will Harvick really want the old crew back? If the No. 4 doesn’t win a championship in 2014 what’s it going to be like to being back the original in 2015? Egos are a funny thing to mess with and bruised ones tend to take a long time to heal.

A few years ago the No. 48 team swapped out their crew with the No. 24 crew because the No. 48 team was having some pit stop issues. The move was a strong move because the No. 24 crew was having a phenomenal season. Unfortunately that isn’t exactly what is happening in the case of the No. 4 crew and No. 14 crew.

There are many Harvick fans rejoicing over this move right now but I caution them to not count their chickens before they hatch. After 26 races in 2014 Harvick had two wins and everyone knew what his team had and was capable of. Heading into the final 10 races and with a championship on the line the future may seem brighter but it’s still an unknown. This move by SHR could be one that wins Harvick and championship or it could be one that does more damage than it does good.

Like with most things in life we’ll just have to see how it all shakes out.

Christopher Olmstead is the Editor of BeyondTheFlag.com on the FanSided Network. Follow us on Twitter @Beyond_The_Flag and “Like” us on Facebook.