NASCAR Truck Series: Kyle Busch Motorsports’ 2019 season a lost cause

With Harrison Burton and Todd Gilliland missing the playoffs, Kyle Busch Motorsports’ 2019 NASCAR Truck Series season has turned into a lost cause.

Kyle Busch Motorsports team owner Kyle Busch drove his #51 Toyota to victory lane in each of his five starts throughout the 2019 NASCAR Truck Series season. He he never failed to lead fewer than 65% of the laps in any one of these five races and ultimately led 575 (72.33%) of the 795 combined laps of them.

After winning the March race at Texas Motor Speedway, Busch hired Greg Biffle to drive the #51 Toyota in the June race at the track. Biffle had not competed in a NASCAR race since the 2016 season, and he had not competed in a Truck Series race since the 2004 season.

He won the race.

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The #51 Toyota ended up finishing the 16-race regular season in second place in the owner standings behind the #98 ThorSport Racing Ford, which was driven solely by Grant Enfinger.

Enfinger won the regular season driver championship with 665 points despite the fact that he did not win any races. The #51 Toyota scored 652 points throughout the regular season.

The #51 Toyota advanced to the owner playoffs and currently sits in fourth place in the championship standings with 2,015 points, just five points behind the #24 GMS Racing Chevrolet, which is driven solely by Brett Moffitt and leads with 2,020 points.

Based on this information alone, it has been an amazing season for Kyle Busch Motorsports.

But in reality, their season has turned into a total lost cause.

The team entered the #18 Toyota for rookie Harrison Burton to drive on a full-time basis, and they entered the #4 Toyota for second-year driver Todd Gilliland for the same purpose. Gilliland is not considered a rookie since he was granted a playoff waiver last year even though he missed four of the regular season’s 16 races. He failed to win his way into the playoffs last year.

There were high expectations for the two teenagers. In top-tier equipment, there were two popular preseason picks to advance to the Championship 4.

Kyle Busch Motorsports entered the season having had one driver in the Championship 4 since the Championship 4 was introduced ahead of the 2016. Christopher Bell finished in third place in the 2016 season before winning the 2017 championship, and Noah Gragson was last year’s runner-up. Before the Championship 4 was implemented, Erik Jones won the 2015 championship driving for the team as well.

But neither Burton or Gilliland did enough throughout the regular season to even advance to the eight-driver, three-round, seven-race playoffs.

They finished the regular season in sixth and seventh place in the standings, respectively, but four drivers below them in the standings won at least one regular season race. In fact, fifth place Ben Rhodes of ThorSport Racing also failed to advance to the playoffs since he didn’t win any races.

This season has turned into a lost cause for the team that have earned twice as many victories as the next winningest team in the series, Niece Motorsports with three.

Let that sink in.

Of course, there are still seven races remaining before the 2019 NASCAR Truck Series season comes to an end for Harrison Burton and Todd Gilliland to potentially get to victory lane for the first time in their respective careers and prove that they should return to Kyle Busch Motorsports next year after disappointing regular seasons.

But from a big picture perspective, they are out of the championship mix, and even seven consecutive victories for the pair could only result in a best result of ninth and 10th place in the championship standings. At the end of the day, the season has turned into a lost cause for Kyle Busch Motorsports, and there is no hope for a recovery in that context.