Seeking his first victory in five months at a crucial stage in the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs, is Kyle Busch due to break out?
Since the NASCAR Cup Series race at Pocono Raceway back in early June, Joe Gibbs Racing have added eight victories to what is now a series-high tally of 17. But Kyle Busch hasn’t been responsible for any of them.
In fact, every round of 8 playoff driver aside of Busch and Team Penske’s Joey Logano has won at least one of the last eight races, including the first seven races of the four-round, 10-race playoffs. Busch, meanwhile, is on a 19-race win drought, his longest win drought since going more than a full year without a win from the 2016 season to the 2017 season.
By that stat alone, Busch could be considered somewhat of a ticking time bomb, and given the fact that a win in any of the next two races, both of which at tracks where he has three victories, would lock him into the Championship 4, that could spell danger for the rest of the field considering he entered the playoffs as the favorite.
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But that’s just it — he entered the playoffs as the favorite, yet here is is without a win in five months.
Even without winning a race since early June at Pocono Raceway, the 34-year-old Las Vegas, Nevada native still managed to finish the season atop the point standings, netting him 15 additional playoff points to go along with the series-high 30 playoff points he had accrued throughout the 26-race regular season.
But factoring in points alone earned race by race and ignoring the round by round playoff resets, Busch has dropped from first place to fifth in the point standings since the playoffs began.
Right now, he is the third best driver at the four-car Joe Gibbs Racing. When he secured his fourth victory of the season, nobody else had won four races. Teammates Martin Truex Jr. and Denny Hamlin had won three and two, respectively.
Now Truex has won seven. Hamlin has won five. Truex sits in second place in the point standings. Hamlin sits in a third place tie. Truex is locked into the Championship 4 as the top driver in the playoff picture. Hamlin is the highest driver in the playoff picture who isn’t locked into the Championship 4.
Again, Busch hasn’t won a race in five months.
A total of 11 other drivers have managed to win during that time, even teammate Erik Jones, who was eliminated following a round of 16 laden with issues out of his control, including a mechanical error at Las Vegas Motor Speedway and a disqualification from fourth place at Richmond Raceway.
Toward the end of the regular season, Busch was particularly outspoken about the fact that his teammates were consistently outrunning him, and he wasn’t wrong.
He still isn’t.
With all things considered, it really hasn’t been that disastrous of a stretch for Busch, whose average finish during his 19-race win drought is the fourth best among all drivers at 11.74. It’s not like he hasn’t been quick. He has recorded five top three finishes and an additional two top five finishes during this span.
The problem is, the drivers who rank ahead of him in this category are Hamlin, Truex and Stewart-Haas Racing’s Kevin Harvick, three legitimate championship contenders, and they rank well ahead of him in it at 8.21, 8.84 and 9.79, respectively, with three, four and three victories since Busch last drove to victory lane.
So is Busch due to break out? Yes. But will it happen this season? It really doesn’t look like it.
Will Kyle Busch break out of his win drought and propel himself to the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series championship to become the first two-time champion since seven-time champion Jimmie Johnson was crowned for the second time back in 2007? You can never count him out, but the last few months don’t look particularly promising for him, especially not compared to his competition.