NASCAR: Is it difficult to stay mad at Kyle Busch?

Kyle Busch apologized multiple times for wrecking Chase Elliott during Wednesday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Darlington Raceway. Is it difficult to stay mad at him?

The Toyota 500 at Darlington Raceway was Chase Elliott’s race to win before Kyle Busch moved his #18 Toyota up the track several car widths and wrecked the #9 Chevrolet on what turned out to be the final green flag lap of a rain-shortened NASCAR Cup Series event.

Elliott was leading the race around the four-turn, 1.366-mile (2.198-kilometer) egg-shaped oval in Darlington, South Carolina before a late caution flag period sent most of the field to the pits. He came out in sixth place, but many of the drivers ahead of him were on old tires.

He quickly worked his way up to third place and was about to blow by Busch for second when the incident happened. Denny Hamlin, the race leader and eventual winner, was on old tires, so Elliott was in the catbird seat as far as taking his first checkered flag of 2020 was concerned.

With Elliott being (by far) NASCAR’s most popular driver and the two-time reigning of the official Most Popular Driver Award and Busch being, well, Kyle Busch, there is no doubt that this race being a fanless race worked to Busch’s benefit.

Additionally, social distancing being in place may very well have prevented anything beyond Elliott’s middle finger salute from transpiring.

But with everything considered, Busch stated multiple times that the incident was not intentional, even though every camera angle would suggest otherwise. He also apologized for the incident multiple times, something that you don’t always see in NASCAR.

He also stated the following, according to NBC Sports.

"“I’m certainly going to reach out (to Chase Elliott). Him and I have always had a cordial relationship over the years. Certainly we’re not near as close, we’re not friends like you’d say him and (Ryan) Blaney are or anything like that. I’ve known him since he was 12 or 13 years old, been racing with him ever since then, late models, super late models, trucks, Xfinity cars, all that sort of stuff.“Obviously I just made a mistake, misjudged the gap, sent him into the wall.  That was entirely unintentional.  Yeah, I mean, I’ll definitely reach out to him and tell him I’m sorry, tell him I hate it that it happened.  All I can do.  That doesn’t change the outcome of the night. I hate it for him and his guys.”"

Busch did indeed go on to seek Elliott out on his own to discuss the matter before publicly calling him a “class act” and stating that their talk went well.

Hamlin even made a comment about how Elliott retaliating against Busch may have the same end result, but it wouldn’t be the same in that there would naturally be intent involved. Elliott later stated that he believes Busch did not mean to wreck him, but that his middle finger salute was completely justified.

There’s nothing inaccurate about any of that, from any of their standpoints.

So is it difficult to stay mad at Busch?

Obviously the popular answer is no. He is literally Kyle Busch. A strong contingency of fans watches NASCAR races just to see the #18 M&M’s Toyota torn up and into the wall and to hear him whine like a petulant child in post-race interviews just so they can hate on him some more. Rewatch last year’s Las Vegas playoff race if you need a refresher.

Of course it’s not difficult to stay mad at him.

But from a more realistic, broader perspective, it is challenging in this case to stay mad at the 35-year-old Las Vegas, Nevada native no matter how ticked off Elliott and his fans were in that moment when they saw a surefire victory evaporate into a 38th place, one-point effort.

Busch rarely makes mistakes, and Elliott was right to point out that it was quite unfortunate that one rare mistake from Busch just so happened to cost him a win, 39 points and five playoff points.

But it’s hard to hold a grudge against somebody who truly had no bad intentions, even if that somebody is Kyle Busch.

Plus, the Kyle Busch we all know and love isn’t one to apologize for doing something intentionally. That much can even be acknowledged by the biggest haters.

Busch, who has already made well more than his fair share of enemies during his career, was quick to acknowledge that there would be repercussions from this incident, even though he and Elliott have not had a history with one another as far as these kinds of incidents are concerned. This certainly isn’t Brad Keselowski we’re talking about here.

And there most assuredly will be, but perhaps not in the sense that the #9 Chevrolet is going to dump the #18 Toyota into a wall Matt Kenseth/Joey Logano Martinsville-style.

It makes no sense for NASCAR’s fan-favorite to dump NASCAR”s most hated driver in front of a roaring crowd of zero fans anyway, and fanless races are on the schedule for the foreseeable future amid the coronavirus pandemic.

So unless he plans to wait until the championship race or a race with at least some fans in attendance, that’s almost out of the question.

Racing him harder and taking every inch would make more sense, because that is all Busch was trying to do to begin with.

But even that has nothing to do with staying angry. That’s racing.

NASCAR’s next race is scheduled to take place this evening, with live coverage from Charlotte Motor Speedway set to begin at 6:00 p.m. ET on Fox. Tonight’s race is the Coca-Cola 600, the longest race on the schedule.