The offseason between the 2024 and 2025 IndyCar seasons was one of change within the NTT IndyCar Series paddock, with eight of the sport's 10 existing teams making at least one driver swap and a new team joining the series with two more drivers.
Unfortunately for Linus Lundqvist, he was on the bad end of one of the driver changes, and unlike Rinus VeeKay, he wasn't able to make up for it by landing a new ride, despite a 2024 season in which he won Rookie of the Year honors with two podium finishes and a pole position.
Several driver changes throughout the grid raised some eyebrows, with a few of them clearly made for no other reason than something Lundqvist apparently could not bring: funding. Talent, however, remains in question, as Lundqvist's apparently wasn't enough to justify remaining in the series after a strong year number one.
Here are five existing teams that should have signed Linus Lundqvist.
Chip Ganassi Racing
This wouldn't have required any change whatsoever, since Lundqvist was already competing for Chip Ganassi Racing, but this one also clearly came down to a lack of funding.
Due to the new charter agreement, Chip Ganassi Racing downsized from five cars to three to avoid having two cars battling it out for the "open" spots each race. While Marcus Armstrong joined fellow former Chip Ganassi Racing driver Felix Rosenqvist at Meyer Shank Racing, which formed a new technical alliance with Chip Ganassi's team, Lundqvist was left on the outside looking in.
Instead, Ganassi opted to retain Kyffin Simpson as his third driver, a move that obviously came down to funding, just as the move to promote Simpson to IndyCar after a lackluster stint in Indy Lights/Indy NXT did last year. Simpson recorded no higher than a 12th place finish in his rookie season. Lundqvist recorded seven top 12 finishes.
They obviously still have Alex Palou and Scott Dixon, winners of nine total and four of the last five championships, so they should have no shortage of contenders. But for how much longer is Dixon going to stick around?
Dale Coyne Racing
When Dale Coyne Racing found themselves with the series' final two open seats (as usual), there was hope that they would go to VeeKay and Lundqvist. That went out the window when they signed Jacob Abel, which presumably came with the advantage of financial stability to go ahead and make VeeKay the 27th and final piece of the puzzle.
It took Abel until his eighth season in the Road to Indy to find victory lane, and it took until his fourth to even stand on the podium. Lundqvist experienced no such struggles, winning four championships in seven years before making the jump to IndyCar.
Given Dale Coyne Racing's well-documented track record of scoring at least one podium finish whenever they have at least one full-time driver, a VeeKay/Lundqvist duo would have been optimal for keeping that streak alive in 2025.
Ed Carpenter Racing
I understand taking the opportunity to sign Alexander Rossi, whom Arrow McLaren gave up on after just two seasons. But replacing VeeKay, who remains Ed Carpenter Racing's most recent race winner and podium finisher, didn't make a ton of sense. He finished between 12th and 14th place in the standings in all five years with the team, despite their recent decline in performance.
Instead, they retained Christian Rasmussen, and not only did they retain him, they made him a full-time driver, with Ed Carpenter himself stepping back from the full oval schedule to run only the Indy 500.
This team was the toughest to include on this list, because like Lundqvist, Rasmussen had a very decorated pre-IndyCar career. But he scored just a single top 10 finish as a rookie in 2024, while teammate VeeKay at one point reeled off four straight top 10 finishes in the same equipment. Would Lundqvist had been an upgrade?
Juncos Hollinger Racing
Juncos Hollinger Racing have shown signs of improvement since becoming a two-car full-time team in 2023, never more so than last year, when Romain Grosjean's top 10 finish total eclipsed the team's combined total from their previous six seasons in the series, and then again when Conor Daly added their first podium finish.
Retaining Daly made sense, but funding was presumably a huge factor when it came to giving Sting Ray Robb his third different landing spot in three years.
Robb has just three top 15 finishes in two years, and his only top 10 finish came in a wreck-filled Gateway race last year. He is perhaps best known for leading a bunch of laps in the Indy 500 on fuel strategy last year. Yet he still only finished in 16th place.
Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing
Every year we hear the same things about how Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing are going to bounce back and reinvent themselves as contenders. Yet the "Indy Recovery Plan" still resulted in Graham Rahal in the Last Row Shootout once again, even after he called doubters out on social media during a disastrous practice week.
Bro. Chill. Some are doing qual sims and some in traffic. Have you looked at no tow reports? Not necessary to send conflicting messages when the focuses for many teams are varied.
— Graham Rahal (@GrahamRahal) May 16, 2024
Signing reigning Indy NXT champion Louis Foster to replace the Arrow McLaren-bound Christian Lundgaard, whom they would have liked to retain, made sense. But when it came to Devlin DeFrancesco, funding was once again the key factor.
In two years with a superior Andretti Autosport team, DeFrancesco never finished a race higher than 12th place, and there really isn't much reason to believe that will change in 2025. Rather than replace the struggling Pietro Fittipaldi with a driver capable of delivering results, they opted for a lateral move (at best) that could hinder whatever "recovery" plan they're trying to take into 2025.
DeFrancesco's highlight came when he made a bold outside move to go from fifth to first place at the start of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course race two years ago. He still only finished that race in 19th. Like the other four teams on this list, it's hard to imagine that Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing wouldn't have been better off with Lundqvist.
The 2025 IndyCar season is scheduled to get underway on Sunday, March 2 with the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida. Fox is set to provide live coverage beginning at 12:00 p.m. ET. Start a free trial of FuboTV today and don't miss it!