Dale Jr Writes off SHR Victory in 2024 but Expects JRM Products Josh Berry & Noah Gragson to Survive

The 2023 Cup Series season was one that Tony Stewart and everyone associated with Stewart-Haas Racing would want to erase from their memory. The team will be looking to improve this season and with a new driver lineup, there are a lot of expectations. However, according to Dale Earnhardt Jr, the team won’t be able to register a race victory this year either. Having said that, the veteran also expressed confidence in former JR Motorsports drivers Noah Gragson and Josh Berry to perform well enough to retain their seats for the following season.

Stewart-Haas Racing had an abysmal Cup Series campaign last year. Despite having experienced veterans among their ranks, the team could not win a single race all year long. Two of their racers bid farewell to full-time Cup racing at the end of the year and Tony Stewart recruited Josh Berry and Noah Gragson, both great prospects, for the Cup Series.

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In a recent episode of the Dale Jr Download podcast, Dale Earnhardt Jr predicted how the 2024 Cup Series season will unfold and one of the first teams that grabbed his attention was Stewart-Haas Racing. With two of his former drivers in the mix, there is a lot for the 2-time Xfinity Series champion to look toward when it comes to the team that failed to win even a single race in the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series.

Speaking about Josh Berry, the 49-year-old said that he would struggle to win in his first season in the #4 car, based on its performance last season. However, Junior also expressed that there would be an improvement in the team’s performance in 2024, much like what happened with Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing last year. The only difference is that SHR won’t have the race wins to show for it.

“Josh Berry, in the #4 car, missed the show at the Clash. That was a gut punch, I’m sure. I believe Berry will perform well enough to earn more time in the #4 car. Take that however you want. I think that he’s going to have a hard time…that car was up and down last year. SHR wasn’t very good at all. I think SHR gets better, a little better, they take a few steps forward and improve like maybe kind of similar to Roush. I don’t think they get the wins that Brad and those guys got last year,” the former Cup Series driver said.

He also mentioned the second ex-JRM man in Tony Stewart’s team, Noah Gragson. The 25-year-old got into a lot of trouble last season due to his social media antics, but Junior expressed confidence in him before the start of the new season. “So Gragson, he’s back. I think he has a better performance than he had in the #42 car when he was in the Cup Series last year and I think hopefully he’s gotten in together and can stick around, stay out of trouble,” he added.

It’s not easy to consistently be a part of the NASCAR Cup Series if a driver doesn’t perform well. If one isn’t getting the results, their time at the topmost level of stock car racing will be numbered. When it comes to his former driver, Dale Earnhardt Jr believes that they will do just enough to keep their seats at Stewart-Haas Racing beyond this year.

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Dale Earnhardt Jr looking forward to seeing his former drivers push each other

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The 2-time Xfinity Series champion knows all about how tough it is to maintain that high level of performance in the Cup Series, but what is even more interesting to him is how Josh Berry and Noah Gragson will push each other to be better. The two supposedly have a good relationship since their time at JRM and their partnership is intriguing to their former boss.

“I’m interested to watch Josh and Gragson because they worked here at JR Motorsports and they seem to get along pretty well as teammates and that will be interesting to see how they can kind of challenge each other at SHR but I think they both don’t have these performances that they want to have. At the end of the year, they’re both gonna say, ‘Hey man, I wish we would have done better than we did’, but I think they’ll do well enough to satisfy the critics. Just keep the heat off and allow them to continue to try to improve. So. I don’t think that anybody’s gonna be calling for their jobs at the end of the year,” Earnhardt Jr explained.

It will certainly be interesting to see how Stewart-Haas Racing performs in 2024 and Dale Earnhardt Jr is not the only one waiting with bated breath to see that. A new driver lineup can be tricky at times, but it can also be a blessing in disguise. Which one do you think it will be for Tony Stewart’s team?

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