Kyle Busch is struggling big-time right now. After running the best show at the beginning of his career, he is in the midst of what could be his worst NASCAR Cup Series season ever. From self-induced mistakes, including single-car spins at Phoenix, Bristol (twice), and Kansas, to crashing out at Goodyear’s tire test at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, it has been a poor season for the 39-year-old.

Yet, he is also the same Kyle ‘Rowdy’ Busch who won 2 Cup Series championships in 2015 and 2019 and is also the Xfinity Series’ winningest driver in history. So what has gone wrong? Kyle Busch’s crew chief, Randall Burnett, has given an insightful answer.

A season to forget for Kyle Busch

Busch’s frustration has been evident this season. Wrecking his truck in the second lap at Darlington, he had an altercation with Christopher Bell at COTA and Ricky Stenhouse Jr in the All-Star race. Busch also collided with Kyle Larson at the World Wide Technology Raceway last weekend. If that wasn’t all, statistics aren’t in his favor either.

Rowdy’s form has been steadily declining for nearly half a decade now. In the first 15 years of his career, Busch’s average stood at 3.8 a year but has dropped to less than half of what it was – 1.3 in the last 5 years. His average finishes have also fallen to 16.7 and 15.0 in 2022 and 2023, while he’s on track to extend it to 17.2 this season. Now, it looks like crew chief Randall Burnett, unlike others, has blamed the increased competitiveness of the NASCAR Cup Series cars as the reason why the Richard Childress Racing driver hasn’t lived up to expectations this season.

In an appearance on DJD Reloaded, Randall Burnett said, “Everything is so close right now, especially in the Cup Series. We go to the race track, and we are a 15th-place car. We’re a tenth off the pace. It’s that tight. Everybody’s got the same car right now, everybody’s got the same everything. Everybody’s got the same access to all the data. If you go to the racetrack and you’re looking at somebody else’s car, you can tell where their car is better within seconds, like, ‘I need to work on this portion of my car.’”

When NASCAR introduced the Next-Gen car, it was to create a level playing field – giving small teams and rookies an equal chance to fight against the top dogs. To enable this, the series also implemented the sharing of SMT data. As a result, if a team’s car isn’t performing up to the mark, they can always look at their competition and see what they’re doing, just as Burnett said. Because of this, there’s little to no passing during races these days. And, well, Burnett pointed to exactly this.

“We always complain there is no passing. Well, everybody is doing the same thing, and everybody has access to so much information that the difference between winning and a 20th-place car is so minute these days, it just makes it hard,” he added. The introduction of Next-Gen cars has also been the reason for Kyle Busch’s drop in form, according to the #8 driver himself.

As reported by Motorsport.com, Busch revealed, “I always think back to the golden days – you could drive from the back of the field to the front of the field. You could make something happen. I still feel like I can do that. But in reality, with this car, equipment, talent, and everything being so equal, the SMT data – everybody seeing it and being so equal – it’s tougher than ever to pass the guy in front of you.”

Indeed, the parity trend has taken a toll on the uniqueness of the vehicles and, in turn, the excitement around the sport. And there’s no doubt that Randall Burnett is no fan of the parity. His suggestion to improve racing? “Just pull the plug and end it; don’t give it to anybody and end the feed.” That said, you might be wondering if it’s all glum for Busch going forward.

Can Kyle Bush bounce back?

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Despite winning 3 races last year, Kyle Busch’s form has been poor since the second half of 2023, when he averaged 19th place in the final 17 races. Looking at the playoff grid, Busch is currently 19th, nowhere close to being the first to make it to the postseason from points alone. Even if he does make it, it’s clear that Busch isn’t a championship contender.

Even though he has just one DNF at Gateway Motorsports Park, Busch’s average finish of 17.2 clearly indicates that he simply hasn’t done well enough, irrespective of the competitiveness of other cars. To push cost savings to race teams, NASCAR has kept a very lean practice schedule after the COVID-19 pandemic simmered down. Some fans have claimed that this might be the reason for Kyle Busch’s decline, a reasoning that may hold some weight given the fact that the timelines match.

With a 50-minute practice session at Sonoma Raceway to prepare teams for qualifying on Saturday at the road course, it will be interesting to see how Kyle Busch performs at the Toyota Save Mart 350. There are a multitude of factors that haven’t gone in Kyle Busch’s favor this season, and it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that he might end the season without a single win for the first time in his career.

Do you think Kyle Busch will bounce back this season? Let us know in the comments.