“Never Really Asked for It”—Tyler Reddick Reveals His One Issue With Kyle Busch Taking His RCR Seat

Kyle Busch will be racing for the Richard Childress Racing team in the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series. He will take over the #8 car, which has been lying vacant since Tyler Reddick was let go. Fortunately, Reddick will still be on the NASCAR grid, as he has joined the 23XI Racing team. Recently, he appeared on a podcast where he spoke about his reaction to Busch taking his spot at RCR.

Talking to Door Bumper Clear, Reddick said, “They were my guys for 3–4 years. They’re going to have a great opportunity for themselves to not only further their own story but Kyle’s as well. When you look at it, I guess the only thing that is kind of funny—saw that they changed the font of the #8. I never really asked for it, I didn’t think it was on the table when I was there. Richard wanted it, I think Richard said he kind of wanted it to look like a football jersey… soccer.”

Why was Tyler Reddick not too happy about the situation?

Apparently, Reddick only found out about his departure just before RCR’s announcement of signing Busch. Admittedly, there had been a massive saga surrounding Busch’s future. It all started when M&Ms announced that they would be leaving the sport at the end of the 2022 season. Since they were Busch’s long-time sponsor, it threw his future with Joe Gibbs Racing in doubt.

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From then on, there was a lot of speculation about the 2-time Cup Series champion’s future. It soon got to a stage where it was increasingly likely that a return to Joe Gibbs Racing was off the table for Busch.

There was a bit of a complication when 23XI Racing announced signing Reddick for the 2024 Cup Series season. This came on the back of his maiden win at the Cup Series. But when RCR announced signing Busch, Reddick was left hanging until 23XI Racing came to his rescue and bought out the remainder of his contract from RCR.

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It is possible that the RCR announcement came out of left field for Tyler Reddick. It certainly seems to be the reason of his unhappiness with the situation. But now that the dust has settled, an exciting season is definitely on the cards.