Denny Hamlin and Kyle Busch were teammates for 15 years at Joe Gibbs Racing. That changed after the 2022 season when Busch departed for Richard Childress Racing.
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Both drivers are among the best NASCAR has to offer and they were usually respectful of each other, especially while they were teammates. Hamlin certainly knows what Busch is capable of and he shared that sentiment on the Feb. 12th episode of his "Actions Detrimental" podcast.
However, he was a little critical of Busch's race team, claiming that Richard Childress Racing could be holding him back.
After joining RCR, Busch won three races and made the playoffs in 2023. However, once he got to the postseason there wasn't much more to offer.
His teammate, Austin Dillon, struggled throughout 2023, and that is a major point Hamlin fears could hurt Busch again this season.
Hamlin couldn't pinpoint an exact reason for the struggles, but he seemed to be trying to send a message to the team.
"I can't pinpoint anything that RCR doesn't have that can't make him successful," Hamlin said. "They have got really strong pit crews and a good organization; they have just underachieved a little bit as far as you would expect. Last year, I didn't feel as much for RCR when there were weekends when all the RCR cars were fast. But I feel like in the years prior to that, there were weekends where Austin Dillon or his teammate was really fast. They didn't have that show-up that they were the fastest organization. Every other team had that last year where both of their cars were fast. RCR just never had that. It was either Kyle, or it just wasn't happening."
Hamlin isn't afraid to ruffle feathers during his podcast, but there is some truth to his thoughts, and he summed up Busch's playoffs in a simple way.
"To me, he is like Kyle Larson. You can say 'Oh he is going to win four races a year.' That's just because of his talent. He had real bad playoffs last year and we were talking about him driving 'backwards' more than 'driving forward;' that was kind of his highlight reel. Even he admitted that he had kind of lost it."
It will be interesting to see if Busch can help RCR take another step forward in 2024.
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