Steve Addington disappointed, surprised to be removed as crew chief for Kyle Busch’s Cup team
Joe Gibbs Racing's Steve Addington will serve as Kyle Busch's crew chief for the final time in Sunday's NASCAR Sprint Cup Amp Energy 500 at Talladega Superspeedway.
// Jim Fluharty, NASCAR Scene
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TALLADEGA, Ala. – Steve Addington said he was disappointed and surprised that as of next week he will no longer be the crew chief for Joe Gibbs Racing driver Kyle Busch and the No. 18 team, but he wouldn’t go into details of why he was released or who called him this week about taking over as crew chief at their organizations.
Busch has won 12 Cup races since joining Joe Gibbs Racing and being paired with Addington, who had been crew chief of the No. 18 team for one season with Bobby Labonte, two with J.J. Yeley and then nearly two years with Busch. But the team missed the Chase For The Sprint Cup by eight points and is 13th in the current standings – and now Addington is in his last weekend as crew chief for Busch before Dave Rogers takes over the team.
“Kyle’s talent brought a lot to this race team, but I think this race team [had] a lot to do with Kyle Busch winning 12 points races and one non-points race with the 150 at Daytona,” Addington said.
“He was a piece of the puzzle that worked good with this group when he got here. When something like this goes down, you do think about what do you have to do because there’s a lot of teams in this garage area that would have had this past 18 months that we’ve had.”
Did this come down to the eight points?
“It’s probably [a performance-based decision] for the standards that were set for the 18 car,” Addington said. “The way things went last year [with eight wins], it went really smooth and there’s things that have happened to other guys in this Chase that happened to us in the Chase with engine problems [last year].
“[I’m] not pointing fingers at anybody in the organization. Things happen. And somebody has got to be the person that is responsible for that and that was me. And I understand that. I’ve got big enough shoulders to carry that. That’s just part of being in this position.”
Did he think Busch forced him out?
“I don’t know,” Addington said. “Something happened there. I don’t know. I can’t comment on that because I don’t know what the whole story is. I just got that we were going in a different direction with the 18 car and we will move on. And Steve Addington will land on his feet.”
Addington said he didn’t think his relationship with Busch had deteriorated. He said it was difficult working with Busch’s schedule as Busch was running a full scheduled in both the Nationwide and Cup series.
“I have not spoken [to him],” Addington said. “I wanted to come down here and do this race and let Dave get situated and get caught up where the cars are for [upcoming races at] Texas and Phoenix. I’m a bigger man than that. I can come down here and do this race for Joe Gibbs Racing and the 18 team, and we’ll see how it plays out.”
Addington said he was surprised by the decision Monday.
“We had talked about some changes on the team, and we were trying to get to the end of the season,” Addington said. “We talked about some changes we were going to make. It surprised me it came when it did. That’s the decision Joe Gibbs Racing made, and that’s what I’m good with and I’m going to still be an employee of the organization.
“I told them that I’d explore all my options that are available. I think I have earned a lot of respect in this garage area and I have a lot of phone calls this week and a lot of support in this garage area.”
Addington will be at Texas Motor Speedway next week to help with the fourth Joe Gibbs Racing Sprint Cup car, but not as the crew chief, and he plans to beat the final two races as well. JGR has considered adding a fourth full-time team in the future.
“You’ve got to look at everything,” said Addington, who spent much of his career in the Nationwide Series, including one season with JGR before moving into a Cup role. “I’m going to look at everything. I didn’t ask to be put in this position, so I’m going to look and see what’s best for Steve Addington’s future. I could go back to the Nationwide Series and do some races over there and chill out for a while.”
Among those looking for crew chiefs are Penske Racing’s Kurt Busch and possibly Hendrick Motorsports’ Dale Earnhardt Jr., and while he has had some phone calls, Addington said Friday morning that he hadn’t heard anything from anybody high up at Hendrick Motorsports. He wouldn’t comment on who has contacted him.
“There’s a lot of unanswered questions of where I’m going with the organization to whether I look at my options outside the organization,” Addington said. “[President] J.D. and [owner] Joe [Gibbs] will be the first ones to know. If I have offers and there’s something that is very appealing to me that I feel like I can go and make the difference in, I told them straight up that they would be the first ones that I talked to. … There’s a lot there [at Hendrick], but I don’t know. I haven’t spoken to anybody on what the situation is over there. There are a lot of things that are appealing and a lot of interesting phone calls this week is all I can say.”
