“That Is the Wrong Guy!” Kevin Harvick Declares RCR Firing Kyle Busch’s Crew Chief Was Long Overdue

Ahead of the 2026 Talladega Cup Series race week, Richard Childress Racing made major announcement. They fired Kyle Busch’s No:8 Chevy crew chief Jim Pohlman over the poor start the season they have, alongside the crack in their relationship. He was only hired at the start of the season to get the veteran’s RCR career back on track.

2014 Cup Series champion and former RCR driver Kevin Hravick shared his thoughts on the team restructuring on his podcast. He believes the duo was not compatible from the start. Both the driver as well as the crew chief were vocal, tough and fiery personals. This deprived the team the opportunity to someone that balanced the veteran driver with opposite character.

Here’s the problem I saw with this scenario: Jim Pohlman’s just like Kyle Busch. Very vocal, very rough and tumble, fiery. It never sounded like it was going to work. And we talked about this somewhere, I don’t know where, but Richard Childress not being afraid to pull the trigger when he needs to to make changes.

Kevin Harvick said on his podcast.

The Kyle Busch-Jim Pohlman duo had multiple radio rants during race weeks owing to execution failure and it was a PR nightmare for RCR. Richard Childress has never heisted to move on from people if things get worse and the unacceptable dynamic the reason he needed to make the change. The No:8 team had the wrong guy leading them, considering the driver, according to Kevin Harvick.

It was just a really, really, really combative scenario that you had with those two personalities of Jim Pohlman and Kyle Busch in the car. If I had a crew chief that talked about me like that, I would fire his ass quickly because that is unacceptable. They can be mad at me, but talking like they talked on that Channel 2 after Bristol that week, that was unacceptable. That is the wrong guy.

Kevin Harvick added via Happy Hour podcast.

Kevin Harvick has history with Kyle Busch’s new crew chief

Further talking about the point, he highlighted how RCR needs either the No: 3 or No:8 team to produce strong runs to get back to winning ways. They seem to have found some hope of redemption on Sunday at Talladega, with the P10 finish.

At some point, you have to put the whole company in a better scenario so that the 3 car runs better, so that Kyle runs better. Got their first top 10 of the year for RCR this weekend at Talladega, finished 10th. That’s the best finish of the year for either of those cars.

Kevin Harvick said.

The new crew chief of the No:8 team, Andy Street had a strong start and now has the responsibility to deliver more. Harvick, who has previously worked with Street when they were at RCR, believes the very mild-mannered might be capable of putting Busch is the right scenario to win.

I think that Andy Street, he was at RCR when I was at RCR. Very mild-mannered, been around for a long time. We’ve seen him on those O’Reilly Series cars in the past… I think Richard believes that Kyle Busch can get it done behind the wheel; it’s just a matter of putting him in the right scenario.

Kevin Harvick added.

The comments from the veteran are something majority of the racing community agrees with. The No:8 team needed a changed, the driver or the crew chief.  Firing Pohlman was the most rational choice of the two and RCR did exactly that.

Also Read: “It Was Time to Get Some Fresh Blood!” Denny Hamlin Gives Honest Take on Jim France NASCAR Departure

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