- Neither Ty Gibbs of Joe Gibbs Racing nor Noah Gragson of Legacy Motor Club has been especially impressive through early-season races.
- It’s unlikely anyone at JGR or LMC is terribly worried about their first-year driver.
- After all, only one ROTY winner in the past 10 years has won during his first full season.
Five races aren’t necessarily a fair sampling, especially when no short tracks or road courses are included. That’s why it’s probably too early to judge this year’s two-man NASCAR Cup Series rookie of the year class other than to say they clearly have a lot to learn.
Neither Ty Gibbs of Joe Gibbs Racing nor Noah Gragson of Legacy Motor Club has been especially impressive through early-season races in Daytona Beach, Fontana, Las Vegas, Phoenix, and Atlanta. They’ll do their first road race this weekend at COTA near Austin and their first short-track race on April 2 at Richmond.
Gibbs’s best result has been ninth last weekend near Atlanta, where Gragson finished a season’s-best 12th. Combined, though, seven of their 10 finishes have been in the 20’s and 30’s. Gragson has led the only lap (one) and has no DNF’s; Gibbs’s has one DNF. Each has occasionally run among the top 10, but only Gibbs has managed to finish there.
It’s unlikely anyone at JGR or LMC is terribly worried about their first-year driver. After all, only one ROTY winner in the past 10 years has won during his first full season: Team Penske driver Austin Cindric won last year’s season-opening Daytona 500. Other than 2014 rookie winner Kyle Larson (19 victories) and 2016 rookie winner Chase Elliott (18), the eight other rookies since 2013 have combined for only 15 victories.
In truth, being named Rookie of the Year means very little in the fullness of a driver’s career. Despite three victories in 2002, seven-time champion Jimmie Johnson lost the award to Ryan Newman. Three-time champions Cale Yarborough and Darrell Waltrip missed it, as did both of the Labonte brothers and fellow champions Bill Elliott, Brad Keselowski, Martin Truex Jr., Kurt Busch, and Dale Jarrett. Neither did fan-favorites Dale Earnhardt Jr., Harry Gant, or Mark Martin. (Surprisingly to some, NASCAR never found a way to give the award to Danica Patrick).
In contrast, Cole Custer, Brad Moffitt, and Daniel Hemric have won the award in recent years. And then there was the three-year run (2010-2012) when Kevin Conway, Andy Lally, and Stephen Leicht were named ROTY before almost immediately disappearing from NASCAR. Ron (1981) and Ken (1988) Bouchard are the only brothers to win the award… then won only one race in 193 combined starts, by Ron at Talladega in 1981. Earl Ross (1974) and Juan Pablo Montoya (2007) are the only foreign-born winners.
Given time, Gibbs and Gragson will be just fine. They came to Cup racing this year after building solid resumes in the Xfinity Series. Not always, but that’s usually a reliable sign of future success at the next level.
Gibbs, from the Charlotte area, took last year’s Xfinity title by winning the season-finale near Phoenix. His seventh victory of 2022 and 11th of his career came shortly before his 49-year-old father, Coy, died in his sleep of natural causes later that night. Just 20, Gibbs is the grandson of JGR owner Joe Gibbs, whose organization has won five Cup and four Xfinity championships with six different drivers. He drives JGR’s No. 54 Toyota, basically the entry that two-time Cup champion Kyle Busch (the 2005 ROTY) drove before leaving after last season. For one so talented at such a young age, most series-watchers see great things just ahead for Gibbs.
Gragson finished eighth or better in his four full-time Xfinity seasons, including second to Gibbs in 2022. All told, he has 13 career Xfinity victories, eight coming last year, including four in a row for Dale Earnhardt’s JR Motorsports. With the likelihood of a Cup ride at JRM in doubt, the 24-year-old Las Vegas native accepted the offer from team principles Richard Petty, Jimmie Johnson, and Maury Gallagher to drive their No. 42 Chevrolet with teammate Eric Jones, the 2017 ROTY. Often called “talented, but rough around the edges,” Gragson will get better just by being around Petty and Johnson.
The next five Cup races are the road course at COTA, the ¾-mile at Richmond, the half-mile dirt at Bristol, the half-mile paved at Martinsville, and the long, fast, superspeedway at Talladega.
That five-race stretch will certainly tell us more about this year’s two rookies.
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