When it comes to Junior vs. Busch, there are no losers

On the surface, it would be easy to think that Rick Hendrick made a mistake. After all, the driver he let go, Kyle Busch, has won a series-leading four races for Joe Gibbs Racing and has established himself as the frontrunner for the Sprint Cup crown. The driver he hired, Dale Earnhardt Jr., heads to Michigan International Speedway this week with his winless streak stretching to 76 races.

Yes, events have certainly taken an unpredictable turn since that news conference one year ago Friday uniting NASCAR's biggest organization with NASCAR's biggest star. So it's simple to see why some folks in the grandstand think the Hendrick Motorsports owner should have stuck with the status quo, looking past Busch's stubbornness and toward his limitless potential. It's simple to see why some believe he should have locked Busch up long term, just as he did with Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson, and let Earnhardt sign with another organization where the stakes and the expectations weren't quite so high. It's simple to see why there are whispers and rumblings that Earnhardt's five-year deal was a gross miscalculation.

And to all that, we say: rubbish.

Trying to discern winners and losers 14 races into the Earnhardt-Busch swap is beyond shortsighted. It's ludicrous, given that both drivers are going to be in their current seats for several seasons, and show every sign of thriving in their relatively new environments. Busch has four victories, but he still has his Kyle moments, and his hard-charging style prompts questions over whether he can stay out front the entire season. Earnhardt doesn't have a race win, but he's firmly ensconced in Chase position, is off to his best start ever, and has a handful of poor finishes that aren't necessarily his fault.

In Vegas terms, right now this is a push. You have two drivers who are enjoying successful first seasons -- granted, one a little more above-the-radar than the other -- with organizations that seem to fit their styles and their personalities. Busch and Earnhardt left Pocono Raceway last Sunday a respective first and third in championship points, both of them the standard-bearer for organizations they only joined months ago. Both have assimilated flawlessly. With apologies to Jeff Burton, it's very easy to envision a scenario in which Busch and Earnhardt are racing for the championship as relentlessly as they raced one another that night in Richmond a month ago.

More on Kyle

• Caraviello: Addington perfect
• Menzer: Future bright at JGR
• Caraviello: Busch no fluke
• Busch's Triple Crown diary
• Makes history, but loses points

There are no losers in this deal. Earnhardt, a Nationwide Series car owner with a keen appreciation for the history of the sport, meshes perfectly with a Hendrick organization that's renowned for keeping sponsors happy and remembering its roots. Busch, the occasional wild child who always seemed a little out of place in Hendrick's buttoned-down culture, is clearly more at home on a Gibbs team run by an ex-football coach who knows how to manage people while letting them be themselves at the same time. In each case, that level of comfort can not be overstated. For a driver to be successful, first he has to be content -- something Busch and Earnhardt weren't necessarily last year, but clearly are now.

For Earnhardt especially, the change has been a dramatic one. The sniping with his stepmother Teresa, the public fight for control of Dale Earnhardt Inc. -- all of that now seems like it occurred a very, very long time ago. He's gone from a season in which he was the headline every week to one where he's just another driver in the top 12. Surely some expected a bigger bang -- Darrell Waltrip's projection of six race wins in 2008 jumps immediately to mind -- but you get the impression that driver No. 88 seems very comfortable with where he is, his focus on the car and the race team rather than the issues that made last season such a struggle.

"I have a new job, everything is different about it. I am happier, yes. I have a good team, have good cars. The one thing that may stick out is the pressure and the stress is a lot less because there is more confidence now with the equipment and the team, my future and the company's ability to be a frontrunner over a long period of time. That is really good. So for the next five years, I will have a good opportunity at that each year," Earnhardt said last week at Pocono.

"I just don't have to worry. I guess I just really worried a lot about DEI and its future and how successful it would be and how healthy it was, and I don't have to worry about that as much. They have really good people working at Hendrick Motorsports that are there to assure the success of the company for a long time. Those types of things are out of my hands and I can just concentrate on my job. I get good criticism and feedback from my owner that helps me understand what my job is and what I am supposed to do. How to do it differently. It is just an easier deal. My days off are a lot more worry-free. I have noticed that a little bit."

As for Busch? The results speak for themselves. He's been fast since the first instant he stepped into a Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, zooming to the top of the speed chart in a test of the new car at Atlanta Motor Speedway late last year. He's fit well with crew chief Steve Addington, whose easy-going manner is the perfect balance to Busch's hard-nosed style. He's going fast, he's winning races, and he's given the latitude to try things like last weekend's three-race, three-state, three-day tripleheader, which earned the kid some respect despite the sub-par race results that ensued.

And while we're on the subject, don't give me this junk about how Busch should have stayed in Pocono all weekend. Yes, he finished three laps down in the Nationwide race and crashed out of the Sprint Cup event. But that kind of competitiveness can't be taught. These are all preliminaries anyway, and he's still the championship favorite whether his lead is 10 points or 100. Let him go race powerboats in the Keys if he wants to. He's all but earned a spot in the Chase, and as a result the right to try something a little different every once in a while. Joe Gibbs' willingness to let him do it is a perfect example of the hands-off management style that's worked so well in both NASCAR and the NFL.

Busch is thriving in that environment, just as Earnhardt is thriving in one where the focus is completely on performance. Those were whirlwind days last year, when Earnhardt's decision to leave DEI created a domino effect that resulted in two top drivers landing with two top teams. No, they're not quite even right now in terms of race victories and statistics. But they are in terms of satisfaction, something much more difficult to achieve.