Report: Trevor Bayne ‘unlikely’ to return to Roush Fenway Racing in 2019
By Nick Tylwalk
The arrival of Matt Kenseth, presented publicly as a stopgap measure, could instead mean Trevor Bayne is looking for a new ride next season.
It’s hard not to root for Trevor Bayne, one of NASCAR’s legitimately good guys. But it’s sounding increasingly likely that fans may have to pull for him somewhere other than Roush Fenway Racing in 2019.
Bayne is reportedly under contract with the team through next season, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it couldn’t buy him out or otherwise find a way to sever their relationship. With the 27-year-old mired in the worst start to any full-time season in the No. 6 Ford, he was probably going to be on shaky ground all the way through Homestead if he couldn’t find a way to turn things around.
Instead, that ground turned to quicksand when Matt Kenseth rejoined Roush Fenway Racing, and was announced as the driver of the No. 6 for races that Bayne wasn’t driving for the remainder of the 2017 season. Exactly which races have yet to be announced, but there was some thought that Bayne would only be in the car when AdvoCare was on the hood.
That still left what the team would do next year as an open question, but there might be some clarity on that front thanks to Adam Stern of SportsBusiness Journal.
NASCAR industry folks close to @RoushFenway are saying that it's unlikely that @Tbayne6 will return to the team next year, but RFR is insisting that no decisions have been made and that it's hopeful @MattKenseth's arrival will improve the performance of the entire organization. pic.twitter.com/Yjj0h9H8bo
— Adam Stern (@A_S12) May 3, 2018
It would be a bummer of an ending for a driver who burst onto the scene with his incredible underdog win in the 2011 Daytona 500. He got a full-time gig with Roush Fenway Racing in 2015, but he’s never won a Cup Series race there or even managed a runner-up finish. Bayne has also never finished higher than 22nd in the season-ending points standings, and he’s currently doing even worse than that, sitting 30th.
With teammate Ricky Stenhouse Jr. trending in the opposite direction — he won twice in 2017 and would be in the NASCAR Playoffs again if the season ended right now — it’s hard to fault RFR for wanting to make a change. It’s a little surprising the team would look to Kenseth, who would be the oldest Cup Series regular by several years if he is in the car full-time in 2019, but it’s clear right now that the organization is more interested in performance than driver development.
Next: When will NASCAR's young guns win a race in 2018?
A lot can still happen before the end of the current season, but the question would be that if Roush Fenway Racing is thinking about giving the seat to Kenseth next year, what can Bayne do to change the team’s mind? If he only has 10 races left, the number that AdvoCare is said to still be sponsoring, those could very well be the biggest 10 starts of Bayne’s driving career.