Richard Childress: Tyler Reddick ready for Cup Series 'right now'
Tyler Reddick looks destined to head to the Cup Series in the near future. But it’s extremely unclear where that destination could be at the moment.
Reddick, the 2018 Xfinity Series champion, has three wins in NASCAR’s No. 2 series this season and leads the points standings after moving from JR Motorsports to Richard Childress Racing. And Childress said Tuesday at a NASCAR Hall of Fame event that the team has a goal of getting him into a Cup car full-time.
That’s easier said than done, however. From NBC Sports:
“That’s our goal right now is to try to put him in a Cup car,” Childress said. “That’s what he wants to do. That’s the reason he came to RCR because he knew we had Cup cars and Cup experience.
“He’ll win some Cup races if you put him in a Cup car. That’s where he wants to be, and I think he deserves it. He’s ready for Cup right now.”
Childress is currently in its second season of running two cars full-time in the Cup Series after operating as a three-car team for the previous six seasons. RCR downsized when Paul Menard and the Menards sponsorship left for Wood Brothers Racing at the end of the 2017 season.
Going back to three cars full time and adding Reddick to a team that includes Austin Dillon and Daniel Hemric wouldn’t be that big of an adjustment. But — and stop me if you’ve heard this before — Childress said it “boils down to dollars.” And sponsorship is extremely hard to come by. It’s simply not feasible to run a full-time car and attempt to be competitive in the Cup Series without sponsorship unless you’re willing to lose money.
That sponsorship wrinkle is what clouds Reddick’s future — he’s run a car with 11 different primary sponsors in 19 Xfinity Series races this season. If RCR can’t find consistent funding to move him to the Cup Series, he would ostensibly be free to find a Cup Series ride with another team. But there aren’t too many options available. And there may be no options available that include a sponsor that’s already in place on an existing team.
Reddick is more than ready to move to the Cup Series on talent alone. But talent is, unfortunately, only part of the equation in NASCAR. It may be a while before we find out where Reddick and his Xfinity Series counterpart Christopher Bell are continuing their careers in 2020.
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Nick Bromberg is a writer for Yahoo Sports
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