Bubba Wallace, Kyle Busch, others wonder what could have been in missing playoffs

DARLINGTON, S.C. — In the days before their last chance to save their season, Bubba Wallace, Kyle Busch and Ross Chastain toiled at the racetrack, focused on something other than their NASCAR Cup Series cars.

With the Cup regular-season finale at Darlington Raceway looming Sunday night, Wallace raced a Legends car Friday and Saturday night on a 0.4-mile track down the road. He got beat on the first night by, among others, 11-year-old Keelan Harvick (son of Kevin). The cars are typically raced by kids and hobbyists. 

Busch was at the track, too, guiding his 9-year-old son, Brexton, who was competing in one of the local divisions.

Chastain remained at Darlington, where he competed in a relatively underfunded Xfinity Series car at Darlington.

All three of the drivers desperately wanted to make the playoffs. But it also appeared that they also knew that, well, life goes on without making the playoffs — which none of them could achieve Sunday night. They were joined by Chris Buescher, who also missed out thanks to Chase Briscoe snapping a 93-race winless streak with the Darlington victory to snag a playoff spot.

The drivers who came close could look at a year of almosts and know they will have to compete in the last 10 races amid disappointment.

Chastain made a conscious effort to watch Briscoe's race-winning celebration.

"I wanted to stand out there and watch the 14 [of Briscoe] celebrate and see that," Chastain said. "We had 26 opportunities and didn't do it. I wanted to soak that in and let that hurt and let that fuel the fire for the next few months."

Wallace, who is expected to renew at 23XI Racing to remain with the team for next year, though no deal has been officially announced, got off social media in July. He has a baby on the way later this fall.

"I'm pissed off," Wallace said. "I'm frustrated. I'm disappointed. But at the end of the day, I'm here. There are 40 of us who get to do this. I'm blessed at the same time."

The 30-year-old Wallace tends to show his emotions — some might say too much — and did all he could to not let the playoff pressure get to him.

"If you just show up and race, which is what you used to do when you were a kid, I think that that's super important, and that's what I've been doing," Wallace said in the week leading up to the race. "So it doesn't mean I'm not as passionate. Doesn't mean I'm not as pissed off when we don't win. It just means, I get even hungrier but more in a positive mindset way.

"And so I think that just helps us flow naturally, instead of pointing the blame, getting back to the shop, figuring out where we need to be better. ... People want to see the frustration and the anger and, well, it's there, but it's being constructed in a more meaningful way and used for the next weekend and the next race, the next opportunity."

Wallace will try to view the next 10 races as the next opportunity. After Daytona last week, he got a text from Michael Jordan that he said told him "Things you want more, cost more."

Jordan, a co-owner of Wallace's team, texts Wallace nearly weekly.

"He understands the situation that we're in," Wallace said last week. "And he can see everybody fighting hard and doing what we need to do. ... MJ is usually texting me right after every race with, ‘Good job' or whatever it may be. So he's very much involved."

Jordan watched the race from the pit stall as Wallace was on the brink of potentially making up points on Buescher. It wouldn't have mattered in the end because Briscoe won, meaning only two winless drivers made the 16-driver playoff field on points.

"I'm absolutely terrified right now because I want him to do well," Jordan said during the race telecast.

For Wallace and Chastain and Buescher, they not only didn't make the playoffs, they all saw their teammates reach the playoffs. Wallace teammate Tyler Reddick won two races and captured the regular-season title. Chastain teammate Daniel Suarez got in thanks to a win at Atlanta while finishing 117 points behind Chastain. Buescher saw his teammate and co-owner Brad Keselowski win at Darlington earlier this year in a race in which Buescher perhaps had the best car.

Buescher had two seconds, a third and two fifth-place finishes during the regular season. One of those was being on the wrong end of the closest finish in NASCAR history in a side-by-side battle with Kyle Larson.

"You think about the times I wish I would have done something different and the times I wish other people would have done something different," Buescher said.

Wallace last week said it was "unacceptable" to have him on the bubble and Reddick contend for the regular-season title.

"I look at the last seven or eight races, we've executed very close to how the 45 [of Reddick] is, and our and our results show that," Wallace said. "A little bit different tire strategies at the end that promote a couple spots better for the 45 like Nashville, but they were able to execute and be there for the end of races as to where we were either caught up in somebody else's mess or something would go south, and we didn't have an opportunity to better ourselves."

Both Busch and Chastain had made the playoffs each of the last two years, including Chastain finishing second overall in the standings in 2022. 

"If you would have had me fill out a bingo card at the start of the season, I wouldn't have dabbed this block [of missing the playoffs], for sure," Chastain said.

Busch's main goal the rest of the way is to win a race and extend his streak of winning a race every year to 20 years. He came up one spot short in each of the final two regular-season races as he finished second in both and also was third in a photo finish at Atlanta (the race that Suarez won). 

"The whole season's been frustrating," Busch said during the week. "Every week, it just kind of seems like, ‘OK what's next?' But that's something that we can't change. Chris Buescher just said it [earlier that] there's a lot of things and a lot of questions that we have for ourselves and answers that we might not be able to answer exactly right now as to how our year has gone, but that's in the past, and you know you can use that as a distraction or a motivation tool, and we'll look to try to make that as a motivation tool."

All four of these drivers know they can win and that will be the focus over the final 10 weeks in a sport where the non-playoff drivers still compete every week.

"I know how close we are, and we still have the resources and will continue to fight on," Chastain said. "We're not going to just cruise. We'll go and try to win."

Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including over 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass.