Kyle Busch was never the driver everyone loved. For years, he was cast as NASCAR’s villain, the one that fans booed and rivals hated racing against. But after his passing, Chase Elliott wearing a Brexton Busch T-shirt showed everyone a different side of Busch. “He was the first and one of very few to come pat me on the back,” Elliott said while reflecting on the heartbreak of losing the Coca-Cola 600 late, recalling how Busch had comforted him afterward. In fact, he is ready to sacrifice something, rather close to his heart.

Elliott, talking to the media, recalled how he raced Busch in late model events as a teenager, when Busch would come down from the Cup Series and race against young short-track drivers across the country. ”I think I was like 14 or 15, and he won, obviously. But there were so many lessons in all of that… you were being taught by one of the best,” Elliott said. And now that the talks about Busch getting the NASCAR’s Most Popular Driver award have come, he is in full support of Busch wearing that crown.

“I really haven’t processed all of that, I guess, to get to that point,” Elliott said when asked if he would step aside for Busch to win the award. “But I would certainly be in favor of him winning, whatever it took. Yeah, I think it would be really deserving for him to have that honor.” What makes the moment even more emotional is the Elliott family history behind it. His father, Bill Elliott, did the same back in 2001.

He willingly withdrew his name from the Most Popular Driver ballot after Dale Earnhardt passed away during the 2001 Daytona 500.  Bill had already won the prize several times and was the sport’s dominant fan favorite at the time. That winter, Earnhardt posthumously received the fan‑voted Most Popular Driver award, a moment many in the garage still see as a sign of how much fans valued him. Now, 25 years later, Chase Elliott finds himself in an eerily similar position.

After winning the 2025 fan poll, the younger Elliott continued his eight-year run as the NASCAR Cup Series Most Popular Driver. He has become the modern face of NASCAR fandom due to his popularity, and the Elliott family is now practically associated with the honor. With 16 career Most Popular Driver honors, Bill Elliott continues to retain the record. But Kyle Busch’s passing has clearly shifted the emotional landscape surrounding this year’s voting.

That being said, Kyle Busch wasn’t necessarily the fan-favorite driver. He had the Rowdy Nation behind him, but he was never far from boos and jeers. Take the 2018 race win at Chicagoland. A last-lap battle between him and Kyle Larson put on an epic show for the fans. But when Busch crossed the finish line, he was greeted with a roar of boos. And how did he respond? “I don’t know what ya’ll are whining about, but if you don’t like that kind of racing, don’t even watch.”

But after his death at 41 years of age, rather abruptly, one thing is clear: in the garage, the respect for Busch always ran much deeper than the public reactions suggested. Elliott, in fact, admitted Busch’s death has hit him harder than expected.

“As long as I’ve been racing with Kyle, he’s impacted my career directly a little more than I even realized,” Elliott said. “It’s really not going to feel right racing without him.” And he had a message for Brexton Busch too.

Elliott said he wants the family to know he will always be available if needed. “I’ll throw my name out there now and for as long as needed,” Elliott said. “If I was ever needed for help, I hope Brexton knows I’m a phone call away.” And like him, many in the NASCAR world are standing for Kyle Busch, and his family.

The NASCAR world remembers Kyle Busch

This weekend, the sorrow surrounding Kyle Busch has extended well beyond the NASCAR garage. Deeply personal memories of the two-time Cup Series winner are being shared by drivers from many disciplines and eras. For Kyle Kirkwood, the connection goes all the way back to childhood.

Kirkwood recalled attending one of his first professional racing events as a seven-year-old kid, where he asked Busch for an autograph on a hat that he still keeps today among his racing memorabilia.

“That was like one of the first moments that I got around professional cars,” Kirkwood said Friday at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. “In a way, he turned me on to motor racing and wanting to move forward from karting.”

Meanwhile, seven-time NASCAR Cup champion Jimmie Johnson praised Busch’s unmatched technical understanding of race cars.

“The bravery, just natural skill, and then being able to tie that all back to the engineering process and communicating what he’s feeling, and expanding on that, and understanding cars, and the build [of the cars],” Johnson said. “Technically, in [knowing] the build of a car, he’s one of the best.”

Even longtime rival Brad Keselowski admitted Busch’s loss had shaken the entire garage.

“Kyle and I were not friends, we were rivals, but the NASCAR racing community is still a brotherhood,” Keselowski said before adding, “The race is going to go on this weekend, but the sport is never going to be the same without Kyle.”

Carson Hocevar echoed similar emotions while reflecting on their brief time together at Spire Motorsports.

“Whether he disliked me or not on Sundays, when it came to … at Spire, we were teammates,” Hocevar said. “That said a lot about him.”

And perhaps one of the most emotional tributes came from Dale Earnhardt Jr.

“Kyle and I had a really challenging existence for many years. But we luckily took the time to figure out our differences, and that was something he instigated with a conversation in his bus around how we each managed our racing teams. I was super eager for us to get on better terms. But it was he who made the effort for that to be possible. I will never be able to make sense of this loss, but I am thankful that we had found a way to become friends,” Earnhardt Jr. said.

In many ways, that sentiment perfectly captures Kyle Busch’s legacy. He was fiercely competitive, deeply respected, and just impossible to ignore.