Busch offering Hendrick something to think about

Each week SI.com's Tom Bowles will evaluate and rank the 10 best drivers in NASCAR. (Send comments to siwriters@simail.com)

NASCAR Power Rankings Rank Last Week Driver 1 2 Kyle Busch "Pretty badly, really." That's how Busch responded to the question of how much he wanted to win a race the way Atlanta unfolded last week. Call it the understatement of the year. Busch led 173 of 325 laps in handing Toyota its first ever Cup victory while also trouncing the man who led to his release at Hendrick Motorsports, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Forget that Busch, 22, leads the Cup and Truck Series points by a wide margin; what's more impressive is how quickly he's turned around the No. 18 program. Joe Gibbs Racing's struggling third car hadn't had a sniff of Victory Lane since Bobby Labonte won Homestead in November 2003. You have to wonder if Rick Hendrick has any regrets; Busch's replacement in the No. 5 car, Casey Mears, is mired in 30th in driver points with no Top 10 finishes this season. 2 1 Carl Edwards What a weird week for the No. 99 bunch. A Wednesday penalty for the faulty oil tank cover cost them 100 points following their Vegas victory. With crew chief Bob Osborne suspended on Sunday, Matt Kenseth's former head wrench Robbie Reiser was called in to pinch hit. But while he called Carl by the wrong name all race long, Reiser put the right setup underneath the Aflac car; Edwards was the only driver to have anything for Busch before his engine expired just 51 laps from the finish. "To win three out of the first four, that would have been spectacular," said Edwards. "But I think we showed today and the last couple of weeks that we've got a great team." Right now, though, the proof isn't in the pudding ... er, stats sheet. After finishing 42nd, Edwards fell from 1st to 17th in points in just one week. Good thing these Power Rankings don't take off points for parts and pieces breaking down ? 3 7 Dale Earnhardt Jr. All right, I'm convinced; Earnhardt Jr. is already the real deal at Hendrick. As my colleague Lars Anderson likes to say, this guy is the best at rim riding around the high line; and with the inside groove at Atlanta giving everyone fits, that talent translated into an excellent Sunday performance. Four races in, who'd have thought that Junior would be the best of the Hendrick foursome -- with three intermediate tracks run during that span, hardly this man's forte? 4 3 Ryan Newman The Daytona 500 winner had some sour breath during Sunday's race; surprising, considering Juan Pablo Montoya tried to shove him a dose of Wrigley's Big Red. The two "old friends" got together with about 100 laps to go Sunday, turning a top-five run for Newman into a tire rub that needed some attention on pit road. Newman's anger after the race was evident in a rivalry that shows no signs of stopping. Montoya and Newman tangled in the Colombian's first race in the series and they haven't gotten along since. With the short tracks of Bristol and Martinsville up next, don't be surprised if a meeting of minds -- and fenders -- happens again. 5 10 Greg Biffle While Edwards has been the star at Roush Fenway Racing this season, Biffle has quietly put together his best start since 2005. What's been notable about the No. 16 the last two weeks is how strong the car's come on at the finish; both times, a top-10 car turned into a top-five machine capable of challenging for the win. It should be noted that a lightning-quick final pit stop helped with that; the crew pushed Biffle from 8th to 3rd during the final 100 miles, yet another sign this team is coming together after nine months with crew chief Greg Erwin under the helm. 6 6 Jeff Gordon One week after one of the hardest hits of his career, Gordon got back on track at Atlanta. A consistent run in the lead pack left the Rainbow Warrior fifth at the end of the day; but while the race didn't end with his transmission lying halfway down the back straightaway, it didn't mean things were any less difficult for Gordon in an event that had drivers dangling on the edge of control. "I felt like I was going to crash every single lap," he said afterwards. "I'm exhausted right now. I feel like I've run a thousand miles; and there is just no reason for this. And it's not any one person or group's fault. It's a combination. This car, this tire, at this race track was just terrible." 7 9 Tony Stewart Suffice it to say, Stewart's comments were far less diplomatic than Gordon's. In a well-publicized post-race tirade, Stewart blamed Goodyear for a race in which it was near-impossible to race side-by-side. "They exited out of Formula One. They exited out of IRL. They exited out of CART. They exited out of World Outlaws, and there is a reason for that. Goodyear can't build a tire that is worth a crap," said Stewart in comments that prompted a public response by the tiremaker. Expect the war of words to continue this week; but what's lost during all this mess was that Stewart finished second and is running strong at a stage of the season in which he's usually struggling to get off the ground. 8 5 Matt Kenseth He was in championship form Sunday; at least the form he used to capture the final title under the old points system in 2003. Starting from the rear after changing transmissions, the No. 17 was junk for most of the race before a well-timed Lucky Dog and late-race adjustments boosted him up to 8th by the checkers. Pretty, it wasn't; but those are the types of gritty performances that put you in contention to capture the biggest trophy. 9 NR Kevin Harvick When a driver scores his first top-10 finish at a track in seven years, it's high time to put him in the power rankings. Since winning the first race of his Cup career at Atlanta in 2001, Harvick's found the 1.54-mile speedway tough to tame; in his past dozen starts prior to Sunday, he'd finished no better than 15th. That he overcame that slump with a 7th-place performance speaks to how well RCR has got the Car of Tomorrow working at intermediate tracks. In fact, it's to the point that they're even challenging their Hendrick counterparts at Chevy for overall strength in that department. 10 4 Kasey Kahne He joined Gillett Evernham Motorsports on a flashback weekend Sunday; but it wasn't something the team was hoping to relive. All three GEM cars revisited their nightmare season of '07 last weekend, unloading as junk and struggling to remain competitive throughout Atlanta's 500-mile event. Kahne saw his '08 momentum snapped with a mid-race spin and a car that was just plain slow. He wound up 28th, three laps off the pace, but remains a solid 7th in the season standings.