The inclusion of Cleetus McFarland in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series line-up by Richard Childress Racing gathered ample criticism. However, it was not more than what NASCAR received after their surprising decision to allow him to race in the second tier of stock car racing. Pointing it out, Brad Keselowski shared his thoughts and proposed a radical idea to prevent such situations in the future.

Keselowski’s take on the system following Richard Childress’ driver’s inclusion

“The problem that we have—this is NASCAR’s industry as a whole—is for whatever reason we completely abandoned the identity of those four series,” Keselowski said on Dale Jr.’s podcast. “Not necessarily the Cup series, but those four series—kind of like the pecking order—have been thrown away. And it started with removing the Cup drivers from the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series.”

Keselowski mentioned how ARCA was the starting point for every stock car racer after their jump from Late Models. Following this, the Truck Series used to be for veteran drivers who were around 35-40 years old, but now it is for inexperienced drivers around 17-18 years old. However, the double approval of Cleetus McFarland in the Truck and O’Reilly Auto Parts in a span of two months and one race made Keselowski change his mind.

Following this, the RFK driver revealed what he thought was the perfect way to get the Truck Series approval from ARCA and then improve further to the O’Reilly Auto Parts and the Cup Series. Here’s what he further added:

“Personally, I think that the 3 series should have three different approval criteria, with the Truck series being approved. So, here’s my opinion. If you want to run ARCA and you know you have less than 100 starts in any major or even minor league form of racing. Yeah. Okay, cool. ARCA is your place. You, in my mind, should not be allowed to run the Truck series unless you’re like, “I have 100-plus starts across the country.”

Notably, Keselowski’s concern surfaced after NASCAR allowed Cleetus McFarland to race in the Truck Series after just six ARCA races. What shocked fans and experts more than anything was that NASCAR allowed him to run in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series just after one race in the Truck Series!

NASCAR allowed McFarland even though he only ran four laps at Daytona before crashing his truck in his debut. This was something many experts, including current Cup Series driver Kyle Busch, criticized.

Kyle Busch criticized NASCAR over Cleetus McFarland’s approval

Kyle Busch did disagree that NASCAR allowed Cleetus McFarland to run in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series despite having just seven races to his name. Drivers often regard O’Reilly Auto Parts Series races as a gateway to the Cup Series.

Busch, who has himself had to wait two full years (he started racing in Trucks in 2001 and the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series, known as the Busch Series then, in 2003) before stepping into O’Reilly, compared McFarland with his son, Brexton, and stated that the latter has more races than the YouTuber.

“I mean, he just, I don’t know,” Busch said in an interview with Fox8. “I don’t know how many races he’s run. Denny Hamlin ran 10,000 before he got here, right? So, I don’t know if Cleetus has run 10 or not, but there’s definitely a need to have ample experience. My son has probably run more races than he has, and he’s 10 years old. You know what I mean? So, I don’t think that sits well with many of us.”

In February of this year, NASCAR allowed Cleetus McFarland to race in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series, following which he signed up with Richard Childress Racing. He will drive the #33 Chevrolet Camaro SS entry at Rockingham Speedway this year, the same ride Kasey Kahne drove last year.