Greg Biffle parts ways with Roush Fenway Racing

The Greg Biffle era at Roush Fenway Racing won’t be continuing in 2017. Biffle, 46, wouldn’t be returning to the team for a 16th season in the Sprint Cup Series.

It's been a great 19 yrs at Roush Fenway racing, it was a mutual agreement we started working on many months ago for a departure after 2016

— Greg Biffle (@gbiffle) November 21, 2016

Roush is the only team Biffle, 46, has driven for in the Sprint Cup Series. Since his debut in 2002, Biffle compiled 19 wins and 175 top-10 finishes in 510 starts. His last win came in 2013 when he won at Michigan.

When Roush was at the top of the Cup Series in the mid-2000s, Biffle was a perennial top-10 driver. From 2005, when he finished 2nd to Tony Stewart in the Chase, to 2013, when Biffle finished ninth in the standings, Biffle ended the season in the top 10 six times.

But as Roush has started to struggle, Biffle’s performance has followed suit. He was 14th in 2014, 20th in 2015 and finished this season 23rd in the standings after finishing 17th at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Sunday.

His departure from the team also puts the existence of his No. 16 car into question. Roush has the No. 6 car (Trevor Bayne) and the No. 17 (Ricky Stenhouse Jr.) filled for 2017. Could Roush be a two-car team 12 years after getting five cars into the Chase in 2005?

.@roushfenway this afternoon is officially announcing that @gbiffle is parting ways with the organization. TBD on running the No. 16 in '17.

— Adam Stern (@A_S12) November 21, 2016

If Roush doesn’t fill the seat of the No. 16, it could choose to sell its charter for the car. Or it could lease it to a team for a season and bring the team back in 2018. The lease would be the ideal play if the team decides it wants to bring back the car.

But on the off-chance Roush wanted to sell, who would be a buyer? There could be another charter (or more) up for sale as well this offseason depending on the future of HScott Motorsports. The team, which fielded a car for Clint Bowyer in 2016, hasn’t announced its plans for 2017.

Hendrick Motorsports, Joe Gibbs Racing and Stewart-Haas Racing are all at the four-car maximum. Penske isn’t expanding. Neither, likely, is Richard Childress Racing. And with less than 100 days to go before the 2017 Daytona 500, there isn’t much time for an owner to get a team in place.

We’ll see what the future holds for Biffle and for Roush soon enough.