Harrison Burton’s profile on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, features a simple yet hard-to-miss hashtag at the top of the page that reads as follows: #SomethingToProve.

The hashtag couldn’t be any more appropriate.

Entering his third season as a competitor in the NASCAR Cup Series, Burton — a second-generation driver whose father, Jeff is a 21-time Cup race winner — likely needs to turn it up a notch if he’s to have a ride in NASCAR’s premier division for a fourth season.

In fact, he likely needs to take it up several notches on the heels of two seasons during which his performance was underwhelming at best and downright woeful at worst.

Over 72 points-paying starts stretching through two full seasons as the driver of the iconic No. 21 Ford for the famed Wood Brothers Racing organization, Burton posted a combined total of four top-10 finishes that included only one top-five — a third-finish on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course in 2022.

Between his rookie season and sophomore Cup Series campaign, Burton led just 60 laps. Perhaps the ugliest stat of all was Burton’s finishing position in the 2023 standings — 31st, a four-spot regression from his debut season.

Making his struggles all the more glaring was the fact that two of his de-facto teammates — Team Penske’s Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney — captured the 2022 and 2023 Cup Series titles, respectively (Team Penske has a longstanding technical alliance with the Wood Brothers and actually builds the cars that Burton drives.).

The good news for Burton? His first two seasons at the sport’s highest level are now behind him, and he actually has some reason for optimism that 2024 will be different.

The primary source of this optimism is the return of crew chief Jeremy Bullins, who replaced Brian Wilson atop the No. 21 team’s pit box with 10 races left in 2023 as part of a crew chief swap with the No. 2 Team Penske team of driver Austin Cindric.

“Looking back on it, I think it was the right decision for both of the teams to kind of have the swap,” Burton told noted FOX Sports reporter Bob Pockrass in a recent interview that you can watch in the below video clip where both he and Cindric shared their thoughts. “What it did was the last 10 weeks were a chance to really do a deep dive into how we prepare — what each team did well and what each team didn’t do well and what to build off of for this year.

“Once the 2 car and myself were both eliminated from the playoffs, it was kind of the right time to kind of do something there. We believed in the people we had; it was just a matter of the matchup.”

Although Burton and Bullins didn’t exactly set the woods on fire in their 10 races together — Burton finished no better than 15th over that stretch — Bullins is a veteran of the Cup Series garage and winner of nine races as a Cup crew chief.

One of those wins came with Blaney at Pocono in June of 2017, the last of three seasons — one partial and two full — that Bullins previously spent as crew chief on the Wood Brothers No. 21 car before reuniting with the team at the end of last season. Bullins’ eight remaining Cup Series victories have all come with Team Penske, where he’d called the shots for the organization’s No. 2 Ford since 2020.

Bullins’ most recent win as a crew chief was his biggest yet, as it came in the 2022 Daytona 500 with Cindric behind the wheel of the No. 2 car.

Burton is understandably eager to see what he and Bullins can accomplish together in 2024, and he hopes the two can hit the ground running after pairing up for the final 10 weeks of the 2023 season.

“Going into this year, I feel really good about what Jeremy brings to the table, what I can bring to the table with Jeremy, and I’m excited to get after it with those guys,” Burton told Pockrass of FOX Sports.

Bullins shares the optimism held by his 23-year-old driver, who captured four wins over two seasons in the NASCAR Xfinity Series before joining the Cup Series ranks.

“We got a great jump start on the 2024 season by working with Harrison for the last 10 races of 2023,” Bullins said. “That certainly helped us understand the areas we need to work to be better.

“Our new Dark Horse Mustang looks great, and we can’t wait to get on track and get the ball rolling.”

Above all, Bullins and Burton want to roll into Victory Lane — a place the Wood Brothers haven’t visited since Blaney’s lone triumph in the No. 21 car. The next win for the fabled organization birthed in 1950 by the late, legendary NASCAR Hall of Famer Glen Wood will be its 100th win in NASCAR’s premier league.

“We all look forward to chasing the Wood Brothers’ 100th win this year,” Bullins said.