There's a strong likelihood Kalitta Motorsports VP of Operations Jim Oberhofer never met William Pollard, a physicist, who championed the organization of the Oak Ridge Institute of Nuclear Studies.

Pollard was quoted as saying, "Without change, there is no innovation, creativity, or incentive for improvement. Those who initiate change will have a better opportunity to manage the change that is inevitable."

With this said, Oberhofer orchestrated myriad changes to the Kalitta operation he envisions as a game-changer for the 2017 NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series.

"The biggest thing we wanted to accomplish is just to try and shake things up within our team to make things go a little bit better," Oberhofer said. "We had a great year in 2015 with the DHL car, with Del Worsham winning the Funny Car World Championship. But last year, the Schumacher cars, and the Force cars, they stepped up, and it was tough."

The lion's share of the Kalitta personnel changes were focused on the three-team Funny Car operation.

"Our cars still did well, we still won races and made it to the final rounds, but it’s not what we expect out of our Kalitta teams," Oberhofer explained. "We feel like we should be able to compete for a championship week in and week out. We just decided, before the World Finals, that we were going to make some changes within the team."

Del Worsham and Alexis DeJoria, the team's two full-time Funny Car drivers, finished seventh and tenth respectively.  A year earlier they were first and eighth, with Worsham winning his first career Funny Car title.

The wholesale changes were set in motion with the announcement over Thanksgiving week that Worsham would leave the team to pursue racing with his family's nitro team. After two weeks of juggling sponsor notifications, J.R. Todd was moved from the SealMaster Top Fuel dragster over to fill Worsham's seat.

"We feel we have everybody that we need to win championships, it was just a matter of moving some people around," Oberhofer said.

With the drivers in place, Oberhofer set about reorganizing his team's tuning infrastructure.

Nicky Boninfante, whose family is well-known in the drag racing community for proficiency in clutch manufacturing, was promoted to essentially a "crew chief" of the Funny Car crew chiefs.

In addition, Boninfante, while overseeing the team's Funny Car crew chiefs, will also co-crew chief the DeJoria's Patron team, where he will team up with Tommy DeLago. David Boyer also joined Boninfante in the move and will serve as Car Chief/Assistant Crew Chief.

"I feel like with those three guys that that will give that team the shot in the arm it needs to get back to where we feel it can be, and that’s being a top five car that can compete for the championship," Oberhofer said. "I think it also gives Alexis confidence as well too. She’s an excellent driver and she does a great job driving the car. I know Alexis is fired up about what the future holds for her team."

Todd Smith, originally hired to tune for part-time Kalitta Racing driver Paul Lee, is reassigned to the DHL team and will work with longtime tuner Jon Oberhofer.

Smith, as Oberhofer explained, made an immediate impact in his involvement with Lee's operation.

"That car made ten runs, there was nothing dumb that ever happened with that car, and Paul ran his quickest ET and fastest speed almost every single run that he went down the track," Oberhofer said. "Todd has such a laid back mentality and persona about himself; he’s just really easy to work with. Putting him and my brother together I think was a good thing.

"He has a little bit of a different outlook on things, but he still understands what Kalitta Motorsports is all about. He still understands about Connie Kalitta and the passion that he has for this team. He also understands that Connie is a very smart man, not only in business but running one of these cars."

Oberhofer believes the transition from a dragster to a Funny Car will be a seamless move for Todd, who is now driving for a team that took an initial big hit with the departure of Worsham. Worsham was more than just a hired driver.

"Obviously Del’s a great driver, very smart mechanically and he can run one of these cars on his own," Oberhofer said. "We lost two-fold there when we lost Del as a driver, and then Del as a tuner, so to speak."

Todd, Oberhofer believes, has all the qualities to make the transition flow smoothly.

"He’s the best guy that we feel we could put in that seat to kind of live up to the name, live up to what that car is all about," Oberhofer said. "It’s about Scott Kalitta; it’s about how badass of a driver he was, and how badass of a person he was. I feel like J.R. has that same swagger that Scott had. So I think he’s going to do a great job."

Glen Huszar, most recently teamed with DeLago on the Patron car, will get the opportunity to serve as a crew chief,  handling the tuning on Lee's Funny Car.

"It provides Glen with the opportunity to be a crew chief but not in an environment where he’s got to go to every single race and compete to be in the Top 10," Oberhofer explained. "It allows Glen to get a good feel of what it’s like to run one of these cars, to make decisions on his own, and still be part of the other two cars as well, but not be overwhelmed. I think it will help Glen grow as a tuner and a crew chief as well."

Nick Casertano, formerly the Assistant Crew Chief on John Force’s Funny Car team, will team up with Huszar on Lee's Funny Car, a team which he believes will be capable of winning a national event in 2017.

As for the Top Fuel teams, clearly in Oberhofer's direct wheelhouse, instead of three teams, there will only be two with Troy Coughlin Jr. settling into Todd's vacant Top Fuel cockpit. Though he's a nitro rookie, Oberhofer said the third-generation drag racer's demeanor is anything but one of a newcomer.

"The one thing that I’ve noticed about T.J., is his attention to detail on everything," Oberhofer said. "He came out, and he drove Doug’s car after the Vegas race in the fall. We let him make like three laps in the car, and he did an excellent job. I look at all the things he pays attention to, he reminds me of Doug Kalitta in a lot of ways as far as his attention to detail, and he kind of has that quiet confidence about himself. I think he’s going to do an awesome job in that race car. I guess you can look at him as a cross between a Doug Kalitta and a Shawn Langdon because T.J. has that Sportsman background, racing pretty much anything that has wheels on it."

Oberhofer understands major changes to a tune-up can yield mixed results, but in this case, the major shake up to a team intent on success he feels can only lead to better outcomes.

"I looked at everything that happened this year, and over the winter, and the only negative we had was Del leaving the team," Oberhofer admits. "But there was certainly nothing; there’s no hard feelings or anything like that. In fact, we’re going to try to do what we can on the Kalitta Motorsports side, to help Del and Chuck out with their operation, whether it’s moral support, whether it’s parts, anything that we can do to keep those guys out there and being competitive. Because Del made our team better. He took our team to another level. And sometimes you can’t put a price on that.

"We couldn’t be more thankful that both SealMaster and DHL were very supportive of the changes that we made, and allowed us to do this. It’s not so easy, to just put this person in the car, that person in the car. But there’s a lot of people that you have to get with and make sure they’re okay with it, and the ultimate guy obviously is Connie Kalitta.

"I think it’s going to be a great year and we’re excited about it."