Running a race team in the NASCAR Cup Series is not meant for the financially moderate. It is an expensive game that has existing teams relying on sponsors and the revenue from media deals to keep the lights in their garages on. It is in this corner that NASCAR has got every team except 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports to sign its new (and seemingly unfair) charter agreement.
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The negotiations went on for a large part of the last year and culminated with the majority of team owners submitting to NASCAR last week. The biggest problem that they had was that the promotion wasn’t willing to shelve more money to teams from the new media deal that it has signed to run between 2025 and 2031. Their contention for a bigger piece of the pie failed.
And yet, the two teams – 23XI Racing and Front Row Motorsports – are holding out in the hopes that they’ll be able to knock some sense into the shark. Former racing icon Greg Biffle has become a fan of their resilience. He said on his YouTube channel, “They have their own reasons and in a way, I don’t blame them. They’re saying, ‘Hey! We want more money. We want to pay our driver.”
“We want to take care of our team. And we need so much money to stay up on the cutting edge of this sport.’ I’ve also heard that some teams feel like they haven’t had a seat at the table.” He continued to express that every team ought to have an equal voice regardless of the number of entries that it has. The driver hopes that this complication gets resolved at the earliest.
Biffle’s words make it easy to see why Denny Hamlin isn’t wrong in his steadfastness to stand up against NASCAR. He has been a strong critic of the promotion right from the onset of the charter negotiations. He went a step ahead by unveiling internal matters to the public on numerous occasions and drew the wrath of the officials in the Daytona headquarters.
Perhaps, Hamlin’s resolve is backed by the unwavering support that he has from his partner Michael Jordan. There are a few ways in which things could move forward from here. One, Hamlin and Jordan might decide to comply with NASCAR. An unlikely route. Second, they could decide to take the promotion to the courts. Now that is something that Daytona should fear.
NASCAR has always chosen to operate in the shadows when it came to financial matters. Going to court means full transparency on the books. This could unravel an entire world of chaos in the sport and bring down an empire. Moreover, it is something that would get Jordan’s competitive juices flowing. A mutual understanding could be to everyone’s benefit at this juncture.
