Kyle Busch offered a simple solution to Denny Hamlin’s plight.
“Shut your mouth,” Bush said. “simple as that.”
Busch said this in response to a question at the Atlanta Motor Speedway Media Center NASCAR heavily fined Hamlin earlier this week: The sanctioning body determined that the driver of the No. 11 Cup car was guilty of “attempting to manipulate the result of a race” by “destroying or spinning another vehicle, whether that vehicle was removed from competition or No” – and “taking actions that NASCAR views as detrimental to stock car racing.”
The action in question occurred late in the Cup Series race at Phoenix Raceway last weekend, when Hamlin pushed Ross Chastain into the fence in turn one to prevent the No. 1 car from a good finish. Hamlin finished 23rd; Chastain finished 24th.
No penalty was imposed immediately after the race. Elton Sawyer, NASCAR’s senior vice president of competition, later stated that “when you look back at this past weekend, we view it as a racing event.”
but then hamlin came on his podcast and explained that his run at Chastain was actually intentional – a ploy meant to pause a beef between hamlin and chastain Which has now spread over two seasons – and NASCAR got involved from there.
The sanctioning body ultimately fined Hamlin $50,000 and a penalty of 25 driver points.
Hamlin initially expressed that he would not appeal NASCAR’s decision, but announced that He will go through the appeals process on Friday, Why the change of heart? Hamlin didn’t address it properly on Saturday.
“I’ve had the shingles vaccine,” Hamlin said in dead pan jest, his polarizing persona proudly peeking through.
Any other meaningful follow-up questions to Hamlin were met with similar insight: “I have nothing to say,” he would say, or “Can’t wait for Atlanta,” and so on.
That doesn’t mean other drivers didn’t have much to say on the matter.
“I think those were easy reactions,” Kevin Harvick said of the penalties NASCAR imposed on Hamlin. “It’s like going to court and saying you plead guilty. I mean, it’s hard to react differently when the plea is already guilty.
Harvick, 47, is the most experienced driver in the Cup Series garage and one of the best of all time — and he has recently harnessed that power to become the voice of reason for the game,
Harvick admits he’s “done everything” in his younger, rougher years when it comes to exacting revenge on a driver who wrecked him – one of those unwritten but necessary customs that NASCAR has to deal with. is unique. But he also said that some moves cross lines.
“I think from a driver’s side, you still have a lot to offer. The things that are different in today’s world are the SMT (Sports Media Technology) data and all the things that come with the data side,” Harvick said. “There’s always going to be different opinions, but I can tell you that breaking people under caution, and wrecking people on purpose in the state that we’re prone to injuries and the way the car crashes – that stuff for me just needed to get over.
He said: “We are examples. This is something we want to emphasize cars tour For our local, regional racers. There are lines that can be crossed. And we’re Sunday examples of what’s acceptable at your local short-track on a Saturday night.
Hamlin’s teammate Christopher Bell at Joe Gibbs Racing said he did not see Hamlin’s penalty coming.
“I was surprised NASCAR penalized Denny because that happens a lot in our sport,” he said. “And it’s never been punished before. So I was surprised by that.
Just last year, NASCAR assessed some penalties for race manipulation. Among the most prominent examples: the sanctioning body William Byron punished for wrecking Hamlin under caution And Bubba Wallace suspended in race to total Kyle Larson at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.
Bell recognized that what Hamlin did and what Byrne and Wallace did in 2022 were completely different.
“I think there’s a completely different situation under yellow than under green,” Bell said. “I mean, it happens all the time when people bump into each other intentionally or not intentionally, so I was surprised by the fact that it was a penalty.”
Chastain said that he was initially mad at Hamlin’s move, but determined that his best course of action was to get out of the car and talk to Hamlin after the race.
Chastain said, “I thought getting out of the car and talking to him was the best way I could go about it.” compounded itself, and combined with a man like him, it’s going to be bigger than it probably ever should have been.
Joey Logano considers Hamlin’s wreck a “gray-area-type call,” adding, “It’s a good thing I don’t have to make the call.” The driver of the No. 22 Cup car had a collision of his own with Chastain last year, but has since rectified any related issues before competing in the 2022 Cup Series championship in October.
Logano was asked if Hamlin’s penalty would encourage drivers to routinely retaliate and commit slight fouls in any post-race availability.
“I think you’re always smart about what you say, like right now, you’re putting me in a box here, trying to get me to say the wrong thing,” he said with a smile. “You have to be smart about what you say at any given moment.”
Busch elaborated on his aforementioned “keep your mouth shut” advice to Hamlin on Saturday. “Logano wrecked me in 2017. It was on purpose, but he won’t admit it,” said the driver of the No. 8 car and Hamlin’s former Joe Gibbs Racing teammate.
When asked how the sport should address drivers intentionally colliding with each other, Busch made an impassioned appeal to all NASCAR drivers.
“We have completely lost a sense of respect in the garage area among the drivers,” Busch said. “That’s where the problem is. It’s that nobody cares about anybody else, and it’s just a problem where everybody takes advantage of everybody else as much as they can. We’re all selfish, Granted, but there was a courtesy that once lived here. Mark (Martin) started it. I think Tony (Stewart) really lived by it. I think Jeff (Gordon) lived by it . Bobby Lobante. Rusty (Wallace) for the most part. Dale Jarrett for sure. It existed, and it’s gone.
Bush said: “Blame it on me, of course. I’m not taking the initiative to fix it and talk to all these young drivers, even though I’ve talked to maybe 14 of them who go through KBM.” Some of them have done a relatively good job of speaking up.
“And others, it’s in one ear, out the other.”