Denny Hamlin Believes NASCAR Would’ve Bankrupted Tony Stewart Sooner or Later if Stewart Haas Racing Had Survived

The jittery nature of NASCAR’s economic situation was nothing new. Being a privately owned sport, it does not allow teams to enjoy freedom and flexibility in charters. When a race team fails to deliver, they lose the comfort of million-dollar sponsorships and struggle to make ends meet. Hence Tony Stewart painfully rolled out news of his team shuttering this season.

Yet the problem went deeper than Stewart-Haas Racing’s misfortune. NASCAR’s unfair economic model makes it very difficult for race teams to thrive and continue. Denny Hamlin thinks that is why Tony Stewart was facing a bleak future anyway.

Denny Hamlin calls out NASCAR’s greed

Last year in November, NASCAR signed a seven-year, $7.7 Billion media rights deal. They roped in Amazon, Warner Brothers, and TNT Sports for the 2025 season. More media giants mean more money, yet race teams cannot share bigger, fairer slices of the pie. Even though Steve Phelps, NASCAR president, said he wanted to “change the paradigm for our race teams and we need to make sure our race teams are profitable, competing on the racetracks,” such an update is yet to come.

And that delay axed a stellar Cup team. Holding 69 victories and two championships, Stewart-Haas Racing sadly needs to pack up by the end of 2024. Denny Hamlin outlined the owners’ reasoning behind this painful decision. “They had their Ford deal that ran up at the end of this year, that was gonna be a big financial hit. Sponsorship wasn’t flowing out of its ears at the organization…Gene and Tony just keep putting more money into this, keep sinking more money to put on NASCAR’s show. I think they said, ‘Scr*w this. We’re out. We’re not gonna sit here and go under financial water to just keep your show going.’”

Denny Hamlin then dug out deep-rooted reasons for this misfortune. Since NASCAR hogs the bigger half of media revenue, race teams majorly rely on sponsorships. Stewart-Haas Racing suffered severe blows on that front, as Smithfield Foods exited NASCAR and Anheuser-Busch moved to Trackhouse Racing. 

Hence Hamlin pinned down the flawed economic model years in the making. “I think it happened over time. You can debate how it happened over time…Listen, had NASCAR’s media dollars covered what it costs to run a car, they would not be shutting down. But unfortunately, we’re still under a sponsorship model that forces us to go get millions and millions of dollars in sponsorship just to break even.”

Besides Denny Hamlin’s analysis of media revenue and sponsorships, the Cup car also curtailed Tony Stewart’s finances severely.

Next-Gen Car was concerning for Tony Stewart

The signs of Stewart-Haas Racing shuttering have been visible since last year. Their last win came with Kevin Harvick in 2022, and 2023 was a dry spell. Major sponsors left their fold along with veteran drivers. But another pointer was the Next-Gen car. It uses spec parts supplied by a list of approved vendors, meant to reduce costs. However, it turned out to be the opposite.

Since its introduction, the car has undergone several changes. The main reason was safety, as multiple drivers incurred injuries in 2022. But it also ended up costing teams. Speed-related penalties also add to this bill: SHR driver Chase Briscoe was penalized 120 points and the team was fined $250,000 for a counterfeit part in 2023.

Hence Tony Stewart pointed out the Cup car’s economic toll last year. “For partners coming into the sport now, it’s a financial risk. It’s not got cheaper to operate a NASCAR team like this new car was designed. It’s costing us more money than it’s ever cost us to run these cars.”

Thus as Denny Hamlin pointed out, the issues are numerous and run deeper. Other race teams also lie at risk of profit loss or dissolution unless NASCAR takes steps to mend the economic model.

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