Was it me, or did Denny Hamlin seem like a slightly petulant child after tonights race? OK, so Brad Keselowski was racing you hard, and maybe he wasn't giving you the room you thought you deserved. But to claim when you get out of your NATIONWIDE car (flanked by NASCAR officials by the way) that the problem was "I think it is just him racing in the Nationwide series not having any Cup experience learning how to let guys go at times" is a bit silly.
Denny...Brad IS a Nationwide driver. Not a Cup driver.
And then to keep digging, Denny went on to say "There were several places in the race that I had him cleared....except for maybe two inches...instead he hangs on my right rear bumper quarter, and then goes into the corner right at my door, and that #### drivers off, especially gusy that know patience a little bit better than that."
Isn't that called RACING? And you are claiming that you are the prime example of patience?????
And then to admit on national TV "He picked my back wheels up in one and two, then came up beside me...so I retaliated..you know, you throw a rock and I'm gonna throw a concrete block back, so you are gonna have to deal with it."
Tsk tsk. Denny, you do NOT admit you retaliated under yellow on national TV. Not if you want to keep the money you just won and the points that car has earned so far this year.
As Brad's team owner said "There ain't no excuse for that". Dale Junior just seemed dumbfounded as to what had happened at the end of the race. I don't think he was the only one.
Now, I have no idea who threw the first punch post race. Maybe a Navy SEAL who was on hand to cheer the 88 team on wasn't happy with Denny's "retaliation" and decided to sneak over and try to take out the 20 team one by one (SEALS are good at that.....). It has been a while since we had a good fight in the pits (I think the 9 and 20 teams were the last ones to toss punches at each other a few years back), however there is no excuse for two teams to be exchanging fists, regardless of what happened on the track. If the 88 crew tossed the first punch, then shame on them, especially considering the fact that 1: they represent the Navy and 2: it is Memorial Day weekend and considering the meaning of the weekend they should act with more respect of who they represent. My guess is that Junior will be having a talk with them at some point tonight about that lapse in judgement. He all three of his cars in the top 10, and instead of focusing on celebrating that feat, he now has to straighten out a melee in the pits.
Just another reminder that no matter how mature these young men think they are...they are still young men, and from time to time, they act like it.
It really wasnt Denny's finest hour..lol. I have to admit though, the whole pit thing was purty darn funny. Yes I agree the 88 team should have respect for those they were driving for, but man, it felt like the old days there for a minute or two!! LOL.
The worst part of this whole deal is going to be the resurection of the whole JGR is out to get Jr. thing and the 10 gajillion whining, crying and moaning Jr fans we are all going to have to deal with again so soon...now before I get chopped up, not ALL Jr fans have their blinders on but a good few surely do! I've already fought with my sister (a true blinder wearing Jr fan if there ever was one...) so I'm done with it now...LMAO
It's funny how you NASCAR writers get so wildly indigent when a driver does something you don't like but you always make excuses when your favorite drivers do something wrong like Dale Jr trying to pinch down on Kyle Busch and costing Kyle that race.
Oh and another thing? Who gives a damn if Dale jr was dumbfounded. When is he not? Being one of the dumber hicks to ever come out of NASCAR you act as though he has any intelligence. Oh wait. You're a member of Jr Nation aren't you?
Denny Hamlin could loan Jr 100 I.Q. points and Jr would still be twice as dumb as Denny.
Last edited by NiqueDodson on May 24th at 8:51 PM.
Some body should have restrained the officials and let the Navy boys whip Denny's butt. Ain't the fights exciting in NASCAR? The races certainly aren't.
Going off? I didn't tell anyone this is the most worthless piece of #### blog ever written like was told to me.
I didn't say for the writer to get a GED like was told to me.
I didn't say I hoped to God the writer wasn't allowed to drive because he/she didn't know anything about driving like was done to me.
Nobody asked Miss Loved and oh so nice Volsfan why she was going off on me when she did that to me. Nobody rushed to my aid when she did that to me. In fact they dogpiled on telling me I was being too "sensitive". Now I'm going off?
I don't think I'm going off. I just think it's ridiclous to include "jr was dumbfounded by the whole thing". Was Jr involved? Did Jr win the race. What the hell did jr have to do with it? Jr hasn't won a race in two years. Why would you quote him? Why not quote Richard Petty? Be more relevant.
Last edited by NiqueDodson on May 24th at 10:48 PM.
Not making any excuses for anyone. What I saw was Keslowski bump Denny & lift the rear of his car then come up beside him (for what purpose) when they are supposed to be single file for a caution. Then Denny retaliated (not the brightest idea) and he admitted it while the talking heads were saying maybe he was cleaning his tires. Yea, yea that's it! Then Jr comes around Kes and lifts the rear of Denny's car again to do what? Retaliate - "Tsk, tsk." It will be interesting to see where the penalties fall. If NASCAR is fair all 3 will be penalized. They should have continued the coverage of the fight. Some of the nights most exciting coverage and they go to commercial. And when they came back they went to the winners circle with no replay of what we missed. Of course they were in commercial when most of the cautions came out too.
I don't like Denny Hamlin. He's just another spoiled brat---a growing trend in NASCAR. BUT...HE didn't start the stuff on the track. He finished it. Brad hit Denny's car 1st, Denny hit him back. End of story? Should have been, but it wasn't. Jr's employees had to act like a$ses out in the middle of pit road.
So Denny admitted retaliation on TV, BFD. It's good to hear a driver tell us fans the truth about what's going on out on the track, and not just grin and say, "it's just one of them racin' deals." If NASCAR punishes him for that I hope they don't leave out Keselowski. After all no less of a witness than Dale Jr said on TV that Brad hit Denny in the back, under caution, first.
All this is is a blog of opinion, not an actual column. Not sure what I deserved for the comments, but I was just stating my opinion of the incident. (Which apparently carried over into the post race press conference..I am trying to find the transcript of that....)
I am sorry if folks harassed you on something you posted, but I think the whole point of this blog was that sometimes you have to be the bigger person and not take out your frustrations even when you know you have been wronged.... And if you are gonna post a blog on a public space, you have to be prepared for the bad and obnoxious just like you have to be ready to enjoy the praise.
Dale Junior owns the 88, which is why I mentioned him. It is his first headache as an owner, and I will be interested to see how he handles it.
As for Denny, it seems he and Shrubbie are creating their own rule books as to what applies to them, and what the other drivers have to do when next to them. His comments yetsreday sounded a lot like what Shrubbie said in Richmond.
Who ever would have thought that Tony Stewart would be the voice of reason on that team>??? LOL
So I guess Denny is going to get fined for all this and poor Jr. and Brad will get nothing. I guess it's ok to hit someone in the rear under caution but retallation is not ok. WHATEVER. It was started by Brad and ended by Denny. I wish he would have rammed Brad into the wall.
If they are going to fine, they ought to fine them all, not just #20. Go Denny!!! Glad you don't take any #### from other people and tell it like it is.
Tapping in the read to express dislike happens every week. Running a guy up towards the wall and pushing in his fender isn't. And if Denny was such a mature guy, he would have let NASCAR deal with it, and voiced his opinion after the race. ;-)
Two wrongs don't make a right, and tossing a cinderblock after a stone certainly doesn't make you look like the mature driver you are claiming to be.
But there are fans out there that apparently would rather see a back and forth where their driver proves his point by crashing his rival out by puting him into the wall instead of racing him hard on the track. Seems like Denny didn't appreciate the hard racing, and wanted it to be "easy" on him because he was the big Cup driver and Brad was the lowly Natioinwide driver. As pops said after the race, Denny does this for fun, but this is Brad's only job. Brad is trying to prove he deserves his job by racing hard and going for the win, where as Denny is down there "bushwhacking" (or whatever it is called these days), and it doesn't mean anything to him because his day job is on Sundays with the "big boys". Pops said he went down to Dennys pit to ask him to give the kid a break, and the fight broke out as a result. Not saying Pops should have gone into the other teams pit, but it seems like the 20 was asking for a whole lot more than it was willing to give, and when that was pointed out, they didn't like it.
IMHO.
Last edited by turnlefttony on May 25th at 10:50 AM.
Hey Girl! Good to see you around these parts again...I couldnt agree with you more about Denny. What is up with him and Kyle coming back to the NW races to "teach 'em how to race/respect". That used to be Stewart's line!
Isn't it called "racing" when you keep your cars side by side?? Apparently Denny forgot that when he was riding around his high horse. Also, super dumb move admitting to retaliating, per the broadcast NASCAR believed it was a scrub yer tires mistake...
The pit fight was old school cool, but unnecessary...I dont think I would pick on the NAVY boys. I do wonder how Jr will handle this too since he was quoted earlier about how Brad tries to emulate him without the rep. Owner-pains! LOL
Hope to run into you at the track one of these days!
Even though I agree that Denny should have kept his cool. It was Brad and Jr. who set off the final spark.
If Brad had not run/bump into Denny's car during the caution, Denny never would have reacted the way he did.
Denny is a clean driver. And he races guys the way they race him. Bump him and he will pay you back.
Denny only did what any other driver would have done, even my favorite Tony Stewart.
Tony Stewart the voice of reason? Hmmm....had not thought of it that way. But guess with two young teammates with the same personality as himself, guess he has to be the voice of reason.
Denny and Kyle remind me so much of Tony Stewart. Guess that is why I enjoy watching them as much as I do Tony. lol
Hey klvalus! I was listening to the Morning Drive, and they all agreed that Denny needs to take a step back and re-as-ses (ahhh, profanity guard strikes again...LOL) his situation. It IS the Nationwide series, NOT the Cup series, and to go in beating your chest that "I am Cup Driver, let me by" is not good form. Him complaining about getting past "all but two inches" means you aren't past him...and if the roles were reversed, he'd have claimed he was racing for the win...just as Brad did.
He and Kyle seem to have decided that they have their own rule book that applies to them, and no one else. It is like the hypocritial reaction Kyle had in Richmond. When it involved Steven Wallace Steven was a "Boy in a mans sport" and needed to grow up or get out....when it was Junior and he knocked the 88 out of the way, it was "just a racin deal".
I'm a big fan of Tony Stewart, but I also have no problem calling him an id-i-ot (now why is THAT word considered profanity???) when he deserves it. Kyle and Denny have great potential, however if they want the respect that goes with that potential, they need to earn it, not demand it.
Last edited by turnlefttony on May 26th at 8:20 AM.
I was born and raised in south Florida, one of two daughters of a sports fanatic father. One of my first sports memories in life was wearing my Bob Griese jersey around the house when I was five. I grew up rooting on the Dolphins, and going to see the Dodgers in spring training when I could convince my dad to drive up to Vero Beach. That love of sports carried over to college, when I became a proud Florida Gator (back to back baby!) I have left Florida behind for an adult life in the DC area, but my love of sports remains. You can still find me cheering on the pigskin in the fall, but now I am a huge NASCAR fan as well, attending as many races as I can squeeze into my schedule. Nothing like the smell of high octane fuel in the morning!
Who says girls can't love sports just like a man?
