Michael Jordan and Denny Hamlin share bittersweet NASCAR moment at Darlington

Michael Jordan and Denny Hamlin had much to celebrate on the heels of an action-packed NASCAR Cup Series Race at Darlington Raceway – but the pair of 23XI team co-owners still found themselves longing for more.
On Sunday, Tyler Reddick secured the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series Regular Season Championship thanks to a 10th-place finish in the Cook Out Southern 500 – narrowly edging out Kyle Larson in the standings by only one point. While Hamlin was thrilled to see a 23XI driver clinch the title, the 43-year-old expressed some disappointment that he wasn’t able to accomplish the feat himself.
“Finally won a championship… as an owner,” he captioned a photo posing next to the Regular Season Championship trophy alongside Reddick and Jordan. The Joe Gibbs Racing Driver, meanwhile, finished outside of the top-5 in the regular-season standings.
Regardless, 23XI’s accomplishment is all the more impressive considering the team didn’t even exist just four years ago. Ahead of Sunday’s regular-season finale, Hamlin shared just how special a regular-season championship for 23XI would be.
“It means a lot, it really does. I mean, I’m very proud of what we’ve built over there [at 23XI Racing] and building it from scratch has not been easy, a lot of things take time,” he divulged on the Actions Detrimental podcast. “Although we may have, there’s probably things on the list right now where, ‘Okay, here’s what I want my competition department to work on next,’ That project might take a year, two to actually finish, right?
“We’re just now building our pit crew facility, that’s going to take another three months. It will be done right on time, right when the season’s over. So, like, just things take time. So when I said it would take five years to build a championship-contending organization, I knew that was a realistic number.”
As for Jordan, the basketball legend was over the moon after seeing Reddick rank atop the leaderboard, though was disappointed by his other driver’s finish. Fellow 23XI driver Bubba Wallace was caught up in a massive wreck on Lap 345 of the Southern 500, thereby closing the door on his pursuit of a playoff spot.
After fervently cheering on Wallace at Darlington Raceway – at one point admitting “I’m absolutely terrified right now because I want him to do well obviously” – Jordan commended the 30-year-old for the hard-fought race.
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“I mean we got the right team, these guys, they busy their — all season,” he said. “Bubba fought all night, he got caught in the wreck. Even though the 14 won it would have been tough for us to point out way in so we had to win. But he put it on pole yesterday. He put up a great effort. I am proud of the team.”
Jordan could hardly hide his frustration, however, when discussing 23XI’s inability to field both its drivers in the playoffs. “Believe me I’m not satisfied by no means. [Reddick] still has a chance to win the championship at the end of the season. That’s what we gonna strive for,” he added.
“With Bubba, he’s just gotta keep getting better, he’s gonna use his next races to try to get a win and do the best that he can. We can’t stay in the same place, we gotta keep getting better.”