Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin - Iowa: Everything Sucked

Episode Date: August 4, 2025

Denny Hamlin and his co-host Jared Allen are back from an unsuccessful trip to Iowa 3:15 Sam Mayer gets the first win for Ford in the Xfinity Series6:15 Why Denny struggled all day10:00 Tire falloff was nonexistent19:20 NASCAR needs to punish Chase Elliott and Kyle Larson 24:00 How did William Byron not run out of fuel?36:00 Carson Hocevar caught up in drama once again45:00 NASCAR returning to Chicagoland49:00 Drama in the Hoop Group basketball league  Dirty Mo Media has a new e-commerce merch line! They’ve got some awesome Actions Detrimental merch on the site. Visit shop.dirtymomedia.com to check out all the new stuff.For more Actions Detrimental content: https://www.youtube.com/@ActionsDetrimental FanDuel Disclaimer: Must be 21+ and present in select states (for Kansas, in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino) or 18+ and present in D.C. First online real money wager only. $5 first deposit required. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable bonus bets which expire 7 days after receipt. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG. Call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat in Connecticut, or visit mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit GamblingHelpLineMA.org or call [phone] for 24/7 support in Massachusetts, or call 1-877-8HOPE-NY or text HOPENY in New York. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Lee Diffey referred to him as Hurricane Hosebar, and I kind of like it. Jared, should we break out the T-shirt? There's already a hurricane. Yeah. Hurricane Hamlin. The following is a production of Dirty Mo Media. I believe that I've been a competitive for 20 years. Opinions from tonight's podcast, strictly biased.

You're going to hear from my point of view. I'm a fighter. No, you are not. The spoils of a video. victory for Jared Allen. He's got better luck than Rick and Drake to win. I know, you do. Two trophies missing from your collection, a championship and the most popular driver.

Someone told me that their drinking game is when I say for sure. Yeah. And I've already said it. Hey guys, welcome to Actions Detrimental Post-Iowa Speedway. I'm Denny Hamlin, driver the Bob's discount furniture, Toyota this past weekend. By the way, Bob's discount furniture is one of the fastest growing furniture stores in the in America. We had our first paint scheme with them here in Iowa.

JGR, you know, we live for speed. Bob delivers that. They got over 200 stores coast to coast. Unbelievable prices. The hottest furniture styles out there. Don't wait. Go check out Bob's today. How you doing?

This will be the Everything Sucks Podcast. Everything sucks. You have your title. Everything sucks. Moab sucks It is Tell your friends God

I don't even know where to start I suck The car sucked The tire sucked The next gen sucks It's just everything And everything sucks And I sucked at fishing

Yep Wait what? Yeah I didn't fish well Jesus I should have known the weekend was going to suck. I know. Charlie's out fishing you? Well, he's out there fishing while I'm out there working and I'm qualifying.

He's like, got number six, seven, eight. I'm like, you know, eventually the fish get wise. I got to defend any. On the clock. On the clock when they were both on the pond at the same time. He didn't out fishing that bad. No, he had one more than me. Yeah.

but anyway but I caught some fish you did you called two yeah I felt pretty good considering the amount of time you had a pole in the water it wasn't bad did you remove the fish from the line well so fortunately there were some nice children who were very excited about removing the fish for me

so I just let them do it so you never actually had to touch it well that time we the second one we caught the fish swallowed the hook or whatever Oh, that one. I can't believe. Nearly saved that thing's life. I can't believe it survived.

I mean, guts were pouring out of that fish. Poor guy. I know. All right. We had Sam Mayer win in an Xfinity race. First Ford. First Ford. That's right.

Yeah, Ford hasn't been too awfully strong in Xfinity. When you have... In other sports winning like 12? and then J.G.R. It is. It is. Um, so Sam Mayer goes from junior motorsports to Haas. Is that correct? Yep. Um, yeah. I mean, so certainly you don't think that the equipment is, you know, quite as good. And Xfinity, it's tough because I'm not in the trenches there. I don't know all the details of it, but it seems like Sam's been doing a really good job lately of, um, you know, getting good finishes. And obviously he, you want some road course races.

with junior over the last few years. He's winning on ovals. He's doing all the good things. You know, we had discussions about Sam. I don't know, probably earlier in the year where I think he was maybe doing something dumb. And it was like, and he was talking about how people weren't looking at him to move up. And we were like, well, that's why. But, you know, as long as he keeps doing things like this, certainly.

Yeah, you know, he's doing a lot of good things. And this is a, you know, he was, he was fast all weekend. Wasn't by accident by any means. And first win for Hoss. We talked about first, Ford win in the season, but first win for this new Hoss team. Oh, that is. That is true. Yeah, so they have Sheldon Creed and Sam Mayer now, right?

Yep. Yeah, it's, it's hard. It's definitely hard to win. but it seemed like, you know, kind of the stars aligned there, had some good restarts. Next thing you know, you find yourself up front and you're, you know, you got a fast car. You can, you can pounce on that, especially at that track. It's the way they pave the track, it just makes it so freaking narrow compared to the Iowa that we used to know. And so, you know, I certainly think that they ought to look into paving the whole track to widen it out because even in the next gen cup,

it was just so freaking narrow, couldn't pass. Yes, there was cars that went from the back, laid in the race. There was others that, like myself, the quarter tires that went straight to the back. But man, it's just so narrow that it's hard to get out of the wake of the car in front of you.

And this next-gen car is by far the worst car ever designed to race in traffic. Why do they only pave part? They said originally it was, because they were skeptical that they could get the entire paving job done by the time we visited the racetrack. And somehow, through the last 12 months, they decided, well, the racing was good enough for us, so we're just going to leave it. Why couldn't you get a feel for this track? Why did you suck so bad? I don't know. It certainly, I think it has something to do maybe

with the tire, the combination of the surface and tire. I think that traffic plays a big factor. I don't think I've ever been in clean air or clean-ish air at that racetrack. I haven't gotten good restarts there. I just feel like my car is not under me at that track. So what that means is that, You like to feel the compression of the car.

You like to feel that the tires are actually gripping. But these tires, like, they just chatter across the racetrack. And with it being a newer surface and a harder tire, it just never gets into the track. Now, the guys that are up front in the first couple, three positions have got enough air to push the car down, compress it, and get the tires to saturate. everybody else in the field

it's just riding around skating on that racetrack and so the only time you see like a remote challenge or battle for a lead is when they catch the back of the pack we saw it I think

in the first stage I remember I was running somewhere around 10th or so the leaders checked out because they got the cleaner air they were checking out and next to you know there here comes the whole top nine right back to I'm like, what's going on? I've been running the same times for this entire 60-70 lap run.

And it's just, they catch the back of the pack and they can't pass lap cars. So that's the issue with it is that you, yeah, you can make passes if you're in the middle of the pack when everyone has disturbed air. It's just challenging the leader in this car is just, such a tough task because the leader has such an advantage and if you look at the times the difference between the first place the fastest race car on the racetrack and the 30th place speed car is three-tenths we talked about at indy where you had to be 1.2 seconds faster than someone to actually overtake them the number at Iowa, I don't know, I think it probably is at least three-tenths.

So that's why you saw when the leader catches the 30th place car, he can't, it just takes them forever to work them over because there's not enough difference in speed from that car to that car. And then when you look at the course of the run, I sent Dale Jr. a screenshot of this on Saturday night, I said, can you believe that we tire tested here? Not we, the 11 car, but NASCAR and Goodyear tire tested here.

And this is the tire that they came up with, is the one that had zero fall off after 50 laps. And it was like, how in the world do you expect us to put on a good race when everyone's going to run the same speed? And they're going to run the same speed from the beginning of the run to the end of the run. it just makes it extremely difficult. And really the only time you see those passes is when chaos breaks out, either on restarts or when the leader catches the back of the pack.

And that's what we as drivers are most frustrated about. Do you think you would have been better here? How did you done that tire test? Like, do you get a better feel for it? Yeah, more than likely. And certainly, I'm not airing out my dirty laundry just because we ran poorly. I think obviously we had a definitely had a, bad last run we had a tire issue that when they took it took the tire off it had it had de-laminated

decoaded really really badly so that you know ship off that last run i still was a 10th the 15th place car probably and if you average it all out it's it's you know i think that just some of the fans are really getting labeled as just people that are negative all the time by the NASCAR shills, and that's just not true. They're regurgitating what we are saying, and that is that it's just incredibly difficult out there, and it should be difficult, but it shouldn't be nearly impossible, not when you're significantly faster than the car in front of you. You restarted sixth after, I think, that one college when people were impitting, and

you still weren't able to go forward. So did you need even more clean air? Was that just your call? Yeah. No, I should have been able to make something happen from that position. Being P6, I thought 8th was the highest that I restarted. I think it was 8. Okay.

But still, at that point, yeah, I've got some dirty air, but it's clean enough where I did break out in the pack there. After the restart, I was about 9th or 10th. And at that point, okay, we're single followed out. I should be able to hold my position and could not. So it was a little bit of mix of a few things. And that was there was some guys right behind me with a little bit fresher tires. I couldn't pass the cars in front of me that had older tires.

So I wasn't very good in that sense. And then on top of that, you know, I don't know when this tire is, I had was starting to kick in. I mean, is it, it felt like as soon as we got going, actually got going, instantly, the front tires stopped working on the car.

What do you mean stopped working for? So, yeah, so when you turn the wheel, you know, when your car's tight, when we say constantly our car's tight, tight, tight, tight, that means the front won't turn. This is your NASCAR 101. When we say it's loose,

the rear, is the thing that is sliding. So tight, the front is sliding, so that if you go, you know, if you turn the wheel, the car goes straight. Loose is you back steer, and the rear of the car starts to slide out, and it acts like it spins you out.

So immediately as I turn the wheel on that last run, it is not turning. The amount of grip that the front has compared to what it had all day long was 5% less, and in our world, 5% is a huge shift. and so obviously there was dramatic cords and whatnot on my tire when the race was over so just don't know when that happened more than likely later in the run not early in the run but more than likely it's just the balance all that fuel burning off under all those cautions

could have added a bunch of nose weight to the car and who knows who you know it's the team will figure it out i'll just give them the feedback um but Certainly what I feel like my job is now is I got to give them the best notes possible that we go there next time we don't suck. Yeah, going back to cars struggling to pass, one of the most interesting or, you know, exciting moments of this race was at the end of stage one there once Byron caught the back of the pack and then him and Brad were racing for the stage win, but Byron couldn't get around the lap cars, which allowed everyone to catch

up to him. Yeah, it's the yo-yo effect you see at Martinsville. you can't, you know, no one can pass it. You can't pass the 30th place car. That is the problem we're talking about. And that is what we have to, we have to fix, is that the leader looks like Superman because he can run half throttle and just hold everyone off. She's briscoe at Pocono.

I mean, if you can do it at a short track, that should be like the eye opener. Okay, we got to, we really got to fix this, right? And so, you know, Goodyear's really done a good job all year long of trying to implement softer and softer tires. It's just this one, I don't know how they got where they got on this tire. And, you know, I'm sure there was a reason for it. But when you look at the lap times and it was just a flat-ass level, no drop-off in 50 laps, it was like, I don't know what we expect. That means the tire is so hard that it just, it takes.

It takes dramatic amount of downforce to push that tire into the racetrack and get it to grip. Nobody has, you know, nobody but the first few cars have enough air to do that. So when Goodyear has these tire tests, whatever, though, it's not them saying this is a tire for this track, though, right? It's NASCAR picking the tire. Correct? I don't know. I can't really say who makes the call on that. I do know that they had a tire

that dropped off 2.5 seconds and 25 laps. That sounds kind of nice. Don't it? So you would think like there's somewhere in this there's a happy medium to be had. Like how do you go from nothing

to two and a half seconds? Like somewhere in here is a mix, right? And even if you have a tire, I mean, hell this one, corded in 60 laps. So it had zero drop-off until it cords.

So it's just, I don't know. This is not a good tire combination for this track. You've got to figure it out, though, because you go back to this track and, you know, the fan support is so good there. Like the vibe around Iowa is great. That shot they showed on the broadcast of the parking lot was incredible.

So I feel like if your fans are coming out, you just got to figure out how to make this racing half decent to give them a good show. Yep. Yeah, I agree with you. And it's an important part of the country for us. right there's not a lot of racetracks around this one so you get people that travel from you know the states all around iowa to come in there because this is the closest thing that they're going to

get to watch a naskar race so yeah you you want to you want to make it better for sure and and you know we're going to be until we get the front of these race cars on the ground instead of a foot off the ground we're going to continue to have the same problems and that is when we get behind someone or just gonna plow. The attitude of the cars are wrong. It's wrong. It's wrong. It's wrong. Please fix it. It's wrong. It's wrong. Fix the attitude of the cars. It'll make them better in traffic.

More overbody, less underbody. If you want the same amount of downforce, put it on the overbody, take it off the underbody. God dang it. It drives me crazy. And can't you just lower the nose to the ground? Yeah, but you'll kill your own speed. you're you're no i mean everybody you're just lower than nose of the car yes but it's not the optimum amount

of down force like you would just it would be significantly better in traffic but by yourself the thing would be nearly undrivable because you're pinching off all the air that's supposed to be going underneath keeping you suck down to the race yeah the the design of the car is the design of the car i we keep saying the same thing over and over but it's just you know we're not getting through. Hey Denny. I know the race didn't go the way you wanted, but Bob's discount furniture scheme look awesome this weekend in Iowa. I'm a little biased. I get it. Didn't have great result out there,

but it was great to have them on the car for the first time this weekend. It was sharp and fitting. Bob's is all about great quality at a great price. Exactly. I mean, they got a huge selection of mattresses, bedroom sets, entertainment centers, and the prices will actually really surprise you. So if I'm looking for a power recliner with cup holders and wireless turrets, charging to go with my Sunday NASCAR setup? They've got me. Yeah, 100%. You know, you can get race day ready at Bobbs. If you like recliners, we got that. Sectionals, don't worry. They got whatever you need. Minus the drinks and the snacks, that's pretty much on you. So if it's comfort and style and convenience, it's all in one place. It's at Bob's. Where can the folks check out

of Bob's. Yeah, you can head on over to Mybobbs.com or visit one of their 200 plus stores nationwide. And in fact, there's a new location right here in North Carolina that's just open. and so what are you waiting for fast delivery winning styles bob's discount furniture always in your corner what do you think contributed to all these late cautions we had the stretch of this race where it was caution caution caution caution caution caution you guys couldn't keep it green yeah it was green than tight at the first stage i i you know they were a few wrecks were in front of me but some were behind me and i realized it pretty quick and and i mean the only thing to do is kind of publicly shame but like Chase Elliott and Carl Arsing laying back three car lengths on the field.

Like, and then getting a run and then going four wide, like, that's what causes the wrecks. But is that also, you know, why they could pass some cars? Like, is that what you have to do to be good on a restart? Yeah, but you're not supposed to, you're not allowed to do that. NASCAR's not calling it. Right. Well, allowed, right, is the NASCAR has to call it for it. Yeah, sure.

But if they're not calling it, then why don't you, why don't other drivers it's like a football game if the ref isn't calling pass interference start holding on to the receiver like you start doing it also yeah i i think it's it's what their driver instructor is telling them to do is that you know do it as much as you can get away with it but you know what i'm calling on is nascar fishing to do something about it because it's you know it's it's a complete disregard for the people that you're laying back from because you're just willing to stick them in a four-wise situation where you're you know they're going to wreck or someone's going to wreck and you just don't care.

And that's what happened with the Larson and Chase thing is that they laid back so much. They must have been running 10 miles an hour faster, probably more than that. Then the cars in front of them when they all took off and then they both tried to shoot the gap at the same time in the middle. It's like they both deserve to wreck. What happened to you? Which time? On the one where you spun out.

I got put three wide middle and I forget who was on the inside and then and then then then I got put no four I was three wide and then uh chastain went to the bottom of me off of two he got to run on me as he should he goes in there four wide and so we're all trying to merge into a two lane racetrack and a j's not you know he doesn't want to get up in the fuzz so he's pinching me down not just I can't hold her off all of them. I got to leave room to the guys below me. AJ doesn't want to run up in the in the shit up there. So he he runs in the third lane and I'm in the third lane. The announcers felt that you tried to help basically you spun out because you're trying to not hit AJ and kind of help him.

Yeah, I mean, I'm trying to stay off of whoever I'm next to if we're if we're making contact. I'm trying to stay off of them. Usually I mean there's two ways right. One is you just kind of hold the wheel straight and say, oh, sorry, you pinched me and you're going to, you're going to spin out here. Or you can, like, try to keep it off of them, try to make live to see another corner. But obviously, I got the into the deal, but it is what it is. It was nobody's really fault. I mean, AJ got putting in a tough four-wide top spot there. You were able to come back through the pack a little bit.

All those cautions helped with all the cars you could pass in front. front of you but then you go to the rear this was you you had a tire issue here or what what cause you just plummet late in this race yeah the right the rear tire the right front tire fully corded all the way there's no rubber left on the tire and that's just through we don't know got to figure it out bad set of tires no I think it's probably just balanced migration track changes lower fuel before you know you're because of all those caution laps you're burning fuel so it's adding nose weight to the car because you know you're taking weight off the rear of the car as your burning fuel and the more nose weight you have in the car percentage wise usually the tighter

your car is so i probably started that run tighter than i was all day long track was probably the tightest that it was all day long boom equals cordon right front tire and throwing an anchor All these cautions allowed William Byron to save enough fuel to win this. I think, Travis, you can correct me for wrong, but the last lap he pitted on was 206? 144 laps, I heard. I want to know how, how do cautions and the fuel situation work? There was 50 laps of caution. In that stretch there?

That sounds about right. Yeah. Yeah. There was 50 laps of caution after his last pits up on 206. So one third of the last, one third of the last 150. was under caution. So 50 laps under caution, what is that equivalent to in terms of green flag laps on a gas tank? Usually it, when they're calculating how much fuel we're actually burning under caution,

they used to be two to one. And that was a thumb in the air. This is how we're going to science this thing out. We feel like it's every, if you're running on a caution, that's equal to, I'll make sure I don't get this backwards. you burn half the fuel that you would on a green flag. Okay. So that's equal to two green flag labs.

Okay. But now that we're so aggressive with shutting our engines off, it's probably more than that. And I probably should know this. I don't. I don't get in the weeds too much. I just try to do the best I can, get the proper information,

and let the computers and the people do what they're much smarter people than me. know how to do it. But it's probably two and a half, maybe on a short track, it's three. I'm not really sure, but there is a ratio that they go off of caution versus green to get them understanding where they are,

when they will run out. So should we have been surprised as fans that he was able to save enough of you? I feel like based on TV, we were kind of led to believe that he wasn't going to make it. Well, like how confident. I don't know how they're calculating that, right? I think that Prime had a proprietary AI.

The burn bar. The difference is that I'm wondering, are they assuming that everyone is filling their tank up full every time? Because they're not. You know what I mean? So when they're trying to calculate on TV and tell you how much fuel that each car has, are they assuming that, well, they went in for a pit stop,

so their tank's full now. That's not the case. Right. Because it's an amount, they need to figure it off of the amount of seconds that they were on pit road, not just a pit stop. So let's just say that it,

you know, a normal pit stop, it's normal for some, not for others, is nine seconds. Well, you can't, if your car is empty, all the way empty, you can't get your car full on a nine. second pit stop. You've got to wait till 12 to 13 seconds. Now on a short track like this,

not many cars ran their tank dry. So more than likely they could get their car full on a non-second pit stop. But places like Indy in that like you saw at the end, our last pit stop, we had to wait for fuel to get our tank full. So I don't know how they're doing it. Are they doing it just saying they were on pit road so their tanks full and we're now calculating how far they can go from here i don't know because obviously it's not exact um and because i didn't see it did they did they say there's no way byron was making it because my team told me he's like with 60 70 to go the 24 is probably going to make it now they had him at like they said like four percent or something they were playing rudy fugel's audio which made it they made it sound like

they're telling them to keep backing it up and so To me, I assume that he wasn't going to make it if you're going off of what the announcers were saying. But then the pessimist of me is saying every time we say they're going to run out of fuel, they don't. So I was like he's going to make it. I feel like the broadcast is actually underestimating how much fuel they're putting in the tank. And the teams actually have more than what they think they have. I don't think that they're calculating how much the driver is saving. I think they could be, again, unless they have AI running it to where it's,

It's calculating live how much fuel the driver is burning, not just not counting a lap at four miles per gallon, whatever it is, right? Well, the driver can run a lap that gets you six miles per gallon sometimes. It just depends on, you know, that's the balance is how can, how fast can you run and save the most gas? So I don't know, again, I don't know about their proprietary information and whether they're just kind of using. a flat number or not because obviously with Rudy telling Byron that save more, save more, save more, save more, Rudy can see how much fuel Byron is burning. I don't know that TV can see that. No. Oh, he can. So Rudy has a very clear picture of this car situation. That's right. Yeah,

and he knew it at Indy as well. If you heard, what is he seen? What is he seen that? So they use the data that we get from, that SMT or OTT, whatever it is, you know, the video game stuff that I'm looking at. Yeah. They're using that that gives your throttle percentage, and it's in a program, and it says, okay, he's using this much throttle during the course of that lap. What does that equal for fuel mileage? And they know how much gas by the, how they weighing.

So Rudy has a very, very, very clear picture of if William, was going to make it to the checker or not. Yes. What I was, yeah, what I was saying about India is Rudy knew they were in a dire situation. They were like, I don't know, man. We're probably going to run out. And they ran out like on the back stretch of the last lap. Right.

But Charles in 23 was like, I think we're going to run out too. That's my point. But he didn't. So I feel like in racist past, whether it's been you or whoever, when it's come down to this fuel situation, it's been like, oh, I don't know if we're going to to make it but now because it's not an exact there is no exact science to it i mean there is but these teams are constantly evolving how they're figuring this out live they're it's it's some programs are better than others and so and tv has its own program apparently and so we're all guessing we know

i mean certainly we feel like we know within a lap right of any given run, like how far we can go. But that number changes throughout the run as I save fuel or I don't save fuel. Yeah. It could get worse. It could get better. Unfortunately for Byron, both Briscoe and Kozowski behind him were not able to pressure him enough to, you know, force him to use more fuel. He probably, I don't know, saved a significant amount of fuel in addition to all those costs.

Yeah, they said he was running a half throttle down the straightaway. Yeah. So, yeah, it just. Doesn't matter. This track is made up of corners, and corners are narrow. Narrow corners, next shin. Gross. Anyway, he gets his second win of the year. Can you believe this is his first win for the 2014 since Daytona?

It is a bit surprising to me. I feel like he's been in contention, and he hate using the word luck, because luck is, in the bigger sample size, luck is not a factor in a small sample size, is a factor. He's been better than his results. He's had some very, very poor finishes that ended up coughing up the, you know, he was way ahead in the regular season. He coughed that up to Chase for a few races, but it was because he got caught up in

Rex and ran out of gas. Like, there's not many races where that 24 team is running poorly, like running 15th. Like, they're just, they're better than that, and they're, they're better than that, and they don't, the results haven't shown truly the speed, I feel like, that they've had. And I think Russell sent us some stats. The, I mean, the 24 cars in the top, read them all for me there, Travis, 24 car ranks this year. Because, you know, you did hear media start to kind of poo-poo on his results and like, well, he's lost speed, he's lost this, all that, give me his ranks for the season. For the season, he's third in passing, third in defense, one.

one in speed, one in restarts, nine in pit crew. That's a hell of an average. Average ad all up over 36 people. He's got a 3-3-1-1-9. Yeah. Like, that's... I'd say you're probably the points leader. Good call.

Good call. That's via racing insights. What do you think you are, Denny? Passing, what do you think you are? Passing? Five. Seven. Defense.

Yesterday? Six. No, this is the season. Six. Nine. Overestim, I should. Overestimating myself. Go figure.

Speed. Speed. I think I'm top three there. Three. Two. Okay. Restarts. Jared, what's your guess?

Like 10 or 11. I'm going to say. Restarts eight. Three. Boom. Oh, wow. Eat a bag. And pick through?

Three. six. Damn. So it's, what is it again? Your 7-9-2-3-6. 7-9-2-3-6. Not nearly as good as Byron.

Step it up. 7-9-2-3-6. I guess that does still average out to about where you are in the point standings. Yeah, but you've got to understand. Not everyone's going to be, some people are going to be way high on one number, low on, you got to average them out. That's what I mean. 7, 9, 3, 2, 6 is about 4th.

On the average. A little less than 4. And that's where you are. Who are other standouts? Give me some standouts that are full green. Let's hear Chases. All categories. There you go. Give me Chase. Chase is 1, 2, 7, 10, 3. Where's Larson?

Larson's 1, 2, 3, 710. Larson is 136322. All pretty strong. Pretty strong. Blaney's 284, 815. What is he? Blaney's a little all over the map. He's 284, 815.

He's not all over the map. It just has that 115. Is that pick crew? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's just fascinating. I feel like these numbers, when you average them out,

correlate to where these drivers are in the point standings. Yeah. Where do we go from here? Hosevar. Hosevar? Yeah, let's hear about Wild Thing. Oh, Hurricane Hosevar as Lee Diffy has coined him.

Say it again? Lee Diffy referred to him as Hurricane Hosevar. And I kind of like it. Jared, should we break out the T-shirt? There's already a hurricane. Yeah. Hurricane Hamlin. It's been around for years.

I haven't heard that name. I've got T-shirt. I haven't heard that. Travis, you haven't walked down memory lane in this house. There's news articles. Hurricane Hamlin. Hurricane Hamlin. Yes. Yes. There's news clippings, Travis.

So do you want that or is it okay of hosts of our house? I don't give a shit. It's whatever. I think Wild Thing fits Hosevar better per his 10th slide. Didn't Darrell Walter call Kyle Bush Wild Thing back in the day? There comes Wild Thing. I feel like he did. No.

It's too early for both of them. I don't know. Just call whatever you want. It's fine. But it seems like Carson's definitely brushing it off as if to say, tough luck, buddy. Right? Yeah.

That's a tough way to live. That's the best way to go about this. Okay. Okay. But did he do anything wrong? Is he in the playoffs or is he not? He's not, but you've got to win to be in the playoffs. not necessarily no I'm just saying that it you gotta be a winning card in the long run

if that's the attitude you want to have it's good for social media it's bad for on track results so you're saying the garage the cup drivers are looking at this and going absolutely saying I don't mind sticking that guy three wide middle and if he's the innocent bystandard so be it he would do it to me and he wouldn't care what he did against sane smith though on Sunday fair or foul? It was an accident. He got loose. So then what do we, like I get that he gets this bad rat, but this isn't the same as him.

Then just say, hey, sorry about that. I f***ed up. I got loose. I went in the corner. I shook the right rear out and I got into you. I apologize instead of saying, take a number. It's just, it's what got Joey Lugano destroyed at Martinsville. He didn't address the issue with Kenseth.

It bowled over enough with Kenseth where he had had enough of the, you know, crash you and say, ah, oh well, it just didn't work out. Asked Joey Legano. He's publicly said, I wish I handled that differently. Had I known what I know now, I should have handled it differently. Eventually you grow up. I understand that. But at the end of the day, that's what's, that's partly what's made Joey Lagano.

who Joey Lugano is nowadays. And like that's... Yeah, but even Joey Lugano has... Has matured in that sense of knowing when to do it. Like, I don't know where they were running at the time, but when you're doing it for a win versus when you're running, you know, when he whacked out Ricky for 15th or 20th, wherever they were, like, that's just not the time.

He's apologized to Ricky, though. I think this, I think this, him's insane, I'm not apologizing, but whatever, I think it's because he accidentally messed up, Rex Zane Smith and Zane Smith's crew chief comes after him. You didn't even give him a chance to apologize, and you're coming after him, like he purposely hit Zane Smith. I can tell you, without a doubt, 100%,

he did not purposely hit Zane Smith. It was an accident. But I'm telling you that, your social media post it's good for clicks bad for results and I think he's after the clicks right now that's my opinion

I could be wrong I think that's fine I of course you do because it's not you're not on the team but one day but but you're going to be in contention if you're on the team you're going to be in contention for a win and someone's going to clean you out

and they're going to say I took a number I feel like that's just I just feel like that's, you're going to pay. You're going to pay at the most inopportune time when it was your day. You're going to pay getting. I think you're going to pay getting to that. But if he's racing for a win and you're racing him, you're racing next to him,

you're not just going to clean him out. She's like, oh, that's Carson. I'm allowed to just clean him out. But I'm going to put him in a hell of a spot that you're probably going to do that anyway. You can do it anyways. It's hard for him to get out of. Right. You're going to do that anyway, though.

No, I won't. You just said the other week, if someone gets names. hear me, I'm like PSA. No, no, no, no. You've seen how you race Larson. Like, you're going to race hard. For a win, not for 10th. That's what Jared's saying, though.

Yeah. If he's in position to win a race, and he's going to race, whoever that is, hard is because this is his only chance to win. It doesn't get many in the 77 car. I don't know. I just feel like he's, we keep telling him like, oh, he's got a shape up. And he's said it multiple times over. I'm trying to, you know, clean up the edges.

but at some point just your edges are rough and that's just who you are. You can choose the path in which you want. But Brad Kaczynski went through this, Joey Lugano went through this, and asked them, they said they would tell you right now they changed because they wised up to what it takes to be successful long term in the series. I'll tell you what, though.

If Carson has Brad or Joey's career, he did a solid job for himself. But. Okay. But he hasn't. Not yet. I don't know. How do you look at him as a team owner?

Let's shift this. Like are you impressed by his talent? Are you like, this guy's a wrecking ball on the track? I want him nowhere near my cars. No, very impressive on the talent, but is it worth all the other bullshit? That's a question you asked. Yes. That's what yourself.

Yes. and do you think most team owners are saying yes it's worth it or they're saying it's not worth it i don't know i can't every team owner's got different motivations i'm not really sure you typically want someone that is capable of going fast checks that box uh has good race craft questionable box um there's there's just so many other element there's just more elements than just making speed to being a successful race car driver. Making speed is a small part of it. So for example, look at my ranks.

We've won more races than anyone else. I ain't beaten up on anyone in any category. Right. So there's more to it than that. How do you clean up these edges? If being a little rough and being a bit of a wrecking ball on track, is maybe what's leading to speed? How do you like harness that?

I don't think it's leading to speed. I think he has the speed. He has the ability to get speed out of the car. It's just, I don't know, I'd have to think about it. But it's, I don't know. We've been talking about the same thing for years, about the same guy. So it's just, you almost just want to just let them,

let him do whatever he wants to do. Don't interrupt him while he's making a mistake. Just let him learn it the hard way. Zane Smith's crew chief went up to him after the race. Where do you stand on a crew chief confronting the driver? Is that Zane Smith's battle? I don't mind that. Why should we care about that?

That's the guy that's responsible now having to load that car up into the hauler. I'm not saying that's, I'm asking, you're the driver, so this is, I'm asking you. I didn't know if there's an etiquette of the, drivers need to talk. No, I think it's, I think anyone that works on the car has, has, is entitled to have a voice. Personally, I, that's what I think. Okay. I don't have really a take on this one. Where are you at on this? On Carson? Just like someone else. Oh, I think in the team. Yeah, I think that's fine. Like you said, that's the guy responsible for loading up the junk car on the hauler. That's more work for for him. It's not more work for the other driver. I think it's fair.

All right. We did have some off track stuff, right? We do. Let's start with Mexico City is out for next season and Chicago land reportedly in. No tacos for me. Bummer. I mean, usually this stuff comes down to money.

Let's all be honest. It's, you know, maybe someone's bid, wasn't what it needed to be or they didn't sell as many tickets and so the return from that was not enough it's always money we never did hear really the attendance for the Mexico city yeah it certainly sounded like it wasn't what they expected so um who knows it decisions are always made by money in this instance and more than likely this is a money thing that uh is a reason we're not going to go back. But I can tell you from the team standpoint,

we are like wiping our forehead. Like Mexico was very, very challenging logistically, very, very tough on our race teams to prepare the cars. A week, 10 days in advance, like just a tremendous task. And not only the task of that, but the task it had on everyone's stomach when they got back home, man, there were a lot of. sick people. Lots. I mean, I know of five to six that we're in really, really bad shape.

It's good for you, though, because you didn't go and then those guys' sickness carried over into the next weekend. That's what I hear. Yeah, it sounds like some of the drivers still were not feeling well the following seven days. So, yeah, I don't know. You just, body's not quite used to that the types of food or water. I don't know. As a driver going back to Chicago, to land. How do you feel? Good. I think that'll put on a good race. It's a wide mile and a half. Typically, that's been the one type of racing that's been pretty good. Plus one oval minus one road course. Sure. That's what it stays. I think, yeah. Yeah. How do you think the attendance is going to be there going back to this track? Like, is it going to be received as a new track, a new place on the schedules?

haven't been there in a few years? I don't know how attendance was right before we left. More than likely if we left, it probably wasn't great. But, I mean, hopefully you have some trickle-down effects from your activation in Chicago, in the city, right? I mean, those are the people that are closest to that racetrack. The racetrack's about an hour away. So hopefully what you get is that, well,

you introduced NASCAR now to the people in this city. Hopefully they're willing now to travel now or to go see you next year. Other off-track news here, what are you going to say, Travis? I was going to say how to hoop-crup draft go. That's what I was getting to. No more questions at this time. It didn't go great, Travis. It did not go well for Denny.

So the season starts Thursday, right? Mm-hmm. and are we playing are we holding out no we're playing i i'm gonna i'm gonna play hard for whatever team drafted me i'm a i'm a i'm a joe an average joe that's the name of the team i'm on matt browning's my captain chip is my number one star player oh did you get traded uh do you do you already know the answer to this no can we give like before travis asked these these few questions can we give like a little background on like what this hoop group is. I don't know if we've

really discussed that much of the show. Hoop Group is the basketball league that I run out of my basement on Thursday nights. And we're about to start a new season, so we had our draft last week. Season 17? It's a lot. I don't know how many seasons is this?

17. Yeah, you're right. It is 17. Wow. Season 17. So, I gave up my captainship and so basically to make this really the teams as fair as possible we take we find out the six or seven best captains that we feel like will you know be good for decision making leading good for trades good for banter and we pick those guys out well not everyone is the same level of

talent so we basically you don't get a pick wherever you would be drafted if everyone was in the draft. So like a Greg Frenelli, if I were to pick on him, he's not in the, he's got a little cap issue, he's getting old. It's turned 60 this week, by the way. Greg Freneli, happy birthday. He's great at walking around. Happy birthday, Greg.

He is a sixth rounder. So that's the last round. We have six players per team. So he has a six round X. So he doesn't get a sixth round pick. where like a Charlie for instance, since he is a captain, he gets a first round X. He is its team's first round.

So that way we make sure all the teams are level and everyone has a level team. Well, this guy named Smitty, Ryan Smith, he made a strategic decision to draft me and hold me hostage in my own home. So he overdrafted me. Yeah, well, in the third round

he drafted me in the third round and I'm like oh my gosh first of all his first two picks were questionable at best so he picked he was picking people that he thought other teams

would run to him and say oh man you picked my guy ahead of me like what do you want for this guy well he miscalculated that the fact is is that no one's going to run to pick overdrafted players.

Like, that's where I think he misunderstood his position. And so he drafted me, and I'm like, Smitty, we will not win, we will lose every game by 20. This team you drafted, we can't dribble and we can't shoot. How are we going to score? I'm the only person on the team that can shoot outside 10 feet. And it was, let me cook. and like, no, you're not going to use me as a pawn.

And I end up just, this is just bad, no. So anyway, the commission, I'm not the commission of this league. This is too much for me to have to deal with. So Art Van Wrigdon is our commissioner. He essentially removed Smitty as captain and pronounced it. We're going to have a redraft. from positions 21 to the end. I was drafted number 21 overall.

He says, no, no, that pick was bullshit. And it screwed the rest of the draft up. He's like, you know, everyone got better players than they should have. It messed up the balance of the league by him doing this. And so we did a redraft, and now I'm an average show instead of a... I was on the firm.

And now the firm apparently no longer exist. Imagine that, though, Travis. No other sport league on this planet does a guy, does a third rounder, fourth rounder, get drafted in the second round? He's like, fuck that. You guys overdrafted me. Send me back to... Because I know I can't wait.

Like, if you overdraft me, all you're doing is hurting yourself. And I was way too competitive to have to show up every Thursday night and get beat like a drum. In your own house. Yes, it's not... It's not going to work like that. No. No, no, no. So all is this to say, Travis,

is Charlie is working on a little mock you series. Yes. Following this hoop group season. So there's been plenty of drama. What's it going to be like? It's almost like surviving Barstool, but hoop group, it's going to be like the Netflix docu series.

It's going to be like drive to survive, you know? I can figure out who I'm going to root for. Hoop Group. You're going to be introduced to all the teams. What? What? What? I need to find out what your team is.

Can I just tell you this? Week one on Thursday, we play Charlie. They're taking them down. Are you? Because it's Charlie and Nate, right? Yeah. No defense. Charlie and Nate.

For those listening are the number one and number two players in this week. Yeah, Charlie made a trade to take someone else's first rounders. Now he has two first rounders, but he didn't get another pick. to like the fourth round or fifth round. I think that's... Yeah. Might be the right move. I get it.

I get the strategy because we all are... We are amateurs, right? And even if you leave us dead ass open, we're going to hit 30% of the time. So I get the strategy. It was Grant Van Wringen and made the trade. I thought it was a stupid trade on his end. You can't give up a first rounder.

I mean, you've got to have somebody in the clutch time to, like, make it. I can't make all the shots. I think you need to the... like not let Charlie Fish for the week here play my games with him he's going to get it he's going to get it on Thursday all right so anyway

those interested in the hoop group tune into the mock you series and it's on hoop group's Instagram right and it'll be on yours a little bit I'm trying to convince you to be the narrator of this you have not told me about this that's why he's trying to convince you

I see using my social following to grow the hoop group group Instagram. Okay. No, it's not. It's a very interesting, it is a very entertaining. That's an eclectic group. It's, it's very entertaining channel. That's what I'm saying.

Charlie came to me with this idea for the, this hoop group docu-series. And I was like, it's, so listen, everyone, follow. It's the, is that underscore? Underscore. Yeah, underscore hoop group. One word. The underscore hoop group. That's our league that we run on Thursdays.

I mean, some of these are really, really funny. Wow, I see the real of me sitting outside after I got drafted, sitting on the steps. That's what I'm saying. There's a bunch of great content that comes from this, but I feel like your fans and those that follow you don't know the entire backstory and the story of this hoop group. So just trying to explain it a little better. All right.

Anything else? That's it. We go to Watkins Glen. Next week, practicing qualifying is Saturday at noon on True TV and the race on Sunday on USA at 2 p.m. I got a review here from Trev on Spotify, hoping to see Denny Crack the top 10 all-time wins list with a championship. By the way, my family disapproves with me rooting for you,

so I've embraced the villain also. Great job. Thank you. Stay strong, there, Trev. We definitely have to thank Bobbs for bringing us this episode. Bob's, a little Bob. The car looked good. I know it stands out. Unfortunately, it's hard to point it out when it's running 20th.

But yeah, I mean, listen, go to Bob's. It's the place to go for furniture. If you want the style, the quality, the price, choose bobs every time you need to go in their stores it's it's fantastic uh they got living rooms ready to go there great quality stuff so they're growing big time they got more north carolina stores now i think they already had one they opened up their second not long ago so making its way all right well that's uh that's it for this week and we'll see you after walk is glen