It happened last year, it happened the year before, and it happened this year as well. Denny Hamlin came close to winning at Kansas, but somehow fell short. But while the last two seasons it was more because of either someone taking the lead from him, or someone capitalizing on him battling with another driver, this year, he had the lead, he had the win in the bag, but then Cody Ware happened.
Denny Hamlin left feeling super frustrated after missing out on Kansas win
Right before Denny Hamlin was about to take the checkered flag in a race he led the most laps in, Ware spun and brought out a caution. This meant that the race went into overtime, and Reddick was able to make a quick pit stop and get on fresher tires.
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What followed next was Tyler Reddick doing what he has done a lot of this season. And Hamlin is feeling hard done by that late caution by Cody Ware in the absence of which he would’ve been jubilant instead of frustrated. In fact, such was Hamlin’s frustration that in a post-race interview, FOX Sports’ Jamie Little mentioned that she had never seen the #11 driver so frustrated.
When she asked what the most frustrating part was for him, Denny Hamlin said, “I mean, obviously it’s not winning. It’s Cody Ware, six laps down, wrecking, I don’t know, added up. I fell for the same move that the #5 got me for a couple of years ago when I was on the inside, so I gotta learn from those mistakes that I’m making and not executing in the last few laps.”
To Hamlin’s point about him messing up late in the race, in 2024, it was the overtime finish when Kyle Larson beat Hamlin by a NASCAR record of 0.001 seconds. In 2025, it was Hamlin and Bubba Wallace’s late race that ensured Chase Elliott took advantage and cruised to the win.
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But in 2026, the reason for Hamlin’s potential fifth Kansas win was the caution brought out by Ware. So it makes sense for the #11 driver to be frustrated at Ware, even more so because of his pre-race comments, where he expressed a desire to win at Kansas to shrug off his blues from the last few years.
“For the last six years, if someone else wins a Kansas race, I’m just trying to figure out how we didn’t win, because we’re always just so fast here,” Hamlin said. “We found 10 to 12 different ways to not win here, and I thought I saw the stat this week that there has only been… I think (Kyle) Larson’s been the only repeat winner here in the last 11 races, and it was like, the fact that we haven’t is just criminal. So, hopefully we can change that.”
As it turned out, Denny Hamlin wasn’t able to change that. And while he was frustrated, his business partner and 23XI’s co-owner, Michael Jordan, was delighted, partly because of Hamlin’s frustration.
Michael Jordan delighted to have defeated his fellow 23XI co-owner
Following Tyler Reddick’s fifth win of the season, Michael Jordan opened up on his thoughts in a post-race interview with Jamie Little of FOX Sports. The former Chicago Bulls player admitted that the win was sweeter because it came against Hamlin.
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“I’m racing against Denny. I really wanted to beat him because I know we’re going to talk a lot of trash a little bit later. It was a good race,” he said happily.
Jordan claimed that when Reddick began to run out of fuel, he was unsure what was happening. But the fact that all four of his entries finished inside the top 15 spoke volumes about 23XI’s program. He added that Reddick is ‘on fire’. After all, it was his fifth win in nine races. In fact, this is the first time since Dale Earnhardt Sr. in 1987 that a driver has won five of the first nine races.
But the fact that his driver won was enough to delight Michael Jordan, as he claimed that everyone at 23XI is having fun. However, it’s worth mentioning that there’s one inaccuracy in Jordan’s statement.
There was one person in 23XI who wasn’t having fun with Reddick’s win at Kansas. And that person was, of course, Denny Hamlin.
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