“He deserves that big money”: Former NASCAR driver breaks silence with unfiltered opinion on “$6M a year” Denny Hamlin’s sponsorship struggle

Joe Gibbs Racing driver Denny Hamlin has struggled with sponsorship for the 2025 season after parting ways with his former sponsor FedEx in 2024. NASCAR veteran Kenny Wallace recently took to his X account sharing a clip of him reacting to Hamlin's struggle.

Hamlin's #11 Toyota Camry XSE was sponsored by transportation company FedEx for 20 seasons, making it the longest driver-sponsor partnership. However, the company gradually reduced its investment in the Toyota team. Last season it only sponsored 13 point-paying races, including the Championship Four race.

In the clip, Denny Hamlin highlighted that "it's tough out there" to find sponsors in the current situation with high inflation. He compared the time to his prime when several sponsors were ready to invest in the sport. Hamlin also reflected on his sponsorship with FedEx and highlighted the deal made things easy for him.

Reflecting upon the Joe Gibbs Racing driver's comments, Kenny Wallace mentioned that teams have almost 10 sponsors for a season, and the firesuits alone cost around $30K for each race during inflation.

Wallace pointed out that Joe Gibbs Racing faces sponsorship challenges as the team requires around "$20 million" annually to operate. According to the NASCAR veteran, roughly "$6 million" of that amount goes to Denny Hamlin.

Kenny Wallace explained [01:50 onwards]:

"The Joe Gibbs team, they're looking at 20 million a year. Some of these lesser teams are like, you know, our driver, he only makes, you know, some of these drivers are making them 250,000 a year. What? Denny's a $6 million-a-year guy. So you see what I'm saying. Spire Motorsports, they can use a lot less money because their driver don't ask for no money."

"You see what I'm saying. So why does it take the top teams so much money to operate? Because they got world-class drivers, as much crap as we want to or as you all want to talk about, Danny Hamlin. He's a difference-maker. He did all that talking, and then he went out there and led the race and finished third. You know, he's a gamer. So he, he, he deserves that big money," he added.

Denny Hamlin drove the FedEx-sponsored #11 Toyota Camry XSE for the last time at the Phoenix Raceway and secured 11th place on the grid. Additionally, the JGR driver has won 47 of his 54 races under the transportation company's sponsorship.

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Denny Hamlin secured two new sponsors for limited races in the 2025 season

After parting ways with FedEx last season, the oldest driver on the grid, Denny Hamlin, has signed a deal with King's Hawaiian and National Deby Relief for a multi-race agreement for the 2025 season.

The Tampa, Florida native will pilot the #11 King's Hawaiian #11 Toyota Camry XSE in four races this season. Starting from the race at Atlanta Motor Speedway on June 28, followed by Daytona International Speedway on August 23. The next race will be held at Bristol Motor Speedway on September 13, and the final race of the sponsorship will take place at Martinsville Speedway on October 26, 2025.

The National Debt Relief will be Denny Hamlin's sponsor for the Great American Race Daytona 500 scheduled on February 16, 2025. The next race under the sponsorship will be Circuit of the Americas on March 2, followed by the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on May 25. The final race is scheduled for October 19 at Talladega Superspeedway.