“It’s not a death nail”: Dale Earnhardt Jr. reacts to NASCAR’s 23XI-RCR hammering after Martinsville

Dale Earnhardt Jr. shared his take on whether NASCAR’s penalties on Bubba Wallace, Austin Dillon, and Ross Chastain were enough to deter drivers from allegedly manipulating races. While the penalties were seemingly major blows to the teams, the NASCAR Hall of Famer suggested a different approach.

Last week’s playoff race at Martinsville gave rise to a series of controversies. The first one stemmed from how Chastain and Dillon formed a roadblock behind fellow Chevrolet driver William Byron as he ran 6th. The next one happened on the penultimate lap when Bubba Wallace decelerated all of a sudden giving fellow manufacturer driver Christopher Bell a spot.

NASCAR viewed it as a violation of sections 4.4.B&D of the NASCAR Member Conduct of the Rule Book. The drivers were fined $100,000 and docked 50 driver points. Reflecting on the same in an episode of the Dale Jr Download Reloaded, Earnhardt Jr. said,

“I think it's a lot of money. The points are a lot, but to really get someone's attention, I think parking them a race...it will be enough of a deterrent for someone to not do it again. It's not a death knell or death sentence to a team.” (0:10)

There have been people within the community who have been urging NASCAR to go after Chevrolet and Toyota. However, none of them seemed to know how the series could deter a manufacturer, given their association with other teams like Hendrick Motorsports, who had nothing to do with these controversies.

“People say, ‘Oh go after the manufacturer’s points.’ I don’t know if that really matters, does it? We don’t seem to care about these 50 points for the drivers. Do we know they care about that?”

Dale Earnhardt Jr. further explained

“There's no one here with a great idea and a great way to penalize the manufacturer or to deter them.”

Besides the monetary fine and points penalty, crew chiefs, spotters, and a team executive from all three teams were suspended from next week’s Championship race at Phoenix Raceway. Although the drivers weren’t suspended this time, it might happen in the future.

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Dale Earnhardt Jr. reacts as NASCAR Vice President’s dropps verdict on suspending drivers

In a virtual interview with veteran journalist Bob Pockrass, Elton Sawyer, Vice President of NASCAR, said that although this time the penalties involving suspension from races were directed more towards the team leadership, parking the drivers might not be a very distant call in the days to come.

Speaking of which, he said,

“I promise you that does not exclude going forward. and we have meetings coming up this week with our drivers, and we will get that point across to them and be very clear that when you do anything, that's going to compromise the integrity of our sport. We are going to react.” (0:08)

Dale Earnhardt Jr. had mixed feelings about Sawyer’s verdict. In the latest episode of his Dale Jr Download podcast, Dale Jr. said,

"I hate that because it’s kind of like your parent going, ‘Next time, it’s your a**. Next time, you’re getting the belt.’ Maybe now’s the time to bring the belt…It’s just like that parent where they’re always threatening the next time.”

However, he also supported the “threat”. Earnhardt Jr. continued,

“Maybe they got a great reason why they didn’t why they didn’t want to do it. Maybe they got a great reason why they didn’t want to suspend the drivers. To a lot of fans points that commented on our show yesterday, they weren’t all in favor of that. But I just feel like that would be a way to go.”

Meanwhile, the drivers gear up for their upcoming race at Phoenix (on November 10, 3 pm ET onwards). NBC will provide live coverage of the event with MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio providing radio updates on the same.