Joey Logano breaks his silence in an unfiltered take on NASCAR’s ‘philosophy’ that shielded his boss Roger Penske from disaster

Joey Logano gave his take on NASCAR penalizing his Penske teammate Austin Cindric last Sunday. This happened during the official pre-race media availability at Phoenix Raceway, ahead of this year’s Shriners Children’s 500, which is scheduled for March 9.

Cindric was docked 50 points and fined $50,000 for intentionally right-hooking fellow racer Ty Dillon in last week’s Cup Series race at COTA. However, the officials didn’t suspend him as it was a road course race, so the speed was low, and it did not bring out a caution. Cindric and the No. 2 team were thus saved the hassle of appealing for a playoff waiver.

Renowned journalist Bob Pockrass then questioned Logano about his views on this “philosophy” of retaliation. This is what the three-time NASCAR Cup Series champion said (2:35),

“I think all of this...just go and look back and say, okay, what is acceptable and what is not and how is things called because it's case by case, right? It's just what they say. Now we know what that means. That's how everyone interprets the rules is, you know, it's one thing to be written in the rule book and sometimes it's really hard to understand because it's a lot of legal mumbo-jumbo.”

The next time something like this happens, one will look back at Cindric’s penalty at COTA and hope that things go the same way. The Mustang maestro won’t miss a race, but the points deduction dropped him from 11th to 35th in the standings.

Meanwhile, Joey Logano sits in 12th place with 77 points to his name. He is vying for his first win of the season, also the 37th of his career in the series. Fans can watch Logano in action this Sunday on FOX Sports 1 or listen to live radio updates on MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio from 3:30 pm ET onwards.

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Joey Logano explains why NASCAR drivers should be called athletes

While basketball players are commonly referred to as athletes, the term shifts to "drivers" when discussing NASCAR. Joey Logano takes issue with the fact that NASCAR drivers are rarely acknowledged as athletes.

His explanation is simple: just as a NASCAR driver will not be able to perform well on a basketball court, a basketball player will not be great with the NextGen car.

“So are you going to tell me now an NBA player is not an athlete because he can't drive a race car? Probably not,” Joey Logano said (viabSpeedway digest). “So then why would you call me not an athlete? Why would you even be in the conversation? I just don't, I don't get that.”

NASCAR drivers shoulder a tremendous amount of pressure and put a lot on the line as they strap themselves to their cars each week. So, the intensity of competition in NASCAR is in no way less than the NBA, argued Logano.