"They just won't give the charters": Landon Cassill predicts NASCAR's potential move after Denny Hamlin hinted at teams skipping races 

Last month, Denny Hamlin made the case for why teams should be able to own their charters permanently. However, according to part-time driver Landon Cassill, NASCAR won't offer the teams an option to own charters.

In the ongoing charter agreement tussle between Cup teams and NASCAR, a common ground hasn't been reached till now, with a deadline approaching at the start of next season.

According to Cassill, in a scenario where an agreement isn't reached, NASCAR could offer the teams an alternative option to their demands. During an episode of "Money Lap Podcast with Parker Kligerman & Landon Cassill", Cassill gave his take on the ongoing situation around charter agreements and said,

"My prediction in this scenario that there's no charters, is that the teams get somewhat close to the money that they're asking for, but without charters... I'm not saying that I'm predicting that a charter agreement won't be reached, I'm just saying that if a charter agreement isn't reached, NASCAR will give the teams money per race. They just won't give the charters. That's how NASCAR will overcome the threat of teams potentially striking and sitting out races because NASCAR is going to say, 'Okay, we're not going to give you charters, but we'll pay you a million dollars to start the Daytona 500.' I do believe it worth it," Cassill said [at 31:55].

He further argued that NASCAR paying $18 million a year to the teams is a "worth it" proposition because of the amount of money involved. Having said that, Cassill also claimed that NASCAR doesn't necessarily have to do it because they hold the 'leverage' in this situation.

"I think that NASCAR does not need to give up permanent charters, long term agreements, guranteed starting positions and all that money. I don't think they need to do it," he added.

Cassill predicted that he sees NASCAR offering the teams a 3-5% increase from the last deal based on the rise they got with the new media deal.

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Denny Hamlin made a case for why teams should be able to own their charters

Speaking after the SHR announcement on an episode of "Actions Detrimental" in June, Denny Hamlin argued why it made sense for teams to have permanent charters. He claimed that with the charters, team owners have an asset they can pass down to their kids.

For Hamlin, this point was particularly relevant in the case of family organizations like Joe Gibbs Racing, who would want to hand off their business to their future generations. To further back his argument, Hamlin cited the example of SHR announcing their exit from the sport. He said (as quoted by Sportsnaut):

"Because in, in the instance that it all goes crumbling down, like in Stewart-Haas’ scenario, they were able to sell something to get back some of that investment that they spent over the decades, and they spent hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars.They at least got some of that back. What we’re saying is that they deserve to have a permanent seat at the table when it comes to racing in NASCAR," Hamlin said.

Denny Hamlin claimed that the teams are simply asking to be able to own something they've spent millions of dollars on.

However, a month later, the charter situation is nowhere close to resolution if Hamlin's recent comments are to be believed. The 23XI Racing co-owner revealed that the teams are "banging our heads against the wall" throughout the negotiations because every proposal NASCAR has sent back has been worse than the previous one.

Hamlin further claimed that if a charter agreement isn't reached, teams would only participate in the highest-paying races and sit out the ones that they think don't pay as much.