“I Don’t Know They Really Can” – Dale Earnhardt Jr Calls Out NASCAR Teams’ Bluff Around the Charter Negotiations

The Daytona racetrack is not the only hotbed that everyone seems to be talking about. NASCAR’s equation with the racing teams, considering the financial impasse, also seems to be a big talking point. NASCAR struck a massive $7.7 Billion media rights deal last year in a bid to extend its reach to a global audience. But race teams have made it clear that, as charter owners, they want bigger slices of the media cake. With this already being a big topic of discussion, the most recent take we have got is from none other than Dale Earnhardt Jr.

This whole kerfuffle is not just around the media deal either. Recently, race charters have emptied the pockets of several teams. Charter prices have apparently gone as high as $40 Million. So team owners have raised their voices demanding permanent charters. But Dale Earnhardt Jr is apprehensive about how long the teams will protest.

Dale Earnhardt Jr is not too sure about protesting teams’ conviction

NASCAR’s lucrative revenue-sharing model has raised some eyebrows in the racing quarters. Teams have voiced their demands and sought negotiations surrounding the disputed charter system. But NASCAR officials made their solid stance pretty clear by not turning up at the Sunday meeting.

Dale Earnhardt Jr recently said that it would take a lot to budge NASCAR’s position. “I think that NASCAR will figure it out…The teams can posture all they want. I just think that NASCAR will meet them somewhere, maybe not in the middle. NASCAR is like, ‘we’re willing to do a few things, but not everything you want.”

Earnhardt does not believe the teams can keep putting up a barricade against NASCAR’s stance as they did putting a halt on the charter negotiations earlier this year. Since the current charter agreement comes to an end this year, Dale said, “Are they really serious about not showing up to the Daytona 500 next year [in 2025]? I don’t feel that way. It may take something that big for the teams to get what they want… but I don’t know that they will, or they really can, or would.”

Earnhardt also shed light on how the temporary charters can prove harmful for racers. “If you’re the owner of a charter, right now you only have it till the agreement runs out. And then the charter, if NASCAR thinks they’re obsolete, could just go away…They (NASCAR) look at the charter as only really a guarantee that you’re gonna get a spot in the field.”

Currently, 36 charter teams are racing on NASCAR’s schedule, and they are not happy about the financial situation. Depriving the teams of their economic needs may amount to “actions detrimental to stock car racing,” in NASCAR’s words. But officials are willing to adjust to some extent.

Read More: Dale Earnhardt Jr Believes NASCAR Can Exploit Team’s Divided Stance for Charter Negotiations

NASCAR may pay heed to its racers

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The teams have shed clarity on their incompatible financial situation. Hendrick Motorsports vice chairman Jeff Gordon and RFK Racing president Steve Newman have stipulated that they are running on a budget deficit. They cannot sustain their teams under the present business model. Gordon also spilled the beans that Hendrick Motorsport has not profited in the past decade.

Steve Phelps, NASCAR President, recently talked to SiriusXM NASCAR Radio during Daytona 500 media day. “I’ve said this for two years, we are going to do a fair deal, and the fair deal is going to provide more money to the race teams. We’ll give them a path toward profitability, which is what they want, and an opportunity to increase the enterprise value of their charters.”

With the 2024 season well underway, only time will tell how deep the bruises will open in NASCAR-team relations.

Read More: Denny Hamlin Uncovers Michael Jordan’s Key Contribution in NASCAR’s Charter Negotiation