A winless season so far, and bottom of the pile for playoffs. Martin Truex Jr.’s final year in the NASCAR Cup series isn’t going as per plan. What should have been a smooth sail into the sunset has turned into misery for the veteran Joe Gibbs driver. With his exit confirmed from the sport at the end of 2024, the former Stewart-Haas Racing driver Kevin Harvick pitched in, suggesting MTJ’s end in the Cup series may come sooner than expected.

From what seems a likely exit in the round of 16, Kevin Harvick thinks Martin Truex Jr. is already exhausted from competing in what looks to be a losing race.

A harsh verdict for a hopeful Martin Truex Jr.

The race at Watkins Glen was an exciting one, particularly for MTJ, who took the win in stage 1. Yet, there seems to be a different feeling floating about around his time in the Cup series. Kevin Harvick thinks MTJ is indicating he has mentally checked out of the competition already.

In the latest show of Kevin Harvick’s ‘Happy Hour’, he said, “I think Martin is done with it. Listening to his interview after the race, I think he’s obviously down the road to retirement, frustrated with, you know, the style of racing that comes with this particular car. And, so Bristol’s going to be interesting because I think if you’re Hamlin, you can point your way in but I think it’d be a lot easier if you won your way in.”

What Kevin Harvick here refers to is the state of the championship and the difference in the cars that the Cup series uses at the moment. Martin Truex Jr.’s playoff hopes are very low. With poor performances in the first two races at Atlanta and Watkins Glen, he sits 15th on the grid with -14 points. The only way he can make up lost ground is if he takes the win at Bristol or Kansas, one of which is a track MTJ doesn’t have a good track record on.

There’s another issue!
The NextGen cars. Ever since their introduction in 2022, Martin Truex Jr. took a hit, going winless for 54 races. It was a streak that started in 2021 when the Cup series used the Gen-6 cars. The stark differences between the two variants look to have MTJ reckoning for more, and it’s this style of racing Harvick thinks does not suit the #19 driver.

While Kevin Harvick pips MTJ to call it quits early, there is another JGR driver on the chopping blocks for the playoff series, Denny Hamlin.

Denny Hamlin’s last hope to stay in the title fight

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With the way the first two races of the playoff went, fans certainly can’t predict anything that happens. Denny Hamlin, Martin Truex Jr., and Kyle Larson are all close to the elimination zone. However, it is MTJ and Hamlin who suffer the most, jumping around the cutoff line. Denny Hamlin, at the moment, flirts with elimination, with -6 points on the board. His closest rivals are Chase Briscoe and teammate Ty Gibbs, with 6 points each above the cushion.

However, if Denny Hamlin wants to qualify, going for points is not really the solution. Kevin Harvick has a more extreme solution in mind, one that does not need point scoring to qualify.

He said, “When you look at the first round of playoffs, after watching the first two weeks, l think I underestimated Atlanta-Watkins Glen. And factoring in the Watkins Glen tire throwing everybody for a loop, l think that I was just way underestimating the significance of the way that the races were structured in round one and could eliminate at least two of what I thought would be 2 championship contenders possibly if they could put it all together. I think that going to Bristol, obviously Denny Hamlin is, is very good there.”

What Kevin Harvick refers to is the excellent track record Denny Hamlin has at Bristol.

• Hamlin has 4 wins in total at the track, with the first two coming in 2012 and 2019.
• His recent two wins are more special since he won the 2023 Night Race and the 2024 Food City 500, back-to-back.

The only option for Denny Hamlin, if he wants to compete for the championship, is to push for the win at Bristol. As an added form of incentive, the No. 11 can join an elite group of drivers—four so far—who won three consecutive races at the track in its 60 years on the NASCAR schedule. These drivers are Kurt Busch, Cale Yarborough, Darrell Waltrip, and Fred Lorenzen.

The win will be the only opportunity for Denny Hamlin to go after the much-elusive Cup championship, having not won it so far. Only time will tell how the race fares out for the No. 11 Toyota.