NASCAR has been handing out punishment left and right in recent regard. From Austin Dillon’s desperate double shove at Richmond to Denny Hamlin’s uninspected Bristol-winning engine, the sport’s governing body is not messing about.

Considering all the circumstances, most would agree the penalties for Dillon’s deliberate infractions were just about fair. However, the ones NASCAR imposed on Hamlin & his #11 team feel quite the contrary. Even his teammate, who was the most affected by him jumping the final restart in Bristol back in March, admitted it did not feel right at a pre-race presser at Daytona. And Martin Truex Jr.’s views on the entire issue echo the wider calls of the NASCAR community on how questionable the verdict has truly been.

Martin Truex Jr.’s ‘balanced’ perspective on the Denny Hamlin penalty

Before Hamlin’s L2 penalty this week, Austin Dillon & Joey Logano faced the wrath of NASCAR for their respective parts to play in the highly debated Richmond encounter on August 11. Logano may have escaped with only a $50,000 fine for his unappealing burnout near Austin Dillon’s family members on the pit road. Dillon wasn’t so lucky. NASCAR revoked his Richmond win from playoff eligibility, suspended his spotter Brandon Benesch for three races (now only one after RCR’s most recent appeal), and docked Dillon 25 points for spinning out Logano and Hamlin on the last lap.

In contrast, NASCAR penalized Denny Hamlin with a 75-point championship deduction, 10 lost playoff points, and a $100,000 fine for his crew chief, Chris Gabehart. All for an engine that Toyota Racing Development accidentally misplaced and rebuilt instead of handing it over to tech for inspection. David Wilson, President of TRD himself, cleared the #11 team of any wrongdoing, stating, “TRD takes full responsibility for this grievous mistake, and we apologize to Denny, Chris, Coach Gibbs, the entire JGR organization, NASCAR, and our fans.”

This ‘grievous mistake’ has sent Denny Hamlin tumbling down to sixth in the regular season championship standings. Hence, it had turned into the topic of the hour before the 2024 Coke Zero Sugar 400. Naturally, the media turned to his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate and TRD ally, Truex, for his thoughts before his last shot at a Daytona win in his full-time NASCAR career. These were his initial reflections on the matter: “I mean, obviously, it was a big oops but yeah, got to feel for them you know, him and his team. Just because it literally had nothing to do with them.” 

Truex clarified his stance on Hamlin and the #11 team, prompting a media member to ask him if NASCAR could penalize the OEM without penalizing the #11 team, especially when they weren’t wrong. In his own words, the #19 driver wittily replied, “Yeah I don’t really know. Somebody else was asking me, ‘Why did they penalize them?’ I’m like, ’cause they didn’t know what else to do.’ Like it was the #11s engine, so I guess that’s what kind of put him in that spot… I mean it was obviously, an honest mistake because they came forward with it. But I don’t know really what’s right. It doesn’t feel right, but somebody’s got to take the fall. So I don’t know how else you do it.”