NASCAR: An open letter to Denny Hamlin

By Asher Fair | Oct 4, 2017

DOVER, DE - OCTOBER 01: Denny Hamlin, driver of the #11 FedEx Freight Toyota, prepares to drive during the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Apache Warrior 400 presented by Lucas Oil at Dover International Speedway on October 1, 2017 in Dover, Delaware. (Photo by Jerry Markland/Getty Images) /

Denny Hamlin recently made headlines by saying he thought NASCAR drivers’ salaries are too low. Here is an open letter to the Joe Gibbs Racing driver.

Before we get started, he is a link to Denny Hamlin’s comments about NASCAR drivers not being compensated well enough for the risks they take on a weekly basis.

Here is the open letter to Denny Hamlin, the driver of the #11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota in the NASCAR Cup Series.

Denny,

This letter is in regard to your recent comments about NASCAR drivers being underpaid, especially relative to NBA and NFL players when said players don’t take nearly the amount of risks you do as a NASCAR Cup Series driver each week.

You’re right. It is ridiculous that NBA and NFL players get tons more money than NASCAR drivers do despite the fact that there are far more basketball and football players on the top levels of those sports than there are drivers on NASCAR’s top level and despite the fact that NASCAR is far more risky.

But that is based on the assumption that this world is a fair place where compensation is directly based on every little detail that a job entails. If this world were fair and that were the case, athletes would be nowhere near the top of the salary charts, whether they be basketball players, football players or NASCAR drivers like yourself.

Sure, NASCAR is risky, and your thoughts that drivers should be compensated more so than NBA and NFL player are thoughts that I wholeheartedly agree with. But there are jobs out there, non-competition jobs I might add, that are far more risky and entail a whole lot more in regard to other human beings than simply putting on a show.

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Take people like soldiers, firefighters, policemen, EMT’s and paramedics. They make pennies compared to what even NASCAR drivers make despite the fact that NASCAR salaries are nowhere near what the salaries are in the NBA and the NFL. In a fair world, these first responders would make far more money than anybody. But they don’t, and they don’t complain about it, either.

Let’s face it. Basketball and football are games played purely for entertainment. NASCAR is along the same lines in terms of entertainment purposes even though it doesn’t exactly qualify as a “game”.

But first responders are people who risk everything they have to help others, and they do it making a fraction of what you make, and they don’t go around saying ‘we deserve more than NASCAR drivers because what we do is riskier’…even though that would be completely accurate, especially since they actually aren’t millionaires as opposed to someone like yourself.

You, meanwhile, are a multi-millionaire, and you are in a position to make a difference. You are in the sport of NASCAR, a sport where drivers are respected as role models, and generally for much better reasons than athletes that play in the NBA or the NFL. People look up to you.

A man with your net worth expressing pay concerns for athletes in your profession full of millionaires will rarely be taken seriously, if at all, by anyone as long there are brave people out there who risk everything for others day in and day out just so they can make pennies compared to what you earn…people who rarely complain about it.

Your recent comments are not inaccurate in regard to the salaries of NBA and NFL players, but as a multi-millionaire expressing these concerns for other millionaires in your profession, they give not only you but the sport a terrible look, so I hope you will consider recanting said comments.

Thank you.

Next: 10 NASCAR drivers who deserve better rides

Denny Hamlin and all of the other NASCAR Cup Series drivers get back in action with the first race of the Round of 12 in this year’s playoffs at Charlotte Motor Speedway this Sunday, October 8th, 2017. The race will be broadcast live on NBC starting at 2:00 PM ET.