The Most Popular Driver Award is given to the driver selected by fans by NASCAR at the championship gala as an acknowledgement to the racers strong fan base. Since it became a fan vote award a handful of drivers have won the award while legends such as Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordan has never won it.
Over the last six season it has been Hendrick Motorsports’ Chase Elliott who has been winning the awards. His father Bill Elliott actually holds the record for the most MPDW wins with 16. But now, Brett Griffin, the former spotter of Clint Bowyer and the co-host of Door Bumper Clear podcast produced by Dale Earnhardt Jr, has given a shout out for Denny Hamlin of JGR to win it this season.
Denny should win most popular driver. No one gives you more these days. On the track, Netflix, podcast, Twitter access... what more could you want from a driver? Brett Grifin wrote on X.
Grifin highlighted the dedication Hamlin has to the sport and how much he is doing to make it more famous. The three times Daytona 500 winner was the one who invested the most time for NASCAR’s Netflix docu-series, he has one of the biggest podcast in the sport, he brought in NBA Goat Michael Jordan as a co-owner of 23XI Racing and also has one of the best record of social media interactions with fans.
Denny Hamlin is in hot-water over his recent comments abouts SMI boss Marcus Smith
The future Hall of Famer recently got into a mid-night social media beef with Marcus Smith, the president of SMI. It all sorted when the 23XI co-owner called out the poor repaving of Sonoma which struck a nerve with the SMI head.
Things quickly became personal as they started to insult each other via X. Smith mocked the Toyota driver for his lack of championships. Hamlin got back at him by detailing his failed repaving and reminded him how he is destroying his father’s legacy.
But the duo seemingly sorted out the differences, at least for PR reasons, via their official handles. Smith was the first one to apologize for going personal and said he went over the limit. Hamlin responded by apologizing for his remarks as well.
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