Denny Hamlin weighs in on NASCAR Hall of Fame controversy

Denny Hamlin has weighed in on a controversial off-track topic in NASCAR, surrounding who should and should not be in the Hall of Fame.

The conversation was sparked into life on Dale Earnhardt Jr's podcast, when Travis Rockhold claiming that drivers shouldn't be enshrined unless they were successful in the Cup Series specifically.

Dale Jr, meanwhile, argued that someone like Justin Allgaier – with just two top-ten Cup race finishes but 31 O'Reilly Series victories – should be eligible and given heavy consideration.

Allgaier's record in the O'Reilly Series is genuinely extraordinary, having never finished lower than seventh in the championship in 16 seasons, but his lack of success at the highest level carries a lot of weight with a number of people in the sport.

Hamlin has now explained his view on his Actions Detrimental podcast, pointing out that most people advocating for drivers without a Cup track record are people with a close connection to those drivers – very much the case with Earnhardt and Allgaier, with the latter in his 11th straight year driving for Earnhardt's JR Motorsports.

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Hamlin: NASCAR Hall of Fame is the pinnacle

“I believe that most of the people that have adamant arguments for the lower series guys, they have a connection to them somehow. They are their friends, they grew up watching them or something. So, they have an emotional connection to those people. ‘I want my guy in! He’s my guy! He deserves to be in!’ I think it just depends what you want the Hall of Fame to be.

"Now, I see that folks are making the statements that ‘It’s the NASCAR Hall of Fame’. Well, go ask anyone that is the very casual [fan] as in they know the NASCAR name – they’re not watching – do they know that there’s like six series of NASCAR? No, they know of Dale Earnhardt, Jeff Gordon, and Richard Petty. That’s Sunday. They don’t know about all the steps, right?

“So, people are using the ‘Well, it’s the NASCAR, they don’t say it’s the NASCAR Cup'. They’re trying to make a point saying, ‘Here’s why everyone should get in because they didn’t say it’s the NASCAR Cup, it’s all of NASCAR'. I hear you but to me, and this is my opinion – it’s not right, it’s just my opinion – is that there’s steps to your accomplishments in the sport.

"Winning at the grassroots, winning a championship at the grassroots, it’s then winning at the regional level, winning a championship at the regional level, it’s then winning races at your O’Reilly and Trucks, winning a championship in those series, winning a race in Cup, then it’s winning a championship in Cup, then it’s the Hall of Fame.

“The Hall of Fame is the pinnacle, so my issue is why is your multiple accomplishments at the grassroots, how does that allow you to just jump right to the pinnacle? That’s just my opinion.”