Michael Jordan Sues NASCAR.
That was the headlines all over the national sports news scene on Oct. 2 when the 23XI Racing team he co-owned was one of two litigants — the other being Front Row Motorsports — filing an antitrust lawsuit against the stock car sanctioning body.
MJ. His Airness. The man with his logo on millions of shoes across the world and perhaps the greatest basketball player ever to live and that lifted the National Basketball Association to great heights in the late 1990s.
That man was suing NASCAR.
I think Marty McFly would have made a ton of money if he had that nugget in his Grays Sports Almanac.
The irony in this is that NASCAR has worked feverishly for years to regain its mainstream status after the decline over the last 10 years. Having Jordan in the series was the hopeful catalyst to climb back up out of its asphalt plateau. Instead, after the failed charter negotiations and what Jordan’s team, with co-owners Denny Hamlin and Curtis Polk considered strongarm tactics by NASCAR, they sued.
With the season in the rearview mirrors of every 2024 competitor, the one thing still hanging over these two teams is this federal case. Nobody can be sleeping well in their beds at 23XI or FRM because both teams are — for the moment — heading to Daytona in February as open teams after NASCAR announced that neither would be granted charter status.
The legal battle ensues, as the short-term objective involving a preliminary injunction to allow 23XI and FRM to race under the previous charter agreement hasn’t been ruled on. A new judge was assigned the case on Dec. 11, so that could delay proceedings further. Also still unsettled is the sale of the former Stewart-Haas Racing charters, one each to both litigants, which NASCAR has not approved.
Meanwhile, the clock ticks to the inevitable start of the 2025 season. The holiday season won’t be a relaxing one it seems for the employees at both teams and for NASCAR as they await some sort of news on the direction the lawsuit will take.
What’s at stake? Just millions of dollars in prize money and possible sponsorship, dozens of jobs, and the future willingness of any other team to ever challenge NASCAR’s leadership.
Jordan has attached his name to a lawsuit that is intended to stand up against the NASCAR’s business practices in how they run the sport, specifically the justified allocation of the media revenue. In the modern day,…
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