With Tyler Reddick’s NASCAR Hot Streak, Michael Jordan Is Still Winning Pro Sports
Michael Jordan can’t stop his winning ways — just maybe not in the sport you think.Michael Jordan can’t stop his winning ways — just maybe not in the sport you think.Whitlock: Michael Jordan is NASCAR’s ‘Race Jam’ comeback strategy
When a garage pull rope that was shaped like a noose was discovered in Bubba Wallace’s garage at the Talladega Superspeedway in 2020, the media had a field day.
Despite the FBI determining Wallace was not the victim of a hate crime, NASCAR’s reputation was tarnished.
Now, according to BlazeTV host Jason Whitlock, NASCAR is “fixing its popularity problem” with Michael Jordan.
Jordan joined NASCAR in 2020 and is making history in the sport after his 23XI Racing team won its third straight NASCAR race to start the 2026 season.
“There’s nothing that the media, mainstream media, loves more than a racial story, and Michael Jordan and Tyler Reddick are making a lot of history in a sport that has a lot of so-called racial baggage,” Whitlock says.
“Around 2006, 2007, NASCAR fell off a cliff in terms of popularity and visibility and just relevance and traction. Most people attributed that fall-off to the stock market crash in 2007 and that the hundreds of thousands of fans that would go from city to city to city with NASCAR, they lost their economic stability,” he explains.
“And that’s what most people believe gutted NASCAR. I’m going to posit a theory that, yes, the economic collapse played a role, but the economic collapse was about gutting all of the working class. And NASCAR built its reputation on southern rednecks, working-class people, you know, heart of America people,” he says.
“There was one path back, that NASCAR had to place the race card. They had to create ‘Race Jam.’ They tried to do it with Bubba Wallace. Bubba Wallace is a weak, inferior driver. He’s no good. And so, they couldn’t do it with Bubba,” he continues.
But Michael Jordan is different.
“The guy stepped away from basketball 25 years ago, hasn’t lost a bit of relevancy, and it’s Michael Jordan, and they’ve injected him into NASCAR, and they’ve injected that storyline into NASCAR,” Whitlock says. “And I think it’s going to produce results.”
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Michael Jordan shocks NASCAR by doing something no one has done in 77 years
Michael Jordan is now dominating a new sport, and has started off 2026 by breaking records.
Jordan's 23XI racing team settled an antitrust lawsuit with NASCAR in December, after alleging the racing organization is a monopoly that uses unfair practices to decide which teams are guaranteed participation.
Now that Jordan's team has acquired that guaranteed (chartered) status, they have hit the ground running and immediately set an all-time record in 2026.
'It's time for change.'
In the 77 years of NASCAR racing, no team has ever won the first three races of a season until Jordan's 23XI team. Astoundingly, driver Tyler Reddick has won the Daytona 500, EchoPark Speedway, and the Circuit of the Americas to start the 2026 season, despite having zero first-place finishes in all of 2025.
"It’s time for change," Jordan told Fox NASCAR reporter Jamie Little after the race. "Time for change, and the guys feel the same thing. Tyler came in with the most pressure, I guess. Everybody expected him — or he had a chance — to win three in a row, and that's the hardest one to win. He kept to his strategy, and man, the guys put together a great car."
Jordan gave all the credit to his team and drivers, saying, "I just put up the money. I'm just a competitor."
"That's what it’s about — winning."
Just under Reddick at the top of the standings is another one of Jordan's drivers, Bubba Wallace. Wallace drives car No. 23, representing the number Jordan made famous during his time in the NBA with the Chicago Bulls.
Reddick drives car No. 45, a number Jordan briefly wore when he came out of retirement in 1995, before switching back to 23 in the playoffs that year.
"It's one race, but it was so important, so fitting that we were able to get three in a row and make history," Reddick said after the race, per NBC Sports. "Just trying to remember everything that I knew was going to be important there at the end and just tried to minimize the mistakes."
RELATED: It's personal: Michael Jordan is more charitable than the media tells you
Jordan's lawsuit, which included team Front Row Motorsports, challenged NASCAR's charter program that consists of 36 charter teams who are guaranteed to compete in the field of 40 for each race.
The remaining four spots are decided by a rather complex system that differs depending on the race. In general, non-chartered teams typically compete in a qualifying race or win a spot based on their qualifying time.
As Fearless reported in 2024, Jordan's side argued that the unpredictability of being an non-chartered team meant the possible loss of drivers and sponsors from week to week, while binding the teams to the specific series (NASCAR), its tracks, and suppliers.
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It's personal: Michael Jordan is more charitable than the media tells you
Michael Jordan gives back far more than he gets credit for.
After six NBA championships and a Hall of Fame career, Jordan is now known most for his Air Jordan brand, memes of him crying, and compilations of him expressing personal grievances that fueled his athletic prowess.
'Did you get all the stuff?!'
What does not get as much media play is Jordan's long history of charity toward low-income communities, disaster relief, and sick children.
In fact, even when Jordan was being mocked with the "it became personal" meme following the airing of his 2020 Netflix documentary, "The Last Dance," he was giving millions to feed the hungry during the Christmas season.
In late November 2020, months after the documentary released, Jordan donated $2 million of profit from the movie to Feeding America, the nation's largest hunger-relief program. He focused on the Carolinas, where he played college basketball, and Chicago, where he won his NBA championships.
This came at a time when the organization had announced that more than 50 million Americans were struggling with food bills due to COVID-19.
What may be even more notable, though, is Jordan's history with the Make-A-Wish organization.
As the NBA reported in 2019, Jordan has been chief ambassador for Make-A-Wish since 2008, donating more than $5 million to the charity while granting hundreds of wishes over a 30-year span.
His donation totals catapulted in early 2023, when Jordan celebrated his 60th birthday by giving a whopping $10 million donation to Make-A-Wish, the biggest contribution the company had ever received.
But what is seemingly more impactful than his donations is Jordan's willingness to reach out to young fans of his who are struggling, sick, or even similarly to him, a meme.
The latter is exactly what happened to Jeffrey from Spokane, Washington, in 2016. Jeffrey was spotted wearing Jordan's Chicago Bulls gear at a local basketball park. Viewers were shocked at how similar he looked to the NBA legend, and the video quickly became a laughing stock online as it appeared an adult man was mimicking a professional athlete.
However, Jordan became aware of the nuanced details of the story, including that Jeffrey was developmentally disabled. He has a seizure disorder, mild retardation, and autism. His mother told reporters that Jeffrey was diagnosed at the age of 4 when he complained of painful headaches.
Just months after the meme took off, Jordan sent Jeffrey a massive haul of Air Jordan goods — and even gave him a phone call.
"Did you get all the stuff?!" Jordan is heard asking Jeffrey. After Jeffrey confirmed, Jordan followed up, "Is it enough?!"
The two laughed. "Enjoy yourself, and I'm going to be watching for you," Jordan added.
"All right ... I love you," Jeffrey threw out to his hero.
"Love you, man," Jordan replied.
The greatest basketball player of all time, who famously said, "Republicans buy sneakers too," has made so many charitable donations that the NBA has an entire page dedicated to his philanthropy.
It notes $2 million of relief funds to victims of Hurricane Florence in 2018, $500,000 to stock libraries and preschools in Charlotte in 2016, and $250,000 to food banks in 2012, among many other donations.
In November 2025, Jordan continued his tradition of helping others during the holiday season, with a $10 million donation to a North Carolina medical center in honor of his mother.
The Novant Health New Hanover Regional Medical Center in Wilmington, North Carolina, will name its neuroscience institute after Deloris Jordan, according to ESPN.
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Michael Jordan’s 14-Month Brawl With NASCAR Shakes Up America’s Favorite Motorsport
The sport itself is changing for each of the three major racing leagues.Hot take: Michael Jordan's new show is HURTING the NBA
While Jason Whitlock respects and celebrates Michael Jordan, he thinks the six-time NBA champion is actually doing more harm than good to the league right now. “Jordan is the black shadow that hovers over the NBA like a dark cloud, and he's a constant reminder of how things suck right now,” he says.
Jordan, who has mostly stayed out of the public eye since his 2003 retirement, has recently re-entered the NBA as a special contributor. His new show, “MJ: Insights to Excellence” — a prerecorded miniseries of interviews where Jordan shares basketball wisdom and personal reflections with host Mike Tirico — airs weekly during certain NBA games in the 2025-2026 season.
Fans and players have been soaking in Jordan’s wisdom and the tidbits of information he shares about his personal life, but Jason says this focus on the NBA’s “good ol’ days” when Jordan was the face of the league isn’t doing anything positive for the already hurting association. If anything, Jordan’s show is a reminder of how “lazy” today’s NBA players are.
On Tuesday night during the postgame show following the New York Knicks vs. Milwaukee Bucks game, episode two of “MJ: Insights to Excellence” aired. Tirico asked the GOAT his thoughts on “load management” — the strategic practice of resting healthy players during games or limiting their minutes to prevent injuries, manage fatigue, and extend careers.
Jordan, who was notorious for playing through injury and fatigue all 82 games of a season, pulled no punches: “[Load management] shouldn’t be needed ... I never wanted to miss a game because it was an opportunity to prove.”
“You have a duty that if [fans] are wanting to see you, and as an entertainer, I want to show,” he added.
While Jordan’s work ethic and commitment to the game will forever be admirable, the fact that it remains unmatched over two decades later only highlights how far the NBA has fallen.
“This is not a criticism of Michael Jordan. It's really a criticism of Adam Silver and the executives and ownership in the NBA. They can't come up with a solution for what's wrong with the NBA, and so they're allowing Michael Jordan and the media to mostly drive the discussion about what's wrong with the NBA,” says Jason.
NBC, which recently inked an 11-year, $76 billion media rights deal to broadcast NBA games, is “using the greatest player of all time to basically subtly take a dump on the NBA,” he explains.
“Fearless" contributor and basketball aficionado Jay Skapinac agrees that Michael’s words are true — load management is a reflection of how soft NBA players have become — but the NBA highlighting this is only “undermining the current product.”
If the NBA wants to move into a new era, where grit and passion define the league again, it needs to ditch LeBron James, who he says “is the only player that has left the game worse than the one that he inherited,” and “move forward with these new, bright, rising young stars in the NBA” instead of “focusing on the greatest player that ever existed in the sports history.”
To hear more of the conversation, watch the episode above.
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Is Michael Jordan’s NBA halftime series a flop or a gold mine of insight?
Earlier this year, the NBA announced a new halftime series with Peacock streaming services: “MJ: Insights to Excellence,” featuring the one and only Michael Jordan. The news was shocking for the sports world, as Jordan has largely avoided the public spotlight since his retirement. For him to step back in front of NBA audiences again, this time ready to share his wisdom, has had basketball fans sitting on the edge of their seats.
On Tuesday, October 21, the first episode of Jordan’s new series aired during halftime of the Oklahoma City Thunder and Houston Rockets game. The NBA legend revealed that he hasn’t picked up a basketball in years and shared a memory of feeling “the most nervous I’ve been in years” when asked to shoot a free throw in front of kids during a stay at a rental house for the Ryder Cup.
Many were charmed by Jordan’s candor, but Jason Whitlock says his “insights” flopped.
He was expecting basketball analysis, not personal anecdotes.
“This is [Shai Gilgeous-Alexander] and the Oklahoma City Thunder raising a banner, getting championship rings — the future of the NBA versus the past of the NBA in Kevin Durant, and we had time to go hear stories about Michael Jordan shooting a free throw?” he complains.
Jason doesn’t understand why the entirety of sports media is “genuflecting” to Jordan and treating him “as an idol” when all he did was share some personal stories. “Michael Jordan did nothing, and we shouldn't be celebrating it,” he says, calling himself an “iconoclast” who wants to “tear down icons.”
“Fearless” guest Jay Skapinac, host of “Skap Attack,” agrees: “I was led to believe that this was going to be Michael Jordan kind of as an NBA analyst, not regaling us with stories of what he's been doing for the last 25, 30 years outside of the NBA.”
His fear is that “MJ: Insights to Excellence” is actually just a long pre-recorded interview that the NBA is going to chop up and slow-release throughout the season.
T.J. Moe, however, completely understands the hype surrounding Jordan’s series. “When people don't speak very often, people's ears perk up when that person speaks. The first time we heard Michael Jordan say virtually anything since his retirement was ‘The Last Dance,’ and people were captivated by that. I don't think we should be surprised that people are somewhat captivated by just seeing inside of a guy's life that is a total mystery,” he counters.
But Jason’s opinion is set: Jordan’s “insights” are a distraction from the game. “NBC screwed up here.”
To hear more of the debate, watch the episode above.
Want more from Jason Whitlock?
To enjoy more fearless conversations at the crossroads of culture, faith, sports, and comedy with Jason Whitlock, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.
Michael Jordan sues NASCAR but is dealt major legal blow just 2 days before his driver competes in Cup Series championship
Michael Jordan's racing team was dealt a painful blow by a United States district judge who denied his team's request for an injunction just before the culmination of the 2024 NASCAR season.
Jordan, who co-owns 23XI Racing with three-time Daytona 500 winner Denny Hamlin, was joined by Front Row Motorsports in a suit against NASCAR and its chairman. The lawsuit claimed NASCAR gave all Cup Series teams a last-minute offer in September; but both teams refused to sign the offer on antitrust grounds.
Judge Whitney summarized much of the claims by the racing teams as being speculative and not definitive.
As reported by the New York Post, the racing team owners claimed NASCAR's charter system limits competition by binding teams to the series, its tracks, and suppliers in an unfair manner.
The lawsuit said Chairman Jim France and NASCAR are "monopolistic bullies."
The teams wanted the court to grant an injunction that would release them from a clause in the NASCAR charter that prevents them from suing its sanctioning body. However, U.S. District Judge Frank D. Whitney ruled mid-day Friday that the two racing teams did not meet the burden required to be granted the injunction.
The injunction would have allowed the teams to compete as usual (as chartered teams) while still suing NASCAR. Instead, they may now have to compete as "open" teams, which does not guarantee them a spot in NASCAR races and limits their revenue. This could cause drivers and sponsors to leave the teams because they are not privy to those guarantees.
As reported by NBC Sports, the judge decided that the plaintiffs did prove they would suffer "irreparable harm if the injunction is not granted."
Judge Whitney summarized much of the claims by the racing teams as being speculative and not definitive.
"Although Plaintiffs have alleged that they will face a risk of irreparable harm, they have not sufficiently alleged present, immediate, urgent irreparable harm, but rather only speculative, possible harm," the judge wrote.
The judge also noted that the teams "alleged a possibility" that they will lose sponsorship agreements, citing that this wording is "too speculative."
The judge further wrote that the teams only "allege that their drivers may leave if Plaintiffs compete as open teams."
"Presently, this harm is too speculative to merit a preliminary injunction."
The judge went on, "Plaintiffs have not alleged that their business cannot survive without a preliminary injunction. Instead, they allege that their businesses may not survive without a preliminary injunction."
The ruling went on similarly about "potential" losses and future business losses being "merely speculative."
"As such, this speculative harm does not warrant the extraordinary relief of a preliminary injunction," he concluded.
The ruling comes just two days before the NASCAR Cup Series Championship in Phoenix on Sunday.
Four drivers are headed into the final race in a tie for first place in the Cup Series standings; one of whom is the No. 45 car driven by Tyler Reddick for Jordan's 23XI team.
23XI's other driver, No. 23 Bubba Wallace, is in 18th place. Both drive Toyotas.
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