Michael Jordan started receiving text messages from friends who had never before shown interest in NASCAR after Darrell Wallace Jr. made an impression this week in the run-up to Sunday’s Daytona 500. Wallace, who is known as Bubba, is making his debut with 23XI Racing, the team owned by Jordan and the driver Denny Hamlin.
“So, people are starting to be inquisitive about it, which, to me, is a start,” Jordan told The New York Times in a video conference call with Hamlin and Wallace. “And come Sunday, hopefully both do well. I told Denny what my ideal scenario would be. I won’t say it out loud, but both of them are doing well.”
Jordan, who is widely considered to be the greatest basketball player ever, has already propelled the popularity of one sport. Now, he hopes his venture into NASCAR extends and diversifies the number of drivers, sponsors, business opportunities and fans.
In joining Hamlin and forming 23XI, Jordan is supporting Wallace, the only Black full-time driver at NASCAR’s top level. Last summer, Wallace called for the Confederate flag to be banned at racetracks. He later found a noose in his garage at the Talladega racetrack, but the F.B.I. determined he had not been the target of a hate crime.
“We don’t know where this is going to go, but we know that we’re trying to make it better for all people,” Jordan said. “And not that it hasn’t been, but the thing is, the determination and the drive and the effort hadn’t really been the same.”
He continued: “And if you look at the climate right now within America and all over the world, everyone’s making that a focus, to understand some of the pain and frustration that’s been experienced by Black people, Jewish people, a lot of people, to a point where if we’re going to be united, we’re going to have to give everybody an opportunity.”
Jordan, who owns the N.B.A.’s Charlotte Hornets, is the first Black principal owner of a full-time Cup team in the modern era, since Wendell Scott nearly 50 years ago. He is entering NASCAR with the mind-set to be — of course — competitive.
“I don’t want to lose,” he said. “Everybody’s going to look at Michael Jordan getting involved in the sport. But the first thing they’re going to say is that he wants to win, which isn’t false. I want to win, but I want to be given the opportunity to win, and the opportunity to win is to make sure that my driver has all the right equipment.
“It’s going to be up to him ultimately, but if he has it, he has a chance. That’s what I believe.”
Wallace is exchanging one iconic number — the No. 43 Chevrolet for Richard Petty Motorsports — for another in Jordan’s No. 23. He finished second in the 2018 Daytona 500.
“For me, there’s the motto when Jan. 1 hit, when the clock struck midnight — it was no more excuses,” Wallace said, adding, “Everything, just like Michael Jordan said, everything is ultimately up to me. And that’s what I live off of, when it’s in my court and it’s in my control.”
But Jordan said he didn’t “ever want him to feel that he’s alone.”
“It’s all on him, but in actuality, it isn’t,” Jordan said. “We are very, very supportive. We’re going to be there for him when he makes a mistake, when he succeeds. We’re going to go down as a team, and we’re going to win as a team. I can understand his mentality, and that’s good. I used to say that as well.”
Hamlin will be looking to achieve his own history on Sunday in vying for a third consecutive Daytona 500 victory. (Wallace said he was “kind of pulling” for Hamlin, “but it’d be nice to beat him.”)
The idea of forming the team came to Hamlin as he self-quarantined over the past year during the coronavirus pandemic, when he started pondering what his retirement would look like.
“It’d be hard for me to play golf every day,” Hamlin said. “I mean, I’d like to try, but eventually, there’s something else I want to do.”
Hamlin had wanted to be involved in Wallace’s career for a while, earmarking him as a talented driver.
“By starting from scratch, this was the best option for me ultimately,” Hamlin said. “But I couldn’t do it alone. I needed a partner. Me and Michael always talk about racing, so I took a risk and asked the question.”
“I was looking at it from a financial standpoint,” Jordan said, “but when Bubba’s name came up, it made things so much easier because I think, obviously, he was a talented guy who hadn’t had the equipment.”
Wallace recently disclosed that he lost seven pounds because of the stress of his 2020 season. He said the support of corporate sponsors like DoorDash and McDonald’s was crucial in his moving forward. Drivers who are not white often struggle to get financing. “Performance will always be linked to dollars until the revenues reach a greater level,” Hamlin said.
Hamlin, Jordan and Wallace announced the team’s formation in September. Hamlin took the lead in preparing for this weekend. “It’s just checking off the list of an Excel spreadsheet that’s a hundred pages long of all the little things that you have to do,” Hamlin said, adding that teams usually form in March or April to get ready for Daytona. “We did it in four and a half months,” he said.
Jordan said he had watched the Daytona 500 in person a few times and had visited tracks in Talladega, Darlington and Rockingham.
“The one I want to go to, and I got it circled on the schedule, is Bristol, Tennessee,” he said. “That’s where I want to go. I think that’s, to me, it’s more about skill than anything.”
He plans on watching Sunday’s race from a suite to not take any focus away from the drivers.
“They know they got someone they can ask questions of and give a different perspective mentally,” Jordan said. “Physically, I don’t know much about driving a car. I don’t even fit. So I’ve never really been in one, but I am a fan. I studied the game. I understand some of the strategy behind it. ”
Jordan said he texted Wallace and Hamlin “all the time” to learn more and be prepared to draw parallels between his basketball career and their experiences on the racetrack.
“If you don’t have an opportunity to win, it’s so demoralizing,” said Jordan, who faced criticism before winning his first N.B.A. championship in his seventh season. “And it’s like you’re out there just running through the motions. And my competitive juices are always running. And if I don’t have a chance to win, I won’t play that sport. I won’t do anything about it.
“So, I’m all about winning. And if I have a chance to win, I will put the effort, resources, or the support that I need to, to support Denny, to support Bubba, whoever else we may get as a driver, just as long as I know we can win.”
