DAYTONA BEACH, Florida — Michael Jordan now has another ring.
Thanks to the buzzer-beater move, which is amazing over long distances nba final dagger against utah jazz Or cleveland cavaliers, tyler reddick Jordan co-owned and drove his No. 45 Toyota – a three-time Daytona 500 winner denny hamlin – Crashing through traffic as if he was decking Craig Ehlo to stroke the game winner. The biggest game offered in stock car racing is the Daytona 500.
“I’ll be honest: I don’t even know what happened because I was so focused on that moment and I haven’t seen the tape yet,” the 30-year-old said as he pulled up in victory lane for a family hug and a bottle of champagne. “But that’s what I’ve learned from the two bosses I’ve had: When it’s time to win you have to be in position to win it, or think no matter what? You won’t win it!”
The race itself was an almost perfect representation of what the Daytona 500 has become in recent years. A famous speedway and its signature event since 1959, built primarily on the idea of speed, has now become a chess game of saving fuel and tyres. This is not a new approach for the 500, but it has never been widely practiced for so long. This was a philosophy that was used more on short tracks and road routes. Conserving equipment and bodies, scheduling plans were drawn up on laptops in the pits, with the goal of staying in front for as long as possible so that when the “laps to go” counter finally reached single digits the drivers could uncover their plan of attack.
Now, thanks to greater parity between cars and talent, the Great American Race becomes a very intense, short race, with hours deliberately set at speed. A sprint race. And Reddick, having grown up on the same Midwestern dirt tracks that brought us Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart and even Mario Andretti, is a sprint racer by nature.
“You hire a driver like Tyler because he’s a wheelman, and anyone who follows racing already knew that,” said Hamlin, who joined Victory Lane after finishing 31st in his bid for a fourth 500 win. late accident. “Having patience is not easy, especially for race car drivers.”
Reddick took the green flag in the 26th starting position. At the end of the first stage of the race, he was running in 20th place. At the end of the second stage he was in eighth place. When the white flag is shown to indicate one round remaining, chase elliott Led and Redick finished third… or maybe it was fifth… sitting in the middle of a three-wide, 30-deep sandwich. By the end of that lap, with cars passing both in front and behind him, he was suddenly in first place.
He spent only 18 of 200 laps inside the top five and led exactly one lap. the last one.
“Games aren’t won in the first quarter or even the third quarter. They can certainly be lost,” Jordan said before quietly exiting the celebration. “But you can’t create a buzzer-beater if you’re not there for the buzzer.”
This team, 23XI Racing, has been feeling as if it has been in consistent buzzer-beater status for years.
In 2024, Reddick won the regular-season points title, but was not able to carry that success to a Cup Series title. NASCAR Postseason. brought next year A terrifying health scare for their newborn son As a result one kidney had to be removed.
Last November, Hamlin, who was riding for Gibbs Racing as his day job, failed to end his lifelong quest for a championship in a painful manner. In December, He lost his already ill father To be injured in a house fire.
And all this happened while 23XI was in the process of suing NASCAR on antitrust grounds. After all, he Ended up with a deal that tilted in the team’s favorBut not until a lot of hurt feelings and raw emotions were exposed, which largely affected everything else in the NASCAR garage.
So, when NASCAR officials lined up for the traditional congratulations and photos with Daytona 500 winners, it felt like the final period of a chapter in stock car racing history that everyone in the sport was eager to close.
Former legal combatants embraced it. Hamlin, though more composed than usual, was smiling. Reddick ended a 38-race winless streak. His two sons, both healthy, were in Victory Lane to welcome him.
And yes, Jordan made sure to catch a glimpse of Reddick’s Daytona 500 championship ring before leaving. A piece of jewelry so dazzling that the mesh basketball in the buzzer-beater could take its place alongside MJ’s drawer full of bling.
Reddick looked at the ring and felt a lump in his throat.
“We have a lot of people here with us right now who have been wanting to feel good about something for a long time,” he said. “I can’t imagine a better feeling than that.”
