NASCAR CUP SERIES: CHAMPIONSHIP

October 31, 2023

Joe Gibbs

Press Conference

An Interview with:

THE MODERATOR: Coach, I believe we have a special guest that wants to ask you a question. Rick, can you hear us still?

JOE GIBBS: Not Rick. Taking all of my time, now he wants to get on my part (smiling).

RICK HENDRICK: I have one question, coach. We always text each other, congratulate each other after we win. If I happen to win, are you going to text me and congratulate me Sunday?

JOE GIBBS: I will be forced to. I feel like I need to do that. Yes, I will. The problem is I've been having to text a whole lot more than you have. That's the problem (laughter).

RICK HENDRICK: I just had to mess with you a little bit. I'm proud to be in there with you, brother.

JOE GIBBS: Well, I appreciate you, too. Let's go get it. Let's have a good one.

RICK HENDRICK: Okay, buddy.

THE MODERATOR: Coach, again, thank you so much for spending time with us today. We really appreciate it.

We'll go ahead and take questions from the media.

Q. With you having two drivers eliminated the other day, what is the feeling is in the shop? Do you feel people are deflated or the fact that Christopher is still in it is enough to keep people energized?

JOE GIBBS: I think getting in it is extremely hard. I think that our guys are thrilled that we're in it. We're proud of the fact that we've been in it the years that we have. That's been exciting.

We felt like at Martinsville we gave it everything we had. We felt that Homestead was our problem with the 11 and the 19, everything that happened to us there. We just couldn't overcome it when we got to Martinsville.

I think everybody here, the teams that aren't in, the meeting on Monday is not the happy time for them, it's a downer. But I think overall everybody realizes what an opportunity it is and we got a chance. That's all you can ask for in pro sports. So I think everybody is excited from that standpoint.

Q. A lot of people would probably put Christopher, if they ranked your drivers, as third among the three. What have you seen in him and his team throughout the Playoffs that make you think he can challenge on Sunday?

JOE GIBBS: I think, first of all, Adam, our crew chief, is really something we think. We think he's special. I know Christopher would tell you that. Adam Stevens. He's just been great at directing things. Taking a young guy like Christopher, for us to be in there two years in a row, it's just a huge deal, a huge accomplishment.

I think the thing about Christopher is if you kind of notice what he's been able to do, when he kind of gets to a point where he kind of looks at the latter part of the season, knowing how crucial the races are, it's kind of where he steps up. He did it last year. He did the same thing again this year.

I think there's four very excellent teams in the Playoffs. I don't think many people have a particular favorite. But I think all of 'em are really, really...

When you fight through the year that you have to go through, you think about all you got to do in NASCAR, all you got to accomplish, all the different tracks, the travel, the length of the season I think is a major deal. To go through all that and to wind up being in the Final 4, having a chance, it's just really hard to do.

We appreciate it. Gosh, I think everybody here at JGR is excited about the opportunity.

Q. Coach, you see Denny Hamlin as close as anyone. You are his boss. While no one criticizes Truex for not making it, those who are not on the side of Denny Hamlin, perhaps unfairly, question his focus, concentration and even smarts, do you feel that's unfair? You see Denny in the meetings. Is that unfair?

JOE GIBBS: I can always remember I got a question on Jeff Gordon one time. Why do people boo Jeff Gordon? I said, You got to realize in our sport, what's the most you're going to get of fans? What's the most? What did Dale Earnhardt get? 30%? I don't know. You got a huge group of fans that are going to be pulling against you.

I think that's one of the thrills about our sport. I think you got the drivers are competing with each other. Everybody's got their favorite. You have the manufacturers competing against each other. Then you have the race teams competing against each other.

I think, yeah, popular drivers are only going to get a certain number of fans that are going to cheer for them, then there's going to be some boos in there. That's kind of the world we live in in NASCAR.

I think everybody gets revved up and emotional about it. I think that's one of the great things about our sport. You go into our different racetracks, there's nobody sitting on their hands, they're after it, pulling for their team.

Q. Christopher Bell finished third in 2022, short of Logano. We have these mid young drivers, not the young rookies competing, but a younger batch, then some of the veterans like Truex and Denny will not be in the Championship 4. How do you look at that? How do you look at how they're poised to compete against each other, the competition they'll put on without these veterans that we're used to seeing?

JOE GIBBS: Yeah, I think what happened with this younger group this year, I think it's just something that happened. Certainly we know that many of those veteran guys could have made it.

Let me say this. You go through our Playoff, 10 races, the it's scheduled every three weeks, I think this year it's just the way it worked out.

I know in our case, our two veteran guys, like I said, we had a lot happen to us at Homestead, it kind of got out of our control there, which can happen in our sport. Sometimes the car doesn't obey. It has problems. Certainly that's what happened to us.

But anyway, I just think this happens to be, and I know everybody is writing about it, talking about it, it's a younger group for sure in the Playoffs.

I don't quite know what to make of that, to be truthful.

Q. This is the 10th year of the Championship 4 format. JGR is the only team that has a driver in the Championship 4 every year this has been the format. I know you'd like to have more championships, but what does that accomplishment mean to the team?

JOE GIBBS: I think it is extremely hard. Thank you for bringing that up.

I think our people here, the thing that I kind of hate about our sport in a way, we have all the people here at our complex, and they really don't get to be in winner's circle. What we try to do on the day after we win, before our competition meeting, we put up a banner, we bring everybody in on the floor and we have a chance to have the driver talk to them, the crew chief. Obviously I talk to them.

It's the total team effort. I think everybody that's in this Final 4 or anybody that's racing in NASCAR will tell you that it's extremely hard. I always tell everybody, I was fortunate enough in football to win a Super Bowl the second year. When I came over to NASCAR, it was nine years before we were able to win a championship.

I think that's just an example of how hard it is. I think that's the reason why the fans enjoy it. We appreciate our fans so much. But I think they enjoy knowing how hard it is. I think it's hard to win a race. We see even the best young guys, when they come over, I think the average is somewhere around a hundred races before you can win a race.

I think as fans we appreciate watching something that's really, really hard, and having the people in it make it look easy. I think it's the greatest reality show in the world.

We're just thrilled to be a part of it and love it.

Q. What is your take on the Championship 4 as we've had a decade of it?

JOE GIBBS: I think in general, if you kind of look at whose won championships, who gets into the Final 4, I think it does reward really, really good cars that had a heck of a year. You just can't get there. Our two veteran guys kind of showed how hard it is. There's so much can happen to you.

You take Martin, puncture a tire at Kansas. How does that happen? The issues we had at Homestead. I think it's a lot to overcome. You got to really put together a great year. In particular, in the Playoffs, because you can have one bad race and put yourself in real trouble on any of those three-race segments of our Playoffs.

Q. You've been a beneficiary of what TRD has been able to do with their driver development program, Christopher Bell. To do it as successfully as they have, you can look at Kyle Larson in that manner because they came through the Keith Kunz farm club. You're somebody that understands farm clubs, the development of players. Can you speak to the success they've had in bringing up drivers and being able to plug 'em into organizations such as Joe Gibbs Racing?

JOE GIBBS: I think that's a great point.

I have many times people ask me, How does a young guy wind up getting a chance to race, particularly at the top level of our sport? I think what happens is all those series where young guys start out racing, whether it's the late model world or sometimes it's go-karts. When you see 'em start winning at that level, Toyota has done a great job of trying to look and see who is showing great talent. Sometimes the kids may not have a lot of resources to go with that.

I think Toyota has done a great job of trying to see the young talent, then in many cases helping 'em, supporting 'em, helping 'em whether it's their Truck program, whether it's helping them with late models, whether it's ARCA or Xfinity, as they work their way up. They've just done a great job of that.

Of course, we've been the beneficiary. Christopher is a great example of that. So we appreciate our partnership with Toyota in every way.

I think they do a fantastic job. I know all the manufacturers are looking at young talent. I think they do a good job of scouting. They got talented people that are looking at the young guys and trying to pick out the future stars.

Q. The 19 team, a great regular season, after the struggles the not making the Playoffs last year. How do you assess what the 19 has done? As you look at that team, what do you look at for next year with that group?

JOE GIBBS: I think first of all, great question.

I don't think I've had anything like this happen to our race team since we've been in the sport 31 years. In regular season, you don't luck out in 26 races. You got to really be good.

I felt like that we kind of worked extremely hard, particularly coming back from a year where we don't win a race. We know how good Martin is. We know how good James is, our team. We worked extremely hard. Huge disappointment a year ago.

We made a great effort in the off-season. We came out, started right off the bat. We won with the car. We went 26 weekends. We didn't just win, it was a lopsided win. I think we're over 40 points or something difference. It shows you at that point we really felt like we were in a position to make a great run.

You wind up with things like at Kansas. Never had that happen to us before, puncture a tire. We hit the wall in qualifying I think at Darlington. Kind of made a decision there. We thought we had things fixed and we didn't.

It can happen in pro sports. I've experienced it in the years that I've coached or been over here. But it was really unusual. I don't remember a time like this where we struggled, yet we're as fast as we were, qualified on poles and stuff, yet could not get to the finish line with it.

I think Homestead really hurt us, like I said. We had some issues there, for sure. I think that's the race that cost us. I was standing with the crew chiefs at Martinsville. Both of them said, It wasn't this week, it was last week.

Yeah, I don't think you can really make sense of it in a way because it doesn't make sense. We're all kind of baffled by it, what happened to us this year with the 19.

Q. Doesn't need to be any type of changes with that group?

JOE GIBBS: No. I think the thing about Martin, if you're going to normally have issues and want changes, it would have started last year when we don't win a race. Martin, I tell you, that guy comes every single week, he never second-guesses stuff. He'll be mad during the race, like anybody would be. He's got a temper, all of that plays out.

Honestly, during the weeks after that, some of the toughest things for that guy to have experienced in a race car, he does such a great job of keeping his balance with it. He never really, that I've heard it, second-guesses things.

Q. The pairing of Adam Stevens with Christopher Bell. You had the opportunity to put him with somebody else. What led to the decision to put him with Adam, how that's progressed?

JOE GIBBS: Yeah, I think that's one of the real delicate things in racing because sometimes we have seen in the past where people say this is a dream combination, and it doesn't work out.

Certainly I think the other part of that is, that is a hard thing to keep together: crew chiefs and drivers. What happens to us is you have the extreme highs and the extreme lows. We all know as human beings we have a tough time dealing with those two things.

When you lose races, the natural tendency for all of us is to, It can't be my fault, it's got to be something else. That kind of starts. What's happened with James and Martin, they'll get after each other. You've heard that during races. But they also have a bond there.

I would say Martin, he is as solid as any person you want to ever be around. We've seen him handle some of the worst things that you could kind of have happen to you during a season.

I think it's a tribute to those two guys. I think normally what happens, when that happens, is you start getting the issues that cause crew chiefs and drivers to separate.

If you kind of look at the history, it happens a lot.

Q. To look at the Xfinity Series, John Hunter is going to compete for the championship. Going back to Martinsville, Sammy was a little bit upset about what happened. What was your view of that last restart? Do you think that was heat of the moment of him trying to make the Championship 4 and coming up short?

JOE GIBBS: Yeah, I think a great question.

I would say this. For the last two years, that race at Martinsville in Xfinity has been chaotic at the end. When you think about that, there's everything on the line. You got young guys going for it. Really it was kind of chaos this year, for sure. So much happened.

I would say there were a lot of people that left the racetrack really upset. We saw it play out. It played out on TV and everything else.

You get down to the end, you think about all the things that somebody could have thought of or planned out. But, man, in the heat of battle, everything that was taking place there. It winds up being at the end you don't know how it's going to wind up with who's going to restart in the outside lane, the inside lane. What it does, it can lead to chaos. It has for two years in a row.

I just think there were a lot of decisions that could have been made, weren't made. I think it goes with having a race like that where there's so much on the line, so many young guys going for it. I think a lot of people left the racetrack upset really.

Q. You were asked about the elimination format. We've heard from drivers about how stressful this is, how entertaining it can be. As the team owner, is it the same over the years, how stressful and emotional it is going through this process?

JOE GIBBS: There's so much on the line. I think that's a great question. I go all the way back to when we raced under the other format where it was just year-long, whoever had the most points won.

Really what happened there sometimes is it's pretty much over before even the last race. I think what NASCAR did, which certainly I think increased fan effort and excitement about our Playoffs, certainly it fits with TV and everything else that takes place.

But, man, going three races and realizing four cars are going to be dropped out, it does put a lot of pressure on everybody. It certainly does I know for me. I think at Homestead I was ready to have the big one, you know what I mean (smiling)?

The way it's designed right now, it does add to pressure. I think that the fans really do enjoy it because there is that much pressure. You got three weeks to make it happen.

THE MODERATOR: Coach, a big thank you for spending time with us again. I'm glad you were able to kick off this session with a special visit from Mr. H, as well. We wish you the best of luck this weekend, as well, with Christopher and the team.

JOE GIBBS: We appreciate it. I want to say thanks to DeWalt, Rheem, Interstate Batteries, Yahoo, Sirius and Toyota. I got to get in there. They're all on the 20 car. We're going to take our shot.

I appreciate everybody out there, all the attention and everything that comes from all the people that are on today, just appreciate everybody that covers our sport. Our fans, just a huge deal. We love it here. We're thrilled to be a part of it. I want to say thanks to all of you that make us look so good.

THE MODERATOR: We wish you guys the best of luck this weekend.

JOE GIBBS: Thank you.