Christopher Bell doesn’t ultimately make the decisions but he doesn’t foresee any scenario in which he doesn’t have Denny Hamlin as a teammate at Joe Gibbs Racing next season.
“There’s no way Denny won’t be at JGR,” Bell said when asked about the various rumors about his teammate’s contractual options. “That’s just my opinion. I don’t see that happening.”
Hamlin, who has raced the entirety of his NASCAR career with Gibbs since 2005, is set to be a free agent at the end of the season. It’s been a complicated process due to the sponsorship requirements and how 23XI Racing — the Cup Series team that Hamlin co-owns with Michael Jordan — all ties together.
It also feels like déjà vu given how Gibbs was ultimately unable to come with terms with two-time Cup Series champion Kyle Busch following a similar negotiations process that also included salary demands and considerations over the Kyle Busch Motorsports Truck Series team.
For his part, Hamlin is working towards a deal to remain in the No. 11 car for the immediate future.
“Nothing has changed in the last seven days,” Hamlin said. “I appreciate Christopher saying that and I definitely like being his teammate as well. He’s come into his own and competed for a championship last year and will continue to over the next 15 years.
“I’ve said from the beginning that I like where I’m at and like the relationships we’ve formed over the last 18 years. Hopefully it remains the same.”
The reference to ‘the last seven days’ regarded statement he made over the weekend at Watkins Glen International where he affirmed his desire to stay at Joe Gibbs Racing.
“I intend to for sure,” Hamlin said. “It’s what I want, and I think it’s what Joe wants. There are just a lot of factors that are out of both mine and his hands. Again, if I didn’t own a team, I think this would be done by now, but there are just a lot of different factors that play into it and whether we can get it done or not.
“All you hope is that this late in the season that everyone is putting their best foot forward to compromise and come up with the right deal that’s good for everyone.”
Hamlin was asked about the similarities to the Busch negotiations while in New York and said there are more differences than most people realize.
“I’m not trying to insinuate anything for sure but I think that I’m happy with Joe Gibbs Racing and Joe is happy with me,” Hamlin said in New York. “I think that certainly with the Kyle (Busch) situation last year, Kyle’s ask was his ask. And Joe Gibbs needed sufficient funding on the car to do it.
“From day one, to give you inside baseball, Joe said (to Kyle) ‘I could have zero sponsorship on your car. It doesn’t matter. We want you and this is what we’re going to do.’ It’s different in that sense. It’s easy to draw parallels because you hear I’m saying some things Kyle said and Joe is saying some very similar things but there’s just more factors in play than just us for sure.”
Busch echoed that sentiment on Friday at Daytona.
“I’m not sure what his situation is exactly,” Busch said. “We knew what mine was and it was M&Ms leaving and JGR unfulfilling their obligations to find me a sponsor to keep me in the race car. Fortunately, I’ve been at RCR where there’s been more and more sponsorship obtained, so I’ve been really happy with our front office group.
“So again, I don’t know what Denny’s situation is with 23XI or the things he’s working on.”
The official Gibbs stance remains that the organization is ‘confident’ a deal gets done.
Matt Weaver is a Motorsports Insider for Sportsnaut. Follow him on Twitter.