Joey Logano loves the Playoffs, and the now-three-time NASCAR Cup Series champion isn’t bashful about it, either.
The Middletown, Connecticut-native hoisted the Bill France Cup following Sunday’s event at Phoenix Raceway, beating out his Team Penske teammate, Ryan Blaney, for the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series championship.
In doing so, Logano joined an elite list of 10 drivers who have captured three (or more) NASCAR Cup Series championships throughout their career — the most recent addition was Tony Stewart (2011).
Once the checkered flag dropped, several people within the NASCAR universe were not satisfied with this season’s champion and didn’t believe that Logano and the Team Penske No. 22 team deserved the accolade.
NEWS FLASH: Joey Logano doesn’t care.
“I’ve got nothing to say to them,” Logano said. “I’ve got a pretty sweet trophy right now. I’ll be laughing all the way to the bank.”
Logano finished the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series campaign with four points-paying victories, seven top-five finishes, and 13 top-10s. His average finish of 17.1 is the worst for a champion all-time.
In a season-long points system, Logano would be ranked 12th-place. But, that’s not the points system being utilized in the NASCAR Cup Series anymore. In fact, NASCAR hasn’t used a full-season points format in the Cup Series in more than two decades.
“The only reason why they don’t say this about other sports is because they didn’t change the playoff system,” Logano exclaimed. “But, the playoff system in other sports is not much different than what this is. You can have a great regular season. It seeds you better for the Playoffs. That doesn’t mean you’re guaranteed to go all the way to the Super Bowl, the Stanley Cup Finals, or the NBA Finals. It doesn’t matter.”
“It might help you. It’s the same way in NASCAR, the way we have the rules now, is that you set yourself up much better. You look at the way we came into the playoffs versus [Larson], [Reddick], those guys that scored 15 playoff points for winning the regular season championship. That’s three wins worth of points in three races. That’s hard to make up that amount of points. They have the same opportunity to go out there and win and move on to the next round.”
To Logano’s point, a four-win season isn’t shabby, at all. But, three of those victories came at important moments in the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs. Nashville got him into the Playoffs, Atlanta got him into the Round of 12, Las Vegas secured his spot in the Championship 4, and Sunday at Phoenix won him the title.
“For someone to say this isn’t real, it’s a bunch of bullshit in my opinion,” Logano said. “That’s wrong. This is something everyone knows the rules when the season starts. We figured out how to do it the best and figured out how to win. It’s what our team has been able to do for the last three years.”
“I don’t like people talking that way because if the rules were the old way, we would play it out differently, wouldn’t we? I just think that’s just a bunch of hearsay back there and people that just got to accept what the times are. Times change, right?”
So, to put it lightly… Joey Logano doesn’t give a damn what you think about him winning the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series title, because at the end of the day, there’s nothing you can do to take the trophy away from him.
