Michael Jordan might win a Nascar championship—while he’s suing the sport

livemint.com:

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. An entire generation of NBA players found out the hard way that when Michael Jordan wants something, he usually gets it. Now, another sport is learning the same lesson: Nascar.

This weekend in Phoenix, a racing team owned by the NBA legend will be gunning for a Nascar Cup Series championship, which would give Jordan yet another major title. But that’s just the start of his pursuit to shake up this insular sport, which has been run by the same family since 1948. While his driver chases a title on the track, Jordan is also suing Nascar and its chairman Jim France in a bid to topple what he views as an unfair, anticompetitive business model.

“The France family and Nascar are monopolistic bullies," Jordan’s team, 23XI Racing, alleged in an antitrust lawsuit filed alongside another team in federal court last month. “And bullies will continue to impose their will to hurt others until their targets stand up and refuse to be victims." The lawsuit escalates a bitter dispute with the series over revenue-sharing. Jordan’s team says Nascar has abused its position as the country’s leading stock-car racing series to impose terms that make it economically impossible for some teams to operate.

Jordan’s outfit, co-owned by driver Denny Hamlin, is joined in the suit by another Nascar team, Front Row Motorsports. In a court filing, Nascar’s lawyers called the suit “meritless." “Everyone knows that I have always been a fierce competitor, and that will to win is what drives me and the entire 23XI team each and every week out on the track," Jordan said. “I love the sport of racing and the passion of our fans, but the way NASCAR is run today is unfair to teams, drivers, sponsors and fans." The racing teams’