There’s no need to troll Denny Hamlin on Twitter, because he says he won’t answer you any more
By Nick Tylwalk
Denny Hamlin claims he won’t be engaging with people who talk smack to him on Twitter going forward.
While not quite as notorious with a quote as fellow Joe Gibbs Racing driver Kyle Busch, NASCAR Cup Series veteran Denny Hamlin can definitely be quick with a quip, especially when he perceives he’s been slighted or wronged in some way. Just don’t expect to see him put that skill to use on Twitter in the future.
Hamlin told the media this week, including ESPN’s Bob Pockrass that he wasn’t going to feed Twitter trolls and had already done a good job not doing so in 2018. A glance through his timeline suggests he’s succeeding, at least for now, which hasn’t always been the case.
Not only that, but Hamlin suggests that other NASCAR drivers do the same.
"And y’all should do the same. I’m making a [plea] right now to every driver, every team owner, every NASCAR executive and every media member — stop replying to people that make nonsense comments.They have 16 followers. Don’t give them your 100,000 as their stage. No one will ever see their comment."
He’s not wrong. Not every Twitter troll is looking to get themselves over, in pro wrestling parlance, with the help of a driver’s big following. Some people really just want to rant directly at the athlete, one of the curses that comes with social media. However, there definitely are negative Twitter commenters trying to make names for themselves or otherwise make a famous person look bad by dragging them into the muck.
Next: NASCAR won't use All-Star Race rules package again until 2019
For Hamlin and other NASCAR personalities, it’s simply not worth it. There are other ways to handle trolls as well (those mute and block options work awfully well), none of which are necessarily one size fits all approaches. But Hamlin is definitely onto something here, and if he can keep it up even when things aren’t going well for his team somewhere down the road, it’ll be an impressive accomplishment for someone whose first instinct is probably just the opposite.