Denny Hamlin: Kyle Larson 'definitely will beat Max Verstappen in a dirt sprint car race'

Kyle Larson made headlines when he suggested that he might be the best racer in the world and that he could take down F1 driver Max Verstappen.

Others have taken up different sides of that debate. For Denny Hamlin, it’s a multi-faceted discussion. First off, he thinks Larson would more than handle his own against Verstappen in certain circumstances.

“You’re going to be good at whatever you practiced and grew up doing,” Hamlin said on his Actions Detrimental podcast. “So yes, Kyle Larson definitely will beat Max Verstappen in a dirt sprint car race because that’s what Kyle Larson’s been doing for forever. That’s a silly argument.”

The better argument, Hamlin pointed out, is to take a more apples to apples comparison and go from there.

“I guess Kyle probably brought it on himself by saying he was better,” Hamlin said. “Man, those F1 guys are good. I just would temper those expectations. Why don’t we just say that Kyle’s better on ovals and Max is better on road courses. Can we just leave that as a blanket statement?”

Of course, few are happy to leave it at just that. That wouldn’t really be much fun. So the discussion has been ongoing this week in light of Larson’s comments.

For Hamlin, there are a couple F1 drivers that he thinks could make a crossover to NASCAR and compete with Kyle Larson. He pointed out Lewis Hamilton and Daniel Ricciardo as two.

As for the rest, he likened it to arguments about superstars in other sports, like Michael Jordan vs. LeBron James.

“I guess it’s just not a, you can’t compare the two,” Hamlin said. “When they’re trying to compare generational guys and it’s like, right, well at least they played the same sport. They play the same sport, right? And yes, rules change, but like you can compare stats because it’s the same sport.

“They’re not running the same thing we’re running and I just, I mean the F1 guys are elite, elite. So I wouldn’t try to throw shade on any of them because more than likely with any kind of reps, especially on a road course, even if it’s in a stock car, they’re probably going to be f***** pretty damn good.”