Michael Jordan’s reputation in NASCAR boardrooms is complicated. He refused to sign a charter agreement when everyone else did. He sued the sanctioning body. His team 23XI Racing’s texts during the legal fight were not exactly diplomatic. The arrogance label got attached early and has not fully come off.

Then Corey Heim, the man who won twelve races to take the Truck Series title in 2025 and already has a Cup Series win (Anduril 250) to his name in part-time starts, said something that cuts against all of it.

“If anyone’s gonna be, you know, arrogant in the world, it could be him, but he’s not. He’s just a really good guy,” said Heim in an interview trackside ahead of this weekend’s Brickyard 400 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Heim was not being diplomatic. He talked about Jordan reaching out on bad days, good days, and everything in between. He stated that if you met Jordan without knowing about his legendary NBA career, you would never guess who you were talking to. “He’s such a down-to-earth guy,” Heim said.

That is a particular thing to say about someone whose entry into NASCAR sparked a federal antitrust lawsuit. When NASCAR pushed teams to sign a new charter deal in 2024, thirteen of fifteen signed under pressure. 23XI did not.

Michael Jordan and Front Row Motorsports sued NASCAR directly, and what came out in court was ugly on multiple sides. NASCAR accused Jordan’s camp of trying to “threaten, coerce, and extort” the sport. Texts from 23XI’s side were not flattering either, and the word arrogant got thrown around a lot.

What the lawsuit actually produced was a settlement giving teams permanent charters and a bigger cut of NASCAR’s media money. Whatever you call the approach, it worked for every team owner in the garage, not just Jordan.

Heim lands at 23XI full-time in 2027, taking over the No. 35 Toyota from Riley Herbst and joining Tyler Reddick and Bubba Wallace. He got there through a structured development plan, wherein the team told him to take risks during his part-time starts. He won anyway, at Naval Base Coronado, beating Reddick in a straight fight.

So he has seen the operation from the inside, and his read on Jordan matches what the other drivers say. Wallace describes Michael Jordan as someone who stays in his lane on the car stuff but zeroes in on the mental side. “He’s glass half full. Keep the faith, keep after it because you’re there,” he said in an episode of the Happy Hours podcast with Kevin Harvick.

Wallace also credits Jordan with building the kind of infrastructure that most NASCAR teams do not have, including a dedicated film room where the pit crew breaks down their stops the way basketball teams review game tape.

Reddick has talked about Michael Jordan using trash talk to push him on superspeedways. Denny Hamlin recalled Jordan drawing on his own personal losses during a team meeting to challenge the whole shop, and said he took it as a direct dare.

None of them describe someone coasting on his name. They describe someone who shows up, pays attention, and understands that winning requires pushing people past what they think they can do.

Heim gets a boss who built the most competitive culture in basketball history. For a 23-year-old Cup rookie, that particular perk is pretty hard to argue with.