Tyler Reddick was known to be playful, not just on the track but off it. Exhibit, you may ask? He shared a clip of himself building his backdrop setup at home during the COVID-era remote media sessions, plugging away at it like a kid putting together Legos. Another time, a fan challenged him to eat more than 37 honey butter croissants. His response? “I won’t fit in my seat after!” Even his crew chief described him as a bit of a jokester on the radio, especially during caution laps, when stress is lower. However, all of that has changed since the NASCAR playoffs came into the picture. And the switch-up is with his own teammate, Bubba Wallace, as per an insider.

Tyler Reddick punched his ticket into the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs in dramatic fashion despite a rough regular season. After the crash in the Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona and a slip in performance, he still managed to clinch a playoff spot on points, thanks in part to the misfortune of rivals and some solid stage point accumulation. Reddick admitted, “I just screwed up, honestly… the whole wasn’t there and just made a mistake.” Still, there was pride in surviving the chaos. He entered the playoffs seeded 14th, acknowledging that, “We’ve got work to do… we’ve made more mistakes than anything.”

On the other hand, Bubba Wallace, though he hasn’t grabbed a headline during the first three playoff races, has constantly been in the mix, logging enough strong runs to sit just one point above the playoff cut line after Bristol. And after scoring his biggest win of the season at the Brickyard 400, he declared, “I feel like I belong here and want to continue this trend and have the utmost confidence in our team inability and potential to carry this into making a deep run into the playoffs.” So far, all this has worked out for Wallace, but the same cannot be said for his teammate, Tyler Reddick.

Reflecting on the same, Alex Weaver and Steve Letarte didn’t hold back on characterizing the 23XI Racing drivers on the Inside the Race podcast. Alex Weaver went on to say, “So, my opinion on the drivers of 23XI right now, it’s like Bubba and Reddick have switched personalities.” Steve Letarte didn’t hesitate to agree, saying, “It has. Reddick is like Mr. Negative.” And there is a link between his state of mind and his performance.

Reddick’s postseason run so far has been a mixed bag. He kept things strong at Darlington, where he qualified fourth and delivered a runner-up finish, reminding everyone why he was seen as a contender. At Gateway, however, his momentum stalled a bit; despite starting seventh, he could only manage a 16th-place finish, solid but not the breakthrough he needed. The slide continued at Bristol, where Reddick rolled off 14th and faded to 15th by the checkered flag.

After the Bristol elimination race wrapped up the Round of 16, Reddick finds himself on thin ice heading into the Round of 12 in 12th place, just three points below the cut line, and to survive, he needs to pull up his socks in the upcoming races. And now Denny Hamlin has gotten real about Tyler Reddick’s free agency rumor amid 23XI Racing’s charter dispute.

Meanwhile, Bubba Wallace finished sixth at Darlington. He followed that up with an eighth-place showing at Gateway and then struggled with a 34th-place result in Bristol, though that race came with chaos and elimination pressure. Despite the rough outing at Bristol, early top 10 finishes locked in enough points to keep him safely above the cut-off as he advances to the Round of 12.

However, the Toyota family has been absolutely turning heads in the Cup Series playoffs. Speed, consistency, and wins are stacking up for their Camrys. Joe Gibbs Racing drivers Denny Hamlin, Chase Briscoe, and Christopher Bell swept all three races in the Round of 16, with Christopher Bell breaking his 24-race winless streak by winning the Bristol Night Race and putting an exclamation point on JGR’s first-round dominance. At Gateway, Denny Hamlin and Chase Briscoe locked up the two top spots, showing Toyota had both base and depth.

The brand is being widely praised by rivals for how ridiculously fast they have been lately. However, it is no secret that Tyler Reddick has sounded both frustrated and determined after the race and in Daytona. He went on to talk about “time and time again not capitalizing and not taking advantage of strong Toyota Camrys, and how we’re going to have to clean it up and be forced to do that in the middle of the playoffs”—and that is exactly how it’s playing out, with Reddick also sounding off on the Next-Gen car.

However, as there is less chatter about Reddick, Wallace has been very confident about his thoughts on the NASCAR playoff system.

Bubba Wallace sounds off on the potential NASCAR playoff format

As the dust settles on the Round of 16 and the playoffs inch closer to the Round of 12, chatter about a potential shake-up for the 2026 postseason format is growing louder. On a recent Door Bumper Clear, insider Jordan Bianchi floated the idea of a 3-3-4 playoff split, scrapping the current 3-3-3-1 system. Since then, the rumor mill has been in overdrive, but Bubba Wallace isn’t buying into the noise.

During the Bass Pro Shops Night Race, Wallace made his stance crystal clear to Frontstretch. He has no interest in debating formats, and for him, racing comes down to one thing: beating the competition, and that won’t change no matter how NASCAR redraws the postseason.

He said, “You can leave me out of the format talks. If I have a contract and have a car and have a team all this stuff, I’m going to go race whatever it is and try to be the best of that right. I could give two craps about how it is, not dismissing people’s opinions, Of course, at all. I hear all that, but we have a job. This is what we are paid to do, and we’re paid to beat the rest right. And once you do that, you become champion, Cool, doesn’t matter what format it is.”

That said, Wallace did slip in one suggestion; he believes playoff points could carry over through every round. Do you think the No. 23 driver has a point?