CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Showcased in the middle of the Carolinas Aviation Museum is the Airbus A320 that in 2009 Capt. Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger successfully landed in the Hudson River.

One-hundred fifty-five lives were saved.

None were lost.

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Chris Trotman/Getty ImagesAn early exit at Kansas left Joey Logano 39th in the race and 20th in the Sprint Cup standings.

Makes the feud between Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin seem kind of small, doesn't it?

So does standing in front of an Air Force war plane surrounded by military personnel promoting the Memorial Day weekend Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

"A tough day at the track is hard," Logano said during the Tuesday event outside the museum. "Nothing compared to what these guys are doing. It does put it in perspective. Compared to what all these military guys are doing, I'm not really doing much at all."

Logano has had a lot of tough days at the track lately. It began March 24 with his last-lap crash with Hamlin at Auto Club Speedway that ended his chance of winning and sidelined his former Joe Gibbs Racing teammate with a compression fracture in his lower back.

It continued two weeks later at Texas. NASCAR confiscated the rear-end housings of his No. 22 car and the No. 2 of Penske Racing teammate Brad Keselowski, then penalized the drivers 25 points each and suspended their crew chief, car chief and lead engineer pending an appeal.

It continued on Sunday at Kansas Speedway. Logano was the innocent bystander in a spinout of another former JGR teammate -- Kyle Busch -- that destroyed his car and left him with a 39th-place finish.

So in four weeks Logano has gone from a potential win at California and move near the top five in points to 20th.

"I'm still very confident and I know my team is very confident and I'm going to lead that team to make sure it stays confident," Logano said as he awaits a May 1 appeal of the penalties. "I don't feel like it is as big of a downswing as it may look on the outside.

"I feel like I'm still right where we need to be, like we were at California, to make sure we can go win."

No, Logano isn't concerned that JGR and Hendrick Motorsports have won seven of the first eight races and have led about 73 percent of the laps.

"They obviously have some great race car drivers, they have great teams," he said of JGR and HMS. "But I don't feel like it's anything we don't have.

"So, yes, the numbers may show one thing, but the way I feel doesn't relate to the numbers."

Logano also isn't worried about whether his issues with Hamlin will continue once Hamlin returns over the next few weeks.

He took the high road when given the chance to respond to a tweet by Hamlin -- "I know Joey felt bad but he doesn't have to keep falling in the points on my count :) #seeyasoon" -- after the Kansas crash.

"Personally, I don't like being in drama and I stay away from drama and I'm not going to get carried into any drama on this situation," Logano said. "I'm going to stay focused on what my task is, and that's winning the race.

"And the rest of it is whatever to me. I'm here to win and put the past in the past."

And keep things in perspective.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Can Denny Hamlin still make the Chase?

Yes.

And it might not be as difficult as it appears.

Hamlin is expected to miss the next five races recovering from a compression fracture in his lower back suffered on a last-lap wreck with former Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Joey Logano on Sunday at Auto Club Speedway.

He had 180 points during that span a year ago, which is a ton for one of only two drivers -- Jimmie Johnson is the other -- to have never missed NASCAR's 10-race playoff. It basically ends any chance he has of automatically qualifying in the top 10.

But earning one of the two wild-card berths, given to the drivers with the most wins inside the top 20, isn't a reach at all.

A year ago, Jamie McMurray was 20th in the standings with 640 points when the Chase was set after 26 races. Hamlin, now 10th in the standings, has 145 points.

Hamlin would need approximately 495 points -- and one or two wins -- over the 16 races before the September Richmond race to be in position for the top 20 under 2012 standards. To do that he would need an average of 30.9 points per race, or an average finish of around 13th.

Throw in bonus points for a few wins in which he leads the most laps for a maximum 48 points and his average finish could be slightly higher.

It's possible. A year ago, Hamlin's average finish was only 14.1 from race 11 to 26. But he won at Bristol and Atlanta and accumulated 499 points, three more than he would have needed to get into the Chase.

If he did the exact same thing a year ago after missing five races, he would have knocked Jeff Gordon out of the final wild-card spot.

Based on what 20th place has done so far this year Hamlin may have even more leeway. Ryan Newman is in the bubble slot with 121 points, an average finish of 24.2. Average that out over 26 races and the total is only 629.

If you need more proof this is possible, 13 of Hamlin's 22 career wins have come at the tracks he'll compete between his likely return at Darlington and Richmond. Four have come at Pocono, where he'll have two opportunities to win.

As wild as it sounds, the Chase remains a realistic goal.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Well, NASCAR, you wanted to reach a broader audience.

So far in 2013, you've done that.

The past few weeks the sport has been all over CNN, MSNBC and even MTV between Danica Patrick setting history at the Daytona 500, the Daytona Nationwide Series crash that left more than 28 injured, little-known Nationwide driver Jeremy Clements being suspended for using a racial slur and the NRA sponsoring a race at Texas Motor Speedway.

Only a few days ago you had CNN host Piers Morgan passionately talking about the sport -- albeit in a not-so-positive way -- in a gun control debate with a Texas politician.

"I'm slightly baffled why you can't have a tobacco company sponsoring this race because, presumably, it's bad for Americans' health -- but you can have the NRA, which is basically funded by gun manufacturers," an outraged Morgan said to Texas State Sen. Dan Patrick.

Speaking of outraged, Denny Hamlin kept the TMZ mood going on Thursday when he lashed out at NASCAR for docking him $25,000 for being critical of the new "Gen-6" car.

It probably won't land on headline news, but it'll draw national attention.

When will it end?

Next thing you know Dale Earnhardt Jr. will be on "The Dr. Oz Show" talking about his detox diet.

In case you missed it, Earnhardt told reporters in Phoenix last weekend that he's down 15 to 20 pounds after a 15-day diet that included prune juice and carrot juice.

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Chris Graythen/NASCAR/Getty ImagesA slimmer Dale Earnhardt Jr. is coming to a track near you.

It apparently was prompted by a "shrinking" firesuit last year.

"That's really what it's about for me is just trying to maintain my weight so I don't have to keep getting my driver suits altered throughout the season," Earnhardt explained. "Last year, I was like, 'Man, they're shrinking, something is wrong with the washer.'

"This offseason I lost a lot of weight … just trying to do a better job of managing my calories and stuff like that. I never really worried about it before. Just eat all kinds of stuff like pizza and wings and stuff every day and not really watching portion controls and stuff like that. Just getting out of control so reining all that back in. Not getting too crazy about it though. I'm no health freak by no means."

That is a relief. The sport may not be able to handle its most popular driver being a health freak around all the other issues.

The good news is all these other issues drowned out much of the debate -- much of that negative, too -- over whether the new Gen-6 car has been a success or failure yet at Daytona and Phoenix.

Hopefully, all will settle down and we'll get a better grip on that this weekend at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, one of the mile and a half tracks.

It's time for the talk to return to the drivers and competition, although NASCAR fining Hamlin for what seemed like harmless comments about the new car and single-file racing at Phoenix probably didn't help any.

Particularly since Hamlin is so mad he nearly begged to be suspended.

The bad news? The drivers and competition likely won't connect to a broader audience like everything else has.

LONG POND, Pa. -- There's something in the water in the Sprint Cup garage.

Babies are turning up left and right. OK, all left since that's the way they turn in this sport with the exception of road courses.

Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Kevin Harvick, Jamie McMurray, Greg Biffle, Ryan Newman, Matt Kenseth and Sam Hornish Jr. all have become fathers in the past few years, several in the past few months.

Now it's Denny Hamlin's turn.

The difference between Hamlin and the rest is they're all married.

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Ethan Miller/Getty ImagesDenny Hamlin and girlfriend Jordan Fish attend the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Champion's Week Awards Ceremony in Las Vegas last December.

"No need to rush into anything," Hamlin said on Friday at Pocono Raceway as he delivered the news that he and girlfriend Jordan Fish are expecting in January.

But we can rush into picking names. If it's a boy, Michael Jordan Hamlin might work since the Joe Gibbs Racing driver is good friends with Charlotte Bobcats owner Michael Jordan.

Or maybe Bubba Hamlin after Hamlin's good golfing buddy and Masters champion Bubba Watson. Or maybe General Lee Hamlin after Watson's "Dukes of Hazzard" car. Or Fed Ex Hamlin after his primary sponsor.

If it's a girl, maybe Butter Hamlin after Hamlin's nightclub in Charlotte. Or Michelle Jordan Hamlin. Or Toyota Hamlin. Or Jordan Jordan Hamlin. Chesterfield Hamlin.

If you have any better suggestions, please send them.

Hamlin admits he'll lean heavily on his parents, Dennis and Mary Lou, who he said were inspirational while raising him.

"My family has done a lot for me to get to this point, obviously, and just all of the sacrifices and all that they've gone through," Hamlin said. "My dad tells me all of the time that some of the best times he had is just carrying me around in his pickup truck every day taking me to work with him and things like that.

"It's going to be a great experience, and so I'm really excited about it and really just excited to be a part of it. For my parents to have grandkids is all going to be good."

Later, he added, "I turned out just fine, other than my head's all turned around at times."

He got that right.

Congrats.

WASHINGTON -- The 45-minute postrace "come to Jesus meeting" that Denny Hamlin and crew chief Mike Ford had a few weeks ago apparently has improved the outlook for last year's Sprint Cup runner-up.

Hamlin said during Wednesday's visit to the White House with five-time defending Cup champion Jimmie Johnson and others from the 2010 Chase class that the communication issues that sparked rumors of a split with Ford have been resolved.

That's not good news for the rest of the Chase field with the 10-race playoff set to begin next weekend in Chicago.

"I think it's great," Hamlin said of his relationship with Ford, with whom he entered the final race a year ago with a 15-point lead over Johnson only to see it turn into a 39-point loss. "Personally, from the inside perspective, me and Mike's communication is getting a lot better."

Hamlin still has some work to do to make the Chase. He ranks 12th in points and holds the second wild-card spot thanks to his win at Michigan, but there are several drivers with a chance to move ahead of him should one of them win Saturday night's regular-season finale at Richmond International Raceway.

Hamlin knows this is no time to relax.

The good news for Hamlin is he's won the past two September races at RIR, which he considers his home track, having grown up in nearby Chesterfield, Va. The better news for the Joe Gibbs Racing driver: Since his meeting with Ford, the team has finished seventh and eighth to stop a string of four finishes of 15th or worse.

Hamlin is so confident that he's talking championship again.

"If we can get in the Chase," Hamlin said, "we've got some good stuff coming in these next few weeks that hopefully will show the hard work we're putting in now."