Points Leader Sheldon Creed Leaves Haas for Sam Hunt in a Driver Swap With Dean Thompson

The driver leading the championship is leaving his team, and he says it was not his idea. Sam Hunt Racing announced Saturday that Sheldon Creed, the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series points leader, will drive its No. 26 Toyota from 2027 on a multiyear deal, leaving Haas Factory Team in an effective seat swap with Dean Thompson, NASCAR.com reports.

What exactly was announced at Las Vegas?

A swap, dressed as two separate moves. Creed takes the No. 26 at Sam Hunt Racing, with crew chief Kris Bowen staying for a fifth season, NASCAR.com reports. Thompson, the driver Creed replaces, shifts to Haas, which expands to three cars in 2027.

The odd part is the order of events. Haas had announced Thompson in August as an expansion driver, not as anyone’s replacement, Frontstretch reports. Only on Saturday did the full picture emerge: neither of Haas’s current lead drivers’ futures sat where the standings suggest they should, a reminder that in the second tier of NASCAR’s series ladder, seats follow funding as much as form.

Why is the points leader changing teams?

Because the money did not line up. Creed was unusually honest about it. “I have zero complaints, and I wouldn’t say it was my first choice to move on, but unfortunately, business has to make sense and that overrules results and performance on track sometimes,” he said, via NASCAR.com.

The two sides negotiated through the summer and could not reach an agreement, Frontstretch reports. Creed, who turned 29 last week, framed Sam Hunt as a long-term home, somewhere he could race for 15 years and raise his family if the Cup call never comes. Speaking to Bob Pockrass after Saturday’s race, in comments reported by EssentiallySports, he added the detail fans kept sharing: this deal means a race team will pay him to drive for the first time in his life.

How strange is the timing of Creed’s announcement?

Very. Drivers almost never announce a departure mid-Chase while leading it, in a format our explainer on how the NASCAR playoffs work shows is built to reward exactly the momentum Creed has.

His season is a breakout by any measure: three wins, all of them this year, after 15 career runner-up finishes before his first victory, and an 11-point lead over former champion Justin Allgaier, NASCAR.com reports. The lead was built the modern way, on wins plus the stage points that reward running at the front all afternoon. He finished 13th at Las Vegas on Saturday and kept the lead, with five races left to win a title for a team he has already told he is leaving. Every remaining race now doubles as a farewell tour and an audition. The Las Vegas weekend kept generating garage stories after his race, too: days later, NASCAR warned Cup teams about pit-stall spray leaving white residue over the lines its penalty equipment reads.

What does Sam Hunt Racing gain from signing Creed?

The next step it has been building toward. “Having a guy like Sheldon make a home with us in the Toyota family was the move I needed to make,” owner Sam Hunt said, via NASCAR.com. “It’s the logical next step for our race team.”

Sam Hunt Racing has grown year by year since launching at the end of 2019, and signing a points leader in his prime is a different class of statement from its usual underdog recruiting. The rest of its 2027 driver and sponsor lineup is still to be announced, NASCAR.com adds, which is why this signing reads as the first domino rather than the finished picture, in a garage where the sport’s all-time winners built their legacies by staying put.

What happens next for Creed and Haas?

An awkward, fascinating run-in. Creed stays in the No. 00 through the Chase finale, chasing a championship for Haas while Thompson, his replacement, races against him for the team Creed is joining.

If Creed wins the title, he hands Haas a trophy on his way out and arrives at Sam Hunt as a champion. If the deal sours the final races, Saturday’s honesty about business overruling results will be quoted back at everyone. Either way, the garage now knows something it rarely says out loud: even the points leader was not being paid to drive.

Creed’s move is not the garage’s only personnel fight, just its friendliest. At the Cup level, Joe Gibbs Racing’s $8 million lawsuit against Spire over Chris Gabehart’s move has turned a competition director’s job change into a court case about who owns what an employee knows, and Spire’s owner used a podcast this week to demand his rivals show the proof.