whitt had a hand in determining the 2016 xfinity series champion. late in the ford ecoboost 300, a caution came out. whitt was running eighteenth in tristar motorsports' no. 14 entry and on the lead lap, but the team was out of tires. whitt's crew decided to keep him out, meaning that he would restart first, alongside chase contender daniel suárez. the other three chase contenders were near whitt; elliott sadler was behind suarez while erik jones and justin allgaier were behind whitt. on the restart, whitt was slow on the gas, and while suarez and sadler sped by, jones and allgaier were trapped behind whitt, who eventually fell all the way back to eighteenth in the ten laps remaining. suarez wound up winning the championship. jones harshly criticized whitt after the race, calling the move "disrespectful", while allgaier was more subdued. whitt later apologized for the incident, saying, "it's not like you mean to do it." he also partially blamed jones ramming him on the restart as to why he did not get up to speed.