Dale Earnhardt Jr. doesn’t need fans to remind him his start to the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season – after missing the second half of 2016 with a concussion – has been less than perfect.

He’s well aware, with his best finish through the first five races 14th at the Camping World 500 two weeks ago. He also finished 16th twice – most recently at the Auto Club 400 on Sunday in California.

Twenty-first in the driver standings, Junior acknowledged Tuesday during his weekly Dale Jr. Download podcast there’s plenty of room for improvement, but that doesn’t include dropping members of his team, as vocal fans have suggested to him on social media.

During the podcast, Earnhardt explained:

“I stay pretty close to what fans are saying – what our supporters are saying on social media – and there’s been a little bit of an unusual amount, I suppose, of concern, considering how we finished in the first several races.

But one of the things that really pisses me off, I guess, is when they talk about the pit crew or my crew or my crew chief. You’ll see a tweet every once in a while where they’re like, ‘Change this. Get a new guy here. Get rid of this guy.’ This is my team, and you’re talking about my family.”

As the No. 88 Chevrolet driver continued to defend his crew, along with co-host Tyler Overstreet, he pointed out no one on his pit crew – which he has worked with for multiple seasons – is slacking. The Cup Series is just extremely competitive.

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When Earnhardt sees his team working diligently throughout the week, he said it’s “a little frustrating” to then have people on the outside jump to conclusions about what changes should be made.

More via the Dale Jr. Download podcast:

“We obviously understand – because we’re living it – that our car needs a little more speed. We’re working hard trying to dig and find our weaknesses and find the speed that we need in the car to get the car driving better. I want everybody to know that we are working pretty hard. We worked hard to this point, and it’s not good enough and we know it.

…

We’re going to work on this together and get it right as a group with who we have.”

Moral of the story: Junior doesn’t take kindly to unsolicited critics.