NASCAR Projections Review: Hellman's 500
First of all, a HUGE congratulations is in order, our guy Stevie took down the $300 live final Q yesterday, punching his ticket to Homestead… he also won a little contest I’m running called the #DFSprintCup Chase Invitational. He puts his money where his mouth is, and creates his lineups right from this package (Ranks, Projections, Practice Notes, Cash/GPP picks). So once again, congrats Stevie!
Talladega is known for being a crazy race, and it fit the bill right from the start. Before the green flag, three of the JGR cars decided to drop to the rear of the field and hang out a few car lengths behind the pack, a strategy move to ensure they wouldn’t get caught up in the “big one”, which ended up paying off (except there was no big one to avoid yesterday). The craziness would continue on lap 39, when Joey Logano left the pit with the jack stuck under his car and it remained there for an entire lap until he got back into the pits to remove it. From there on out, it was actually a pretty tame race, there were a few wrecks, but nothing more than 3 cars, and Logano would recover from his error and win the race.
I mentioned last week how difficult plate races are to predict, mostly due to all of the wrecks, and then on queue there are almost no wrecks. Even with a mostly clean race, the results show just how much variance there is in these races, I’ll try to point some of that out as we go along…
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Finish Potential Grade
Sign number 1 of the high variance at plate tracks, our model did not give out an “A” grade for finish potential, and only handed out 5 “B” grades. Because of the high probability of a wreck, and the ease of passing, there were no clear cut “favorites” to fight for the win and only 5 drivers that the model thought had a really good chance at a top 5 finish. There were 15 “C” grades, meaning 20 total drivers given top-10 finish potential, including the eventual winner, Joey Logano. Brian Scott was the biggest surprise of the top finishers, coming in 2nd place while being given an “F” grade, meaning saw him easily finishing outside of the top 20.
Mover Potential Grade
A little bonus in the Mover Potential review section this week. I included every driver that gained or lost more than 10 positions, 22 total drivers. On the high end we see Brian Scott take the top spot, and as mentioned, this was not something the model projected. But, we did see some big moves from our only two “A” grades, with Ragan and Bowyer picking up 16 and 18 positions respectively. Harvick and Allmendinger also with very strong showings, as pretty heavy DFS favorites yesterday. On the flip side, the front row starters, Truex and Keselowski both ran into trouble and finished at the back of the pack. No real surprises on the back end, as everyone that lost double-digit positions was graded “C” or worse.
Dominator Potential Grade
Dominator points are essentially an oversight at Talladega, though they can go a long way in helping you take down a GPP. However, because of the smaller number of laps, and the fact that fastest laps generally spread throughout the field, they are a lot harder to predict. This race saw 2 main leaders, with Keselowski picking up most of the laps led before falling back, and Logano securing some points late. Keselowski was one of three “A” grades, and had an opportunity to dominate the entire race. Logano had a “C” grade, but with the ability to move up and down in this field, it really was not a surprise to see him at the front.
Overall Projection Results
Overall, I’d say this week’s projections did pretty well if read properly. Talladega is generally about picking based on starting position just as much as picking based on driver, then closing your eyes and hoping everyone stays clean. This weekend, however, the wrecks never happened… but the big swings were still there. With over half of the field either gaining or losing double-digit positions, and the race winner coming from the 16th starting position, it really shows you the value of position differential over everything else at plate tracks. The 6 highest DK scores came from starting positions 16, 25, 32, 24, 26, 22 and would have only cost you $47,900 in salary.
Next week things will be the complete opposite, as the Chase moves on to Martinsville. Instead of ignoring dominator points, we’ll be chasing them with as many roster spots as possible, as they race 500 laps around the shortest track on the NASCAR circuit.