Hello everyone and welcome to the first Sway Bar article of the 2020 NASCAR season! This season I will be taking over the Sway Bar article and putting a couple of spins on it. I will be focusing largely on the RS and how to manipulate it to find our top plays. Hope you enjoy it! You can find me in Slack any day of the week, or on Twitter @AUFan30 if you have any questions!
Nilly’s Driver Tools
Our first race of the season is at Daytona International Speedway. This race features 200 laps and not a big need for dominators. If we head over to NillyJay’s “Driver Tools” page, select race calc at the bottom tab, we see that we only need 0 – 1 dominators. We also see how many points are offered in total throughout the race for each section. For example, if a driver led every lap in a race here, they would score 50 points from laps led. Dominator points on DK are calculated by simply adding laps led with fastest laps. This is always the first tab I look at when constructing my lineups.
DKAvgByStart
The next tab I always look at is the “DKAvgByStart” tab on the RS. This is located on the bottom tabs when you open the RS. Doing this shows us 3 tabs I love to look at for every race. If we look to the right side of the screen, we see “Averages By 5 Starting Positions” for Studs, Mid-Tier, and Scrubs. These are the sections I believe hide a huge key that can give us some leverage on the field at Daytona in particular.
When we look at our Studs tab, we see studs starting 26 – 30 or 31 – 35 usually smash their price tags. This is largely due to them not being able to move up to the front very quickly here and being able to avoid any early wrecks that may happen. We also notice the drivers that many will consider a fade this week, those starting 1 – 5, score 40 Fpts or more 30% of the time. This is a good stat we can look to target in GPP’s, but keep in mind the race calculator telling us to use no more than 1 dominator this week!
When we look at the Mid-Tier drivers’ section, we see once again that our highest scorers are from the back of the pack. However, we must take note of the drivers starting 11 – 15, as they score 50+ 23% of the time and may go under-owned due to starting position.
And finally, we will look at our Scrubs section. Again, we should take note that we want to get more of the guys starting from the back here. One thing that really sticks out to me, and note that this is a very small sample size, is how low scrubs score the further to the front they start. We should probably just focus on the guys starting 31 – 35 and 36 – 40 for this race.
I will then head over to the “Tracks” tab on the RS and see what area of drivers we should target. When we look at Daytona International Speedway, we notice a couple of things. 1) This ranks as one of the worst tracks for front end drivers, in particular pole sitters. 2) This track ranks as the best for drivers starting 30th+. This further supports our “Bottom heavy” lineup construction, which is also listed on NillyJay’s race calculator.
TrackTypes
One last tab I always look at is the “TrackTypes” tab on the RS. This tab shows us which tracks each driver is good at, in particular, what their driver rating is versus what the field’s driver rating is. Daytona is a “restrictor” track, so we should focus on that section for this race. When doing this, we see that our scrubs really pop on the “Vs Avg” section, but we also notice just how dominant Ricky Stenhouse Jr is on these tracks. We also notice drivers like Bowman, Almirola, Logano, and Blaney being very good drivers on this track type. We also notice the opposite side here, in particular, that JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing), the team consisting of Kyle Busch, Martin Truex Jr, Denny Hamlin, and Erik Jones are not particularly great on restrictor tracks. This is largely due to how restrictor races work. Restrictor races rely on drafting partners, and during this race, we will see 3 lines form for each manufacturer. JGR drives Toyotas and they are vastly outnumbered by the Chevy’s and Ford’s. This gives them a significant disadvantage.
DraftKings
I will now look at the main page on the RS, the “DraftKings” tab. Here we will see our projections and track history, among other stats.
When we look at our 2019 SuperSpeedway Stats, we see much of the same drivers we noticed from our “TrackTypes” section, Logano, Blaney, Byron, Stenhouse to name a few. Let’s keep note of them.
Normally, one of my key sections when looking at this tab is the practice speeds. However, this week most cars will be drafted with each other and maintain similar speeds, so this section is not very important.
Finally, I will look at the projections section and make sure the guys I’ve already taken note of are popping highly on this section as well. I will then compare my guys, the projections, and go check the projected ownerships to see if I can gain any leverage on any drivers this week. Projected ownerships can be found under the “Projections” section on the “DraftKings” tab of the RS, or on the Domination Station itself.
Top Studs
- Ryan Blaney $9,300: Blaney has popped on a lot of our checklists, and starting 27th, which we know is one of the top-scoring positions from our Averages by 5 Starting Positions (Studs) tab, just sweetens the deal here. He is sure to be mega chalk and for good reason. As long as Blaney avoids the wrecks, he should be a lock for a top 15 finish and 40+ points.
- Kyle Busch $9,800: We won’t see Kyle Busch this cheap again very soon, so we should look to jump on it when given the chance. Starting 28th, and though his track-type history isn’t very strong here, that’s largely due to him making his way to the front so quickly that he ends up getting caught in the big wreck. If he avoids the wreck, he’s a lock for a top 10 and 45+ points. However, I am not opposed to going underweight with him given his history with restrictor-plate races and near 50% ownership projection.
- Chase Elliott $10,000: Chase has had a tough run of luck at Superspeedways, but he doesn’t start this far back often either. His average position last season at Daytona was 11th. If he finishes 11th for us, not counting any lead laps or fast laps, that’s 47 DK Fpts. I love getting some Elliott exposure this week.
Top Mid-Tier Plays
- Clint Bowyer $8,600: Bowyer gets the benefit of being able to draft with his SHR teammates and has had several top 10 finishes here. It has been a few years since he’s had one, but starting 29th gives us immense upside if he gets one this week.
- Brendan Gaughan $7,200: Not an amazing driver and not a great car. But Gaughan is starting next to last and has superspeedway experience. The floor is solid here and he should be good for 25+ fantasy points. Great salary savings option this week.
- Michael McDowell $5,900: When we look at our Track Types tab, we see that McDowell is actually 25% better on this track type than the other tracks we’ll visit this season. This is largely due to where he normally starts, and as we already know, the further back the better. McDowell is starting 26th and has a career-best 4th place finish here. But what really stands out to me is that he finishes in the top 20 here often. If he just finishes 20th, that’s good for 30 DK fpts, and at his price that may be good enough for him to be in the nuts.
Top Pivots
This section will feature drivers I believe will be under-owned and have high ceilings. I will be looking at these guys for GPP purposes only.
- Kurt Busch $9,100: Kurt Busch should have won the last Daytona race, but due to NASCAR not signaling a weather delay until after he pulled in to pit for tires, he settled for 10th. Regardless, Busch is very good on restrictor-plate tracks. Drivers starting 16 – 20 historically don’t do too well, but Kurt can be an anomaly here. If things go his way, Kurt could give us a top 10 which would be good for 42 DK Fpts.
- Christopher Bell $6,700: The rookie Bell was extremely dominant in Xfinity, so we know what he is capable of here. Not excited about the starting spot, 17th to be exact, but if he gets in the right drafting line, he has the potential for a top 10. I will exercise immense caution here, as this is his first full-time Cup race, but at a 7% ownership projection, I am more than willing to gamble with the kid to smash his price tag. He gives us a driver to potentially be unique in lineups.
- Kevin Harvick $9,700: It’s been a while since we’ve seen Harvick finish high at Daytona, 4th in 2016 here, but we get Harvick at a 10% ownership projection and below $10k this week? Sign me up. It will be hard for Harvick to be the top scorer on the slate, but the upside is there if he can pull off a win. Ford’s are very good at restrictor races and Harvick should lead the drafting line. The lead driver is the riskiest to roster, but if he can avoid carnage, he has a legitimate shot at winning this race. Just finishing 4th would give us 46 DK fpts, but if he gets to 4th, he’ll surely add some fast laps and potentially lead laps as well.
Again, these guys are for GPP purposes only and I wouldn’t look to go crazy on them. They are strictly guys I believe have high ceilings and should be very under-owned.
That’ll do it for this week’s The Sway Bar! If you enjoyed, please give me a follow on Twitter @AUFan30, or let me know in Slack! If you know of anyone interested in joining the DFS Army, be sure to tell them to use my link https://wp.dfsarmy.com/ref/99/ and use code “AU30” at checkout for 20% their monthly VIP/BTB membership! Can’t wait to see those helmets crushing tournaments this week!