Rejoice and be glad, NASCAR DFS players. We've hit the golden hour of the 2020 season.
Saturday night's race in Bristol will be the 29th this year. Over the course of the previous 28 races, they've been to every track type at least once, and some tracks have already featured multiple races.
When this happens, we know what to expect going into a race. If a driver runs well at high-banked, concrete tracks, we can expect them to be out front on Saturday night. We've finally got the data to draw those conclusions.
Saturday's race will be the eighth this year in the 750-horsepower package. It'll also be the fourth of the season at a high-banked, concrete track, and it's the fifth if you count the July All-Star Race in Bristol. We're late enough in the season where we have elite data on what to expect at each track type; we've just got to take advantage of it.
The table below has each driver's average running position in the seven races with the high-horsepower package this year. The first race at Bristol is included in the track history section, and the other six high-horsepower races occupy the current-form section. If drivers have run well in those races, we should be high on them entering Saturday. The two Dover races should carry extra importance because they featured banking that is much more representative of what we'll see in Bristol.
The reason for listing the average running position rather than the finish is pretty simple. In this year's spring Bristol race, Chase Elliott ($13,000) led 88 laps and had a fourth-place average running position. He had one of the best cars in the field. You just wouldn't be able to tell that by looking at his 22nd-place finish after he got tangled with Joey Logano ($12,500) while battling for the lead late.
The other numbers listed are each driver's FanDuel salary, odds to win at FanDuel Sportsbook, and starting position. The odds are presented in fractional form, so Brad Keselowski ($13,200) being listed at 6.5 means he is +650 to win.
| Current Form | Track History | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Driver | FD Salary | Win Odds | Starting | Richmond | Dover 2 | Dover 1 | New Hampshire | Martinsville | Phoenix | 2020 Spring | 2019 Fall | 2019 Spring | 2018 Fall | 2018 Spring |
| Brad Keselowski | $13,200 | 6.5 | 1 | 3 | 8 | 6 | 2 | 13 | 6 | 7 | 6 | 6 | 14 | 8 |
| Joey Logano | $12,500 | 10 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 7 | 6 | 2 | 6 | 7 | 20 | 3 | 6 | 8 |
| Martin Truex, Jr. | $11,600 | 19 | 3 | 6 | 7 | 4 | 9 | 8 | 11 | 12 | 7 | 14 | 15 | 31 |
| Kevin Harvick | $13,400 | 6.5 | 4 | 8 | 3 | 8 | 10 | 7 | 3 | 8 | 22 | 24 | 12 | 12 |
| Austin Dillon | $10,000 | 19 | 5 | 6 | 12 | 11 | 17 | 33 | 31 | 14 | 35 | 13 | 13 | 12 |
| Chase Elliott | $13,000 | 7 | 6 | 7 | 39 | 11 | 11 | 5 | 7 | 4 | 4 | 10 | 3 | 32 |
| Denny Hamlin | $13,600 | 4.8 | 7 | 12 | 12 | 3 | 2 | 24 | 24 | 5 | 9 | 11 | 15 | 13 |
| Alex Bowman | $8,900 | 47 | 8 | 8 | 10 | 24 | 17 | 9 | 13 | 28 | 15 | 23 | 14 | 9 |
| Kyle Busch | $12,000 | 6.5 | 9 | 9 | 18 | 8 | 36 | 22 | 6 | 8 | 13 | 7 | 19 | 4 |
| Aric Almirola | $9,000 | 85 | 10 | 9 | 10 | 17 | 7 | 24 | 9 | 8 | 24 | 37 | 14 | 15 |
| Clint Bowyer | $10,700 | 21 | 11 | 11 | 11 | 5 | 11 | 11 | 11 | 13 | 10 | 6 | 5 | 13 |
| Cole Custer | $8,200 | 85 | 12 | 12 | 10 | 14 | 14 | 28 | 14 | 29 | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Kurt Busch | $11,000 | 19 | 13 | 10 | 12 | 39 | 14 | 9 | 14 | 20 | 8 | 9 | 7 | 20 |
| Ryan Blaney | $11,300 | 17 | 14 | 19 | 5 | 14 | 13 | 9 | 31 | 25 | 8 | 3 | 6 | 2 |
| William Byron | $8,800 | 55 | 15 | 19 | 6 | 20 | 10 | 11 | 13 | 14 | 17 | 17 | 22 | 15 |
| Matt DiBenedetto | $9,700 | 47 | 16 | 18 | 12 | 17 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 25 | 5 | 12 | 25 | 21 |
| Tyler Reddick | $7,500 | 85 | 17 | 16 | 16 | 14 | 16 | 13 | 14 | 31 | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Christopher Bell | $8,600 | 75 | 18 | 18 | 23 | 21 | 16 | 28 | 20 | 16 | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Matt Kenseth | $7,000 | 85 | 19 | 13 | 18 | 21 | 24 | 24 | -- | 14 | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Erik Jones | $9,200 | 31 | 20 | 20 | 21 | 16 | 23 | 20 | 15 | 11 | 10 | 20 | 7 | 18 |
| Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. | $7,200 | 130 | 21 | 18 | 37 | 12 | 21 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 17 | 35 | 21 | 11 |
| Ryan Preece | $5,000 | 200 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 23 | 16 | 21 | 23 | 22 | 22 | 28 | -- | -- |
| Chris Buescher | $6,000 | 200 | 23 | 24 | 16 | 17 | 24 | 13 | 22 | 24 | 22 | 11 | 14 | 26 |
| Jimmie Johnson | $9,400 | 26 | 24 | 29 | 11 | 9 | 14 | 6 | 13 | 7 | 24 | 10 | 10 | 7 |
| Ryan Newman | $8,000 | 85 | 25 | 20 | 22 | 19 | 19 | 13 | -- | 20 | 13 | 9 | 16 | 14 |
| Michael McDowell | $5,000 | 200 | 26 | 25 | 25 | 23 | 24 | 14 | 25 | 20 | 31 | 25 | 36 | 29 |
| Bubba Wallace | $6,600 | 200 | 27 | 24 | 20 | 22 | 22 | 12 | 27 | 17 | 17 | 21 | 37 | 13 |
| Ty Dillon | $4,500 | 200 | 28 | 26 | 25 | 21 | 24 | 26 | 21 | 32 | 24 | 13 | 24 | 29 |
| Daniel Suarez | $5,000 | 200 | 29 | 29 | 27 | 29 | 27 | 29 | 27 | 26 | 12 | 12 | 19 | 11 |
| Corey LaJoie | $3,500 | 200 | 30 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 32 | 17 | 24 | 27 | 25 | 27 | 33 | 28 |
| John Hunter Nemechek | $5,500 | 200 | 31 | 28 | 22 | 26 | 24 | 21 | 20 | 16 | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Brennan Poole | $3,500 | 200 | 32 | 32 | 30 | 31 | 29 | 31 | 32 | 30 | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Quin Houff | $3,000 | 200 | 33 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 35 | 36 | 34 | 34 | 35 | 33 | -- | -- |
| Reed Sorenson | $3,000 | 200 | 34 | 35 | 33 | 37 | -- | 35 | 33 | -- | 36 | -- | 31 | 29 |
| James Davison | $3,000 | 200 | 35 | 36 | -- | -- | 32 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Joey Gase | $3,000 | 200 | 36 | 37 | 40 | 37 | 34 | 36 | 32 | 36 | -- | -- | -- | -- |
| Gray Gaulding | $3,000 | 200 | 37 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | 27 | -- | 34 | 38 | 31 |
| Timmy Hill | $3,000 | 200 | 38 | 37 | 35 | 35 | 33 | 37 | 38 | 27 | -- | 34 | 31 | -- |
| Josh Bilicki | $3,000 | 200 | 39 | -- | 33 | 33 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 33 | -- | -- | -- |
| Garrett Smithley | $3,000 | 200 | 40 | -- | 36 | 36 | 33 | 38 | 35 | 33 | -- | -- | -- | -- |
This should make it obvious why Logano is hyper intriguing.
Logano has had a top-seven average running position in all seven races in the high-horsepower package this year. His lone non-top-10 finish was in Bristol due to that incident with Elliott. Both he and Keselowski on the front row rank among the best DFS plays on the slate.
This can also help us see why Bubba Wallace ($6,600) is a tempting low-salaried option. In five career Bristol races, Wallace has three top-17 average running positions, something you'll happily take at his salary. He also starts 27th, giving you place-differential juice from a driver who will help you jam in all the studs you need.
If you want a more wide-picture view of drivers in the high-horsepower package, this Racing Reference fantasy tool link shows what each driver has done in this span. If you click an individual driver's name, you will see what they've done within each individual race. The obvious caveat applies that this focuses just on finishes, but combining that with the table above should give you a good idea of who will have the giddy-up necessary to be a good DFS play on Saturday night.