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The drivers who we think miss out on the playoffs in 2017
Welcome to the last work week without NASCAR until Thanksgiving week. Scary, isn’t it?
Over the next two weeks we’ll have a lot of season preview content here at Yahoo Sports. This week, among other things, we’re going to make our season predictions that are 100 percent guaranteed to be wrong.
Tuesday through Friday we’ll preview four drivers each day who we think will make the Chase … err, playoffs. That means our first installment includes nine drivers who we think miss out on a playoff berth this season. Which of these drivers will make the playoff? Let us know on Twitter or in the comments below.
25. Aric Almirola: 2016 was a disaster for Almirola and Richard Petty Motorsports. And for the first time in his career, Almirola is with a one-car team at RPM. Obviously, the team hopes that the increased resources for one car will help improve upon a season that netted Almirola no top fives and one top 10. In fact, it was the first full season of Almirola’s career where he didn’t get a top five.
Can this team make the playoff? Sure, if Almirola gets a win at Daytona or Talladega. Remember, he made the Chase in 2014 by winning the summer race at Daytona. But while it’s possible there could be some improvement on the horizon, it’s much more likely it’ll be a step rather than a long jump. RPM was already No. 3 on the Ford ladder behind Team Penske and Roush Fenway. The addition of Stewart-Haas means there’s another team above.
24. Paul Menard: Here’s another driver that had a disastrous 2016. Menard had the fewest top-10 finishes of his career since 2009 when he was driving for the now-defunct Yates Racing as the team’s only full-time driver.
Richard Childress Racing changed crew chiefs for Menard during the season and he’ll have Matt Borland as his crew chief for 2017. Borland has had success with Menard’s teammate Ryan Newman at both Team Penske and Stewart-Haas Racing, though we’re going to go out on a limb and say the pairing doesn’t lead to a resurgence for Menard. But the possibility always exists that Menard can top-15 his way into the playoff by simply avoiding terrible finishes.
23. Trevor Bayne: Roush Fenway’s drivers were all next to each other in the standings in 2016 and we’re betting there isn’t much separation between Trevor Bayne and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. again in 2017.
Roush is down to two cars after the departure of Greg Biffle and the leasing of the No. 16’s charter to JTG-Daugherty Racing for Roush driver Chris Buescher. Much like RPM, it’s easy to think that dropping down to two cars will help Roush figure out its performance issues quicker and put Bayne and Stenhouse in a better position to succeed.
It sounds great, but who are Bayne and Stenhouse going to overtake in the standings?
22. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.: If a Roush driver makes the playoff in 2017, our money is on Stenhouse because of the way he performs at Bristol. He and his team have hit on something there and it’s not out of the question to see the No. 17 in victory lane for the first time since Matt Kenseth was driving it.
But the key is to figure out performance at tracks that aren’t named Bristol. His six top-10 finishes in 2016 were the most of his career but he countered that with five DNFs, all due to crashes. NASCAR’s points system is unforgiving and will likely get even more so. If the top teams hog all the segment bonus points, the separation between the great and the not-so-great will get even larger.
21. AJ Allmendinger: Can Allmendinger get a road course win and make the Chase? It’s a question we’ve been asking since the berth of the 16-driver Chase format and Allmendinger is currently shooting 33 percent.
The key for Allmedinger will be to carry over the performance at the end of 2016 into 2017. He finished the season with six-straight top-20 finishes including four top 10s and solidified himself in 19th at the end of the year.
But will the addition of a teammate hinder JTG-Daugherty’s performance in 2017? The team adds a second car with Buescher. And the addition means that double the resources and personnel are needed to field the team. There could be a few growing pains to start the season.
20. Ryan Newman: Is Newman going to get back to the Chase? It’s entirely possible to see him making the Chase and even finishing in the top 10 if he gets back to finishing in the top 15 every week. We’re not optimistic, however, that Newman will ever get back to the heights he saw in 2014 while chasing Kevin Harvick for the title.
Ever since Newman’s team was penalized severely in 2015 for manipulating tire pressure, the No. 31 just hasn’t had the same speed. Newman had 16 top 10 finishes in 2014 and four in five races to start 2015. In the 67 races since the tire penalty, Newman has 21 top 10s.
19. Jamie McMurray: Is McMurray the Alex Smith of NASCAR?
McMurray, 41, has won seven races in his NASCAR career — including the Daytona 500 and Brickyard 400 — made the Chase twice and has finished in the top 20 of the points in 10 of his 14 full-time seasons. Smith, the quarterback of the Kansas City Chiefs, is a former No. 1 draft pick (remember, McMurray burst on the scene with a win while subbing for Sterling Marlin) and his teams have won 10 or more games in a season four times, though not because Smith is a superstar.
Both are good; there aren’t any obvious candidates to replace them in their current roles. But because both are good, they’re stuck in an abyss between being a superstar and being replaceable. And that sometimes leads to underappreciation.
Are we underappreciating McMurray in this column? Possibly. Though it’s going to take an uptick in speed for the No. 1 car for McMurray to be a threat in 2017. After leading 368 laps in 2014, he led 14 in 2015 and none in 2016. Yes. None. That’s got to change.
18. Daniel Suarez: Can Suarez win a race in 2017? Sure. Especially if Joe Gibbs Racing has the speed that it did in 2016. But a lot of people thought Chase Elliott would win a race in 2016. He didn’t, though he made the playoff.
With Carl Edwards at the wheel of the No. 19 car, we’d have no hesitation putting the No. 19 in the top 16. But we’re going to be conservative with a rookie, especially one who is entering just his third full-time season in NASCAR.
It seems like a much better bet for Suarez to make the Chase in 2018. After all, he won three races in 2016 in the Xfinity Series after going winless in 2015.
17. Erik Jones: Can Jones win a race in 2017? Sure. Especially if Furniture Row Racing has the speed that it did in 2016. But a lot of people thought Chase Elliott would win a race in 2016. He didn’t, though he made the playoff.
The repetition above was purposeful. Many of the same questions around Suarez’s competitiveness in 2017 can also be asked of Jones as he enters his first full-season campaign in the Cup Series.
But while Suarez is jumping into an infrastructure that just needed to replace a driver, Jones is on a brand-new team. Much like JTG-Daugherty, Furniture Row is going to find out just what the impacts of a multi-car team are early in the season.
Jones’ experience subbing for three Joe Gibbs Racing drivers earlier in his career should help acclimatize him to the Cup Series. By virtue of his No. 17 standing in our rankings, we view him as the most likely in this group to make the Chase.
Err, playoff. Playoffs. Playoffs.
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Nick Bromberg is the editor of From The Marbles on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at nickbromberg@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
