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What you need to know about all 16 Chase drivers
Welcome to the 2016 Chase for the Sprint Cup. Who is going to be the last driver to say he won a Sprint Cup Trophy before the title sponsor departs at the end of the season? Your guess is probably as good as ours, though we’re going to make an attempt at predicting how the Chase will go at the bottom of this post.
The four-round elimination format, now in its third season, is almost impossible to predict because of the randomness it creates. While a driver was able to recover from one or two bad finishes over the course of the Chase from 2004-2013, a win is about the only thing that can repair the damage of a poor race in a round.
Remember, the four lowest-scoring drivers in the first three-race rounds are eliminated, leaving four drivers to race heads up for the championship at Homestead. A race win in a round means automatic advancement to the next round.
So yes, winning is key. But so is the ability to avoid a disastrous finish. 2015 champion Kyle Busch’s average Chase finish was 9.8 and he finished outside the top 20 just once. Kevin Harvick averaged an 8th-place finish on his way to the title in 2014 and also only finished outside the top 20 once.
With those champions’ statistics in mind, we wanted to see how each of the 16 drivers in the field have done getting good finishes throughout the first 26 races of the season. We took a look at each drivers’ top 10s, top 20s and their ability to string together those good finishes. And then, hoping we’ve found a way to predict the Chase somewhat accurately, made our predictions largely based off the data.
Here’s how the Chase field stacks up against one another.
Brad Keselowski
Points: 2012
Wins: 4
Top 10s: 17
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s in 2016: 6
Finishes outside top 20: 2
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s in 2016: 18
While he hasn’t been as fast as the Joe Gibbs Racing cars or had the top-10 excellence that Kevin Harvick has, Keselowski is one of the favorites to advance far in the Chase because of those 18-straight top-20 finishes. Points accumulation is of the utmost importance in the first two rounds, and Keselowski is damn good at that. Plus his team’s willingness to divert from the mainstream fuel and tire strategy over the course of a race is a strength.
Kyle Busch
Points: 2012
Wins: 4
Top 10s: 16
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 4 (twice)
Finishes outside top 20: 7
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 7
As the defending champion and member of the team that’s been the fastest in the Cup Series, Busch is likely a popular title favorite. We’re not as bullish on his chances as others are, namely because of those seven finishes outside the top 20. Two of those finishes have come at Michigan, however, and we all know that track isn’t on the Chase schedule.
Denny Hamlin
Points: 2009
Wins: 3
Top 10s: 15
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 8 (current)
Finishes outside top 20: 4
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 11 (current)
Hamlin’s consistency is even more impressive when you consider he’s sped on pit road about 100 times this year (OK, it’s closer to a dozen). This team has shown the ability to churn out positive finishes week after week and he heads into the Chase as the hottest driver in the Series. He won at Chicago in 2015, too.
Kevin Harvick
Points: 2006
Wins: 2
Top 10s: 21
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 5
Finishes outside top 20: 2
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 16
Harvick’s aiming to be the only driver to get to the final round of the Chase in all three years of the elimination format. We like his chances too, even with a sometimes balky pit crew. Harvick has led the most laps of any non-Toyota driver this season and has the most top-10 finishes to go with a good record of avoiding calamity.
Carl Edwards
Points: 2006
Wins: 2
Top 10s: 15
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 6
Finishes outside top 20: 5
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 9
Edwards has led 742 laps this season. 702 of them came in a three-race stretch this spring when he finished seventh at Texas, won at Bristol and won at Richmond. Edwards has solidly been anywhere from fourth to sixth in the points standings for most of the regular season, so he’s probably not headed for an early Chase exit. We’re just not sure if he’ll get to the final round either.
Martin Truex Jr.
Points: 2006
Wins: 2
Top 10s: 12
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 2 (multiple)
Finishes outside top 20: 4
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 11
Truex has led 1,234 laps, 10 fewer than laps leader Kyle Busch. And while Truex has been excellent all season, we can’t be alone in wondering if and when something disastrous will strike and knock him out of the Chase at an inopportune time. Like when his Kansas dominance was derailed, or when he had a flat tire at Pocono, had issues at both Bristol races, lost out late at Texas … OK you get the point. But there’s reasons for optimism as long as Truex and team are fast and near the front.
Jimmie Johnson
Points: 2006
Wins: 2
Top 10s: 10
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 7
Finishes outside top 20: 8
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 7
A six-time champion playing the role of spoiler? Has this what 2016 has become? We’re never, ever going to count out Johnson and crew chief Chad Knaus, but there isn’t much to be optimistic about when looking at the team’s stats. Johnson’s two wins came early in the season and only three drivers have fewer top-10 finishes than Johnson does. We can see No. 48 getting to the third round. But the fourth is a stretch right now.
Matt Kenseth
Points: 2006
Wins: 2
Top 10s: 11
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 4
Finishes outside top 20: 5
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 5 (twice)
Just stay away from the Team Penske drivers and you’ll be fine, Kenseth. That’s a sarcastic comment that has a lot of truth underneath. Kenseth would be well-served to not worry about how Keselowski ruined his Saturday night at Richmond and also forget about what happened with Joey Logano in 2015.
Joey Logano
Points: 2003
Wins: 1
Top 10s: 18
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 5 (twice)
Finishes outside top 20: 5
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 9
Logano could be the driver that sneaks into the final round of the Chase. His ability to finish inside the top 10 on a regular basis seems incredibly important this year because of his lack of wins. Logano headed into the Chase in 2015 with three wins over the final six races of the regular season. This year he just has one at Michigan.
Kurt Busch
Points: 2003
Wins: 1
Top 10s: 17
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 10
Finishes outside top 20: 5
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 11
We were exceptionally high on Busch’s title chances earlier this year. That optimism has faded as Busch has over the summer. Busch has three top-10 finishes over the past 10 races; he had 14 in the first 16. Some regression to the mean was likely expected – not even Harvick can sustain a top-10 rate like that – but Busch has come falling back a little faster than we anticipated. If he can regain some of the mojo he had earlier in the season, watch out.
Kyle Larson
Points: 2003
Wins: 1
Top 10s: 10
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 3 (current)
Finishes outside top 20: 8
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 10
While Hamlin is the hottest driver entering the Chase, Larson isn’t too far behind. If Truex’s appearance in the final round and Ryan Newman’s race for the title in 2014 are proof that the final four will have a “surprise” driver, Larson seems to be the perfect candidate for that role in 2016.
Chris Buescher
Points: 2003
Wins: 1
Top 10s: 2
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 1
Finishes outside top 20: 20
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 2
It’s a great story that Buescher made the Chase via a strategy play at Pocono in August, but there’s no way he’s making the second round of the Chase unless there’s absolute and utter chaos. Even then, we’re still not sure Buescher would still advance. Buescher has finished in the top half of the field just six times in 2016.
Tony Stewart
Points: 2003
Wins: 1
Top 10s: 7
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 2 (multiple)
Finishes outside top 20: 8
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 5
Stewart is entering the Chase on a run of four-straight bad finishes, the last two of which came via the patented Sheriff Tony Stewart’s Indiana justice system. How the final 10 races of Stewart’s career will go are anyone’s guess. It wouldn’t be surprising to see him out within the first couple rounds because of a lack of speed or to see him at Homestead with a shot a the title like Jeff Gordon a year ago.
Chase Elliott
Points: 2000
Wins: 0
Top 10s: 13
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 6
Finishes outside top 20: 7
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 9
Elliott’s got the best chance of the three winless drivers to make the Chase, though it’s not going to be too terribly surprising if he doesn’t make it out of the first round. Ever since Elliott finished second to Joey Logano at Michigan in June, he’s gotten just two top 10s. One of those was another second-place finish at Michigan. When you take that out of the equation, his finishes entering the Chase average 22.3.
Austin Dillon
Points: 2000
Wins: 0
Top 10s: 10
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 2 (twice)
Finishes outside top 20: 6
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 4
DIllon’s season looks a lot like Ryan Newman’s did in 2014. Newman had 10 top-10 finishes entering that Chase and he too never had a streak of more than two-straight races with top-10 finishes in the regular season. Are we looking at Richard Childress Racing deja vu? For Dillon’s sake, hopefully he doesn’t get caught up in the moment and overdrive like he did at Pocono in August when racing Kyle Larson for the lead.
Jamie McMurray
Points: 2000
Wins: 0
Top 10s: 9
Longest streak of consecutive top 10s: 3
Finishes outside top 20: 5
Longest streak of consecutive top 20s: 9 (current)
McMurray missed out on the second round of the Chase in 2015 thanks to a tiebreaker. He enters this Chase on a roll and could be a surprise advance to the round of eight. But for McMurray to do that, he’s going to need the drivers ahead of him to struggle. McMurray hasn’t been excellent enough to outrace anyone ahead of him straight up.
Drivers eliminated in the first round:
Buescher
McMurray
Dillon
Stewart
Drivers eliminated in second round:
Kenseth
Elliott
Logano
Kyle Busch
Drivers eliminated in third round:
Kurt Busch
Johnson
Edwards
Larson
CHASE WINNER: Hamlin, who has been the most consistent driver from the year’s fastest team, beats Harvick, Keselowski and Truex Jr. for the title.
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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!
