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Talladega! After a pretty wild Xfinity race on Saturday, we get the first Cup Series superspeedway race since the season-opening Daytona 500 this Sunday.
The Geico 500 is set to be an exciting race. I assume everyone reading this article watches NASCAR and doesn't just do DFS without watching, but if you fit into the small group that does DFS without watching, WATCH THIS ONE Y'ALL. It's going to be a wild race with a lot of surprise drivers finishing better than they usually would.
Feel free to hit me up on Twitter if you have any NASCAR questions (or, really, any questions about any sport that isn't baseball)" @juscarts.
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NASCAR DFS Research for Geico 500
If you are not familiar, in this article I will highlight some helpful NASCAR data from my deep dive into the Premium Research Station. You can get full access to that Premium DFS Tool, and others including our Lineup Optimizer, with our NASCAR Premium Pass.
Be sure to also check out all of our other weekly NASCAR DFS articles and analysis to help you set your optimal DFS lineups. You can also check out our YouTube video:
Top Fantasy Values At Talladega
Obviously, building a strong DFS lineup requires you to find some strong value, and one thing our Research Station can provide you is the tools needed to find those values.
One way to determine value -- projected fantasy points per $1,000 dollar salary. For DraftKings specifically, this is a race where the projected FP/$ tend to skew towards the bottom part of the race. Here are the ten most expensive drivers on DK with their Value (FP/$):
Only one of those drivers has a projected value over four, which Christopher Bell at 4.43.
Meanwhile, here's just a random sampling of low-priced drivers:
So, what's this all mean?
One thing it definitely doesn't mean is that these drivers are all going to produce this many fantasy points. I don't think it's even possible for the drivers in Sunday's race to all score even close to their projecteds. There's only so many points to go around.
What it means is that there's a flattening of things at Talladega, and cheap drivers from the back of the pack have significantly more upside than they usually would. Will Timmy Hill score 6.23 FP/$? Probably not, but he could this week, which is something you'd never really be able to say.
The thing this really means for me in lineup building: someone from the bottom of the pricing tiers will get a surprise top 10 or 15 finish. We can't really predict who. It makes lineup building more of a crapshoot than usual, but it also means you can afford more top-tier drivers since someone like Quinn Houff is actually playable for the first time since Daytona.
Talladega and Superspeedway Driver Ratings
NASCAR's driver rating formula puts together a lot of factors to spit out a number that rates how a driver performed in a certain race.
The top four priced drivers on DraftKings, for instance, have these driver rating numbers at Talladega and superspeedways:
The takeaway from that? Bowyer feels a little overpriced, right? He doesn't start far enough back for there to be a ton of place differential upside, and his actual performances at plate tracks hasn't been great. (Bowyer's significantly cheaper on FanDuel, by the way. He's playable there.)
Speaking of FanDuel, William Byron is the 14th-highest priced driver and he had a 91.2 average superspeedway driver rating last year. Only three drivers -- Chase Elliott, Kyle Busch, and Joey Logano -- had higher superspeedway driver ratings. Byron feels like a good FanDuel value.
Erik Jones is another driver whose driver rating suggests good value. His overall Talladega averaging rating is 82.6, and only one driver who is cheaper than him on FanDuel has a higher rating at the track. (That driver is Matt Kenseth, by the way. I have complicated feelings about Matt Kenseth. Let's, uhh, just move on for now, because I'm not ready for a "maybe Kenseth is done" talk.)
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Average Running Position At Talladega
Plate tracks often end in chaos, but that doesn't mean your DFS lineup needs to just be chaos.
Picking drivers who consistently run well at Talladega can be a good strategy. It's nearly impossible to predict who'll crash out, but by selecting drivers who tend to run well during races here, you give yourself a chance of picking drivers who'll be up front if they survive the wreckfest that's bound to happen.
The leader in average position at superspeedways since 2012 is Chase Elliott at 10.7. He also is the leader in average position at Talladega over that sample at 10.6. He's also the most expensive driver on both platforms. This all makes perfect sense.
But there are some more interesting drivers further down the price list.
On DraftKings, Jimmie Johnson is 11th in price with an average position at 'Dega of 11.9, which is fifth-best in the series. Johnson didn't run so well here last year, but he's traditionally run well.
Kurt Busch is 13th in pricing with an average running position of 11.4, which is tied for second-highest with Ryan Blaney.
Daniel Suarez has an average running position here of 15th. He's in worse equipment than he was in in the past, but with plate tracks being the great equalizer, could Suarez be a good value driver?
Erik Jones has an average running position of 16th. He's cheap on both platforms and starts 18th. He's incredibly underpriced this week. Put him in some lineups.
NASCAR DFS News and Driver Outlooks
More Fantasy NASCAR Analysis
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