Cup Series Talladega DFS Picks
- RoundersKyle
- Apr 26
- 3 min read
NASCAR heads to chaos and opportunity this week for racing at Talladega Superspeedway. This is a week to expect unpredictable racing when it comes to what drivers will finish up front. With the Pack racing that goes on at drafting tracks like talladega, the strategy is similar to what we had to start the season at Daytona- stack the drivers starting farther back in your lineups and hope they can miss the wrecks and finish at the front at the end. Place differential will be king as laps led and fastest laps will be spread throughout the field as their won’t be any true “dominators.”
Fades
Zane Smith
Kyle Busch
Joey Logano
Ryan Preece
Austin Dillon
Chris Buescher
Austin Cindric
Josh Berry
With place differential being so important, I do not like picking driving starting at the front as they will have very limited upside in the race compared to drivers starting farther back. The likelihood of any of these drivers getting enough dominator points to make up for drivers that have big place differential potential is almost zero. Dominator points will be spread throughout the field and drivers starting farther back are going to outscore these drivers starting at the front even if they finish a little behind them.
Top Place Differential Plays
Kyle Larson
Brad Keselowski
Chase Elliott
Ross Chastain
Tyler Reddick
Ricky Stenhouse
I expect these drivers to be some of the highest owned drivers on the slate for this weekend. They all have big place differential starting outside the top 20 and should be racing at the front as they are top drivers and teams in the series. Larson and Keselowski start in the low 20s and will be popular plays to move forward and have the name recognition of good plays generally in the series. Elliott and Chastain I expect to be very highly owned as they start in the 30s and are some of the best cars with drivers that are good on superspeedway tracks. They will make their way forward and likely will be some of the top plays if they stay out of trouble. The biggest factor for these drivers is missing the wrecks and if any of these drivers stay out of trouble they have a great shot of ending up in the winning lineup.
Cheap Options
Carson Hocevar
Erik Jones
Noah Gragson
Justin Haley
John Hunter Nemechek
Shane Van Gisbergen
Anthony Alfredo
Since place differential is so important, salary does not mean much for this race and the cheap drivers can end up being some of the highest scoring drivers. Hocevar, Gragson, and Nemechek start in the high 20s so they have a lot of room to move forward. Hocevar and Nemechek have some history of running in the back until the end to miss the wrecks but we have seen that not work at times especially at Talladega. We will have to see what strategy they employ but they are all solid options with 20+ place differential points to gain. Jones, Haley, and SVG have some of the most place differential points to gain this week as they all start back in the back. They should all be popular options and if they stay out of trouble they could end up being some of the highest scores of the weekend. All of these drivers have the potential to run the strategy of running in the back to miss the wrecks, so if we get some big wrecks they could end up being good options as well.
BJ McLeod, Cody Ware, and JJ Yeley are options as well this weekend. They will likely ride in the back to miss the wrecks all race. So if there is a wreckfest and they miss them all, they have the place differential to score a lot of points even if they only finish around the top 15.
Lower Owned Tournament Plays
Todd Gilliland
AJ Allmendinger
Ty Dillon
Riley Herbst
Daniel Suarez
I expect these drivers to be lower owned as a lot of the attention will go to drivers starting at the very back or more of the top drivers. All these guys start mid pack so they still have a good amount of place differential potential, but they will likely be overlooked and lower owned so it will help you differentiate your lineups for large tournaments. If one of these guys gets close to a top 5 they can end up optimal and be a great option this weekend.
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