The Baby Won't Get Thrown Out with the Bathwater

Previewing the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs with Ark Fantasy's Noah Lombardozzi

Photo by Chase McBride on Unsplash

I’ve found over my years of following Formula One that the most difficult part of being a fan is not living in Europe. Even as the sport has made a conscious effort to tap into the American market (there are three races in America on the calendar now), the fact is the sport’s beating heart—despite the Aramco advertisements lining each track—is still very much in Europe. More races take place in Europe than on any other continent, and the sport’s European roots means almost all of the must-watch races take place there. That’s not to say races outside of Europe aren’t worth watching. The Japanese Grand Prix is a perennial favorite amongst fans and drivers, offering proof that Formula One can thrive outside Europe. However, if you had to pick and choose only a handful of races to watch each season, chances are almost all of them will be in Europe. For a fan living outside Europe (and in America specifically), this reality presents a logistical headache. Weekends are for sleeping in, not waking up in time to catch a 6 am race start. The time zone hurdle also makes it hard to introduce new people to Formula One. It’s much harder to convince someone to watch the Belgian Grand Prix when you have to tell them it means they’ll have to rise and shine before the sun does. 

The pervasion of the internet and social media into our lives only magnifies this headache. Before both became cornerstones of our lives, you could record a 6 am race and watch it later on your own time while still feeling like you were watching a live race. Now, recording a 6 am race means you also have to commit to not going on the internet at all before you watch the race lest you have it all spoiled for you in a matter of seconds. 

Fortunately, there is much more to motorsport than Formula One, meaning people who want to get into racing have options to choose from that don’t involve getting up at the crack of dawn. This brings us to the topic of today’s post. 

NASCAR being an American series means there’s no concern about waking up early on a weekend. It’s not the only American motorsport series, but it caught my attention because the NASCAR Cup Series has a concept that will be very familiar to fans of most other sports but completely foreign to those who follow Formula One: playoffs. As this weekend marks the beginning of this season’s playoffs, I thought it’d be worth taking a closer look. 

That being said, I won’t be doing the explaining. Me trying to explain NASCAR is like having your omakase made by someone who appeared on Worst Cooks in America. There’s no rule saying you can’t, but why would you ever want that for yourself? 

That’s why I’m so thrilled to introduce Noah Lombardozzi, creator of Ark Fantasy. Noah writes about Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS), and his intelligent, thoughtful coverage of NASCAR DFS (as well as his series on modeling Formula One) makes him the perfect person to have on Omakase Formula. I’m so glad he agreed to collaborate with me when I reached out, and so grateful he patiently put up with me even after I showed just how little I knew about NASCAR by falsely assuming only cars that qualified compete in the playoffs. 

I bet you’re glad I’m not the one explaining NASCAR to you now, right?

Join Noah and I over the course of this season’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs as we recap the action after each round. But before we do that, here’s an introduction to Noah and a look at what to expect from the Round of 16 that starts later today in Atlanta:

I'd love to start with some background on yourself! How did you get into DFS (and could you explain what it is for people who might not know)? 

Sure! Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS) are short-term fantasy contests, often played alongside thousands of competitors. Fantasy contests—assembling a roster of real-life players and stacking up "fantasy points" based on their real-life performance—are an old phenomenon. Often, these contests were played out over the course of a professional sports league's season. But in recent years, contests over a single slate (think an afternoon of football games or an evening of basketball games) have become extremely popular. DFS contestants are given a set amount of "salary" to roster real-life players with. Each player is assigned a cost by the contest provider. Contests can range from a "head-to-head" played against a single opponent to "tournaments" with hundreds of thousands of entries. As the format became more popular, the number of available sports increased. For example - NASCAR fans can now pick a roster of drivers, set that roster against thousands of others, and compete for cash prizes. 

I got into DFS about five years ago. I love the game theory involved, the challenge of trying to best hundreds or thousands of competitors. And I believe that learning to forecast an event is one of the best ways to grow your love for a sport. It forces you to think about the fundamental nature of the game, how all of the pieces fit together, and how your own assumptions blind you to what's really happening on the field (or track). Add that to the ever-changing landscape of any professional sport, and there's always something new to learn and think about!

How did you get into NASCAR specifically?

NASCAR first piqued my interest during the pandemic. It was one of the first sports to return to action after the early months of 2020. My family and I bond over sports, and figured NASCAR was better than nothing! As time marched along, and other sports made their way back to the airwaves, the breadth of strategies, driving techniques, and track types kept me coming back each weekend. And it's stuck ever since!

Why does NASCAR do playoffs?

The short answer is viewership. The thesis is that folks will tune in if you create high drama. One of the easiest ways to create that drama is forcing "win or go home" situations. Formula One fans might appreciate how easy it is to put a championship fight to bed halfway through the season without an elimination-style tournament.

So how does qualifying for the playoffs work?

Teams qualify for the playoffs in two ways: by winning a race during the regular season (26 races), or by accruing sufficient points during the regular season. NASCAR allows 16 teams to compete for the title each year. Usually, the bulk of those spots go to teams that made it to victory lane during the regular season. The remainder go to the teams with the most accrued points. Winning a single race doesn't shut down a team's regular season campaign - the seeding is determined by regular season performance.

The win-and-in part of qualification is what I find most fascinating. Why is it included?

The format makes a kind of intuitive sense, especially when you consider that there'll almost always be fewer than 16 race winners in a given year. We got close this year, with 15, but Austin Dillon's win didn't qualify him for the playoffs due to its controversial nature. Winning a race is a big deal—it's the fundamental goal week in and week out. So there's sense to rewarding the accomplishment. Chris Buescher came about as close as physically possible to a win earlier this year—but the fact that he got sniped at the finish line closes him out from championship contention.

The format also helps create underdog storylines. Chase Briscoe, for example, hasn't shown up on anyone's radar as a championship threat. But if he can survive the first couple of playoff rounds, he gains a real shot at the big prize. Not a good shot, but a real one.

On the topic of Austin Dillon’s controversial win at the Cook Out 400: it felt almost inevitable someone would interpret the rules in a Machiavellian way. What does the aftermath of that entire situation say about the future of the win-and-in rule, if it does say anything at all?

The Austin Dillon situation—a driver deliberately wrecking multiple cars in order to cross the line first—was 100% inevitable. A single win would have saved Dillon's playoff campaign, and so when a win was on offer, he did what he had to do to go get it. However, I don't think the Richmond race will result in any major changes to the rule. Some provisions might get added to make stripping the playoff-qualifying effect of a win easier, or other minor ameliorations (like requiring a driver to finish in the top 30 in the regular season standings) might crop up. But wins matter in NASCAR for far more reasons than the playoffs. Drivers will always have a reason to throw proverbial elbows. So reworking the whole format probably doesn't get you what you want, and it kills the amazing moments it generates, like Kyle Busch and Chase Briscoe dueling for a spot in the regular season finale. I think the baby won't get thrown out with the bathwater here.

What’s the format of the playoffs?

Four rounds to determine the winner. The first three rounds consist of three races each. The championship round is a single race, the final race of a given season. Drivers accrue points based on their performance during the playoff races. Winning one of the three races punches an automatic ticket to the next round. At the end of each of the first three rounds, the four drivers with the fewest points accrued during the round are eliminated from the playoffs. Thus, after three rounds, we're left with four teams. Those four contest the championship in the final race.

One big wrinkle: drivers can bank points for use in the playoffs during the course of the regular season. These special points are known as "playoff points" and are scored primarily by winning regular season races (5 points). Drivers can also accrue playoff points by winning individual stages of a race. A stage, if you're unfamiliar, is a smaller slice of a race. Races typically have three stages, and leading the pack at the end of the first stage (which usually consists of the first quarter of the total laps) is worth a single playoff point. Ditto for leading the second stage. Regular season standings also affect playoff point totals. The regular season champion, for example, claims a whopping fifteen playoff points.

As noted above, playoff points affect the course of the playoff rounds. During each of the first three rounds, a drivers' playoff point totals are "added" to the points they accrue during the round. The points don't come into play during the championship race, but they have a massive effect on individual playoff rounds. Additionally, playoff points scored during the actual playoffs (by, say, winning a race) also count towards a driver's total.

What are the differences between regular season and playoff racing? What are the main incentives/motivators for drivers who haven't qualified for playoffs during playoff races?

In most respects, the races are the same. Everyone always wants to win, and the playoffs don't change that. There’s prize money considerations, for one thing. For another, sponsors pay teams to get eyeballs on their logo. Strong performances typically get more eyeballs. Even if the financials didn't come into the equation, I'm pretty confident the whole field would always gun for P1. Performance at the Cup Series level requires a hefty amount of competitive drive, drive that I'm sure stops most pilots from throwing in the towel.

The one change I think you see in playoff racing is the increased level of "respect" shown to playoff cars. It's bad form to upend someone's playoff run when you're not eligible to hoist the big trophy at the end of the year. That respect shows up in the little things—not bumping a driver when you otherwise might, backing off of a risky move, etc. But the majority of the field isn't in the playoffs, so the basically chaotic nature of each race is unchanged.

Looking ahead to the Round of 16: what are important things to look out for in terms of the tracks themselves?  

The biggest variable right now is the opening race at Atlanta. Atlanta is likely to be chaotic, and it's very possible a non-playoff driver wins the race. The middle of the playoff pack is likely anxious about this weekend because racing at drafting tracks (where cars tend to stay packed together during the entire race) is known for big wrecks. If you don't have a lot of playoff points to pad your total, the prospect of finishing in the bottom five is chilling. And there's only so much you can do to mitigate that risk at a track like Atlanta.

Which drivers might surprise this round in a good way?

I think there's a very good chance Joey Logano begins a real championship run here in the first round. His results have been mixed lately, with a significant number of poor finishes. But finishes can be a poor indicator of underlying performance. He's had a lot of speed here in the back part of the year. It's wouldn't surprise me at all if he begins converting that speed into high-up finishes at the right time.

Which drivers might surprise this round in a bad way?

Most of the top drivers are in good shape for this first round. But William Byron had a long stretch this year where he really didn't look like the elite driver he is. It's entirely possible bad luck bites him at Atlanta, and he can't get himself a decent finish at Watkin's Glen or Bristol. He's got enough playoff points that the above scenario probably still wouldn't end his run. But he could be a lot closer to the cutline than his pedigree would suggest is likely.

Chase Elliot had a very strong regular season, but is in pretty poor shape in terms of playoff points. If multiple drivers near the bottom of the playoff pack (Harrison Burton, Ty Gibbs, etc.) excel in the first three rounds, underperformance from Elliot could seriously threaten to prematurely end his playoff run. I don't think Elliot is particularly likely to struggle in the first round, he's just the most exposed to negative variance.

Be sure to check back in with Noah and I over the next few months as we recap every round of playoffs, and don’t forget to subscribe to Ark Fantasy! You can check it out here or in my list of recommendations on the Omakase Formula homepage.