Dominators (minimum of 2): Denny Hamlin, Christopher Bell, Ryan Blaney, Joey Logano, Ross Chastain
Place Differential: Kyle Busch, Bubba Wallace, Alex Bowman, Austin Cindric, Corey Lajoie, Josh Berry
GPP: Tyler Reddick, Erik Jones, John Hunter Nemechek
NASCAR makes its way to Phoenix raceway this weekend, and they will be debuting the new short track package for 2024. The changes were supposed to help the cars run side by side and make passing easier to do. NASCAR gave us an extra hour of practice this week to test out these updates. Unfortunately, driver feedback has not been positive this week, as many drivers have said it feels no different. We can still use this practice data along with recent track history to make our player pool today. Phoenix is not known for chaos, and the feedback from drivers suggest this should be a calm and tame race. A race like this that may come with such little variance, forces us into eating some chalk on the guys that are obviously the best plays, and trying to just differentiate our last spot or two in GPPs.
The past four races here have seen a driver lead at least 140 laps, so nailing the dominators today is crucial. We typically see 2-3 dominators in this race, so we recommend choosing a minimum of two of our dominator options in your lineups. The top option to lead laps early on is Denny Hamlin. Hamlin will start from the pole and showed good pace in practice. While Hamlin seems to have a good car, he does not appear to have the most dominant ride. However, on a track where it is hard to pass, Hamlin has the clearest path to being our early race dominator. Christopher Bell is the favorite to win the race today, and he is your optimal pairing with Hamlin in cash games, and is a great play in all formats. Bell looks to have the car to beat, ranking 2nd in 5 and 10 lap averages, and 1st in 15, 20, and 25 lap averages. It is also worth noting that Bell was among the group of drivers who participated in the testing at Phoenix back in the winter, and he was reportedly the fastest by a wide margin. Bell offers some PD upside along with the potential to lead a large chunk of this race. The Chevys as a whole do not look as strong this week, but don’t tell that to Ross Chastain. Ross does not appear to have the same speed as the rest of the Chevrolets, as he seems to have a top 5 car this week. This is no surprise though, as Ross has been elite at Phoenix over the past couple years. He had one of the best long run cars in practice and is an intriguing option as a GPP dominator. Our final two top options to dominate this race are teammates Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney. The Penske racing duo is very good here at Phoenix, and they both appear to have great long run cars. Logano looks very strong, as he is just a tick behind Bell in 15 & 20 lap averages. He also had the fastest single lap speed, showcasing the raw speed in his car this week. Blaney was a tad bit slower than Logano in practice, but was still very fast. Blaney also has a 2.5 average finish over the last four races at Phoenix. Both of these guys have a huge ceiling as they provide us with PD upside along with the potential to be a late race dominator.
The aforementioned Bell, Blaney, Chastain and Logano we consider as hybrid place differential and dominators. It’s pretty rare to have 4 guys start that far back with legitimate potential to dominate the race. However they aren’t the safest as they are pretty expensive and don’t have the highest floors. The “safest” PD play today would be KFB, Mr. Kyle Busch. He starts all the way back in 31st today. He didn’t look great off the truck, with speed ranks of 29th, 26th and 14th in the 5,10 and 15 lap speed chart. This isn’t great obviously, but at least it picked up as he went, showing he could be better in the long runs. He is almost a 🔒 in cash games, however as a general rule we don’t usual love paying up for PD in GPPs and that’s what this would be. It can work if you nail the rest of your lines and one or 2 of them dominant cars have problems, just know this is a safe play and not a high reward play. Our favorite true PD play today is Bubba Wallace. As a whole the Toyotas looked to be the dominant cars and we really wouldn’t fault you for looking at any of them, Bubba was arguably one of the best two cars in practice. He didn’t fall below 4th in any speed segment and could easily be seen as a sleeper Dom candidate. It is harder to pass on these track types however when your car is this good, it gets a lot easier. If he stays out of trouble he has the looks of a top 5 car and would almost surely be in the optimal lineup. Alex Bowman is viable as well. He and his teammates are not as strong as usual, but he is in a top tier ride, starts towards the back, and is cheap. We much prefer Wallace, but Bowman is viable as a relatively safe play as well. A few other drivers we like for PD today are Josh Berry, Austin Cindric and Corey Lajoie. These 3 guys are starting in the back and will all be pretty heavily owned. They didn’t look great in practice but all have teammates who did. If they just stay out of trouble they should all be able to move up enough to be solid plays. They have much less risk than Busch as well because of the much cheaper price tags. These 3 are great ways to end a lineup today and match up with your Doms.
If you are feeling really bold today, 3 drivers we like to an extent are Tyler Reddick, Eric Jones, and John Hunter Nemechek. All 3 of these guys had great speed in practice. All 3 are driving Toyotas. Reddick may not be much of a sleeper by name, but isn’t drawing the ownership of some of the guys mentioned above and could be a great dark horse dominator for lineups. The same could be said for Eric Jones. Just be cautious as he is driving for Legacy Motorsports and not the 2 alpha Toyota teams of Gibbs or 23×11 Racing. JHN is Jones’ teammate at Legacy. He starts 19th so isn’t a dom sleeper like the other 2, but had solid top 10-12 speed and starts in 19th. He would be a cheaper GPP flier and nothing more!