With Dover being a 1-mile race track, you’d think that most of the top finishers would also start there. However, that hasn’t been the case here recently. When you analyze the last four races at this track, 60% of the top 10 finishers started 11th or worse, and the two Dover winners last season came from 15th- and 14th-place starting spots. One of those was Kevin Harvick, who started 15th in last year’s fall race but still led 355 of the 400 laps (88.8%) in a dominating effort. So while there is some great Fantasy NASCAR picks that will be starting up front in the AAA 400 Drive for Autism on Sunday, there’s also some nice choices that will start a bit further back–especially since qualifying was rained out on Friday.
Last week at Kansas, our Fantasy Racing Online FOX Fantasy Auto team had a slightly-below-average week with a score of 165 points. We fell back to 1,252nd place overall and sit 2nd in our private group.
FOX Fantasy Auto Picks for the Dover AAA 400
Kevin Harvick ($13,700) – The driver of the #4 Chevrolet is majorly over-priced this weekend, but he’s the flat-out favorite to win the AAA 400 Drive for Autism. Because we don’t get points for place differential this weekend due to qualifying being rained out, we need to go for the most finish points as possible. Even with the high amount spent on Harvick, we still think that we have put together a good FOX Fantasy Auto roster for Dover, so why not pick the pole sitter?
Martin Truex, Jr. ($10,500) – See our notes below on Truex. Our initial plan was to go for finish points with him anyway so this works out.
Matt Kenseth ($9,100) – You simply can’t pass up a guy like Matt Kenseth at such a low salary this week since we’re going off of finish points only. We really believe that this #20 team has gotten the monkey off their back and shed the bad luck bug, so we’re expecting at least a solid top 10 out of Kenseth this weekend. He has posted a single-digit finish in twelve of the last sixteen Dover races, and he’s a must start in FOX Fantasy Auto this week.
Kyle Larson ($8,100) – We’re still going with Larson despite not earning points for place differential. It’s not common to have top 10 potential out of a guy that costs $8,100 in this game. You can see our notes below about the #42 this weekend, just ignore the place differential talk.
Chase Elliott ($7,700) – Yeah, we’re going to leave some money on the table by picking Elliott here, but that #24 Chevrolet has plenty of speed this weekend, and we’re focusing on finish points now. Speed-wise, Chase probably has a car capable of getting up into the top 5, but you have to take into account that he’s a rookie and has never made a Sprint Cup start here at Dover. Still, Elliott has the 3rd-best average finish over the last six races and unless he wrecks or has mechanical issues, we think he’ll have a great AAA 400 on Sunday. Over half of the FOX Fantasy Auto teams have the #24 on their roster, but like we said before, you can’t pass up top 10 potential at this low of a price point.
EDIT: The picks above are our revised selections. We had no idea that the FOX Fantasy Auto game didn’t award place differential points when qualifying was cancelled. And apparently not many other players did either because they have a big red alert section when you log in to tell you this rule. It doesn’t make any sense to us, but we don’t make the rules with this game. Good luck today.
Our Initial Picks
Jimmie Johnson ($12,200) – Here’s one guy that should be on every FOX Fantasy Auto roster this weekend. For whatever reason, the #48 Chevrolet wasn’t extremely fast off the truck on Friday, and Johnson ended up with the 21st-fastest lap. With qualifying getting rained out, that means that that is where he will start the AAA 400 Drive for Autism as well. We don’t expect Jimmie to stay back there very long, though. The six-time Sprint Cup champion has been to victory lane a mind-numbing ten times here at Dover International Speedway, winning in just over 35% of his twenty-eight career starts here. A win percentage like that is almost unbelievable. Jimmie has finished 1st or 3rd in four of his last five starts at this track and has posted a single-digit finish in thirteen of the last sixteen.We don’t care if the #48 Chevrolet was dead last in all of the practices this weekend, he was going to be on our FOX team no matter what. Thankfully that wasn’t the case as Johnson was 12th-fastest in Practice #2 on Saturday and 13th-best in Happy Hour (ranking 8th in ten-lap average). In a Fantasy NASCAR league that awards points on place differential, there probably isn’t a better pick in the field for Dover–even at the pretty high price point of $12,200.
Joey Logano ($11,000) – We’re going purely off of historical data here and hoping Joey Logano has a decent finish on Sunday despite the fact that the #22 Ford has been pretty slow all weekend. JoLo will roll off the grid from 22nd when Sunday’s AAA 400 goes green, and if he can at least make it up to 11th place, we’re looking at a 40+ point week from this kid. Going back to historical data, this is what we mean: in fourteen career starts here at “The Monster Mile,” Logano has posted nine top 10 finishes. He also hasn’t ended up worse than 11th in a race here at Dover since the 2011 season. This #22 team has struggled with long-run speed all season long, and if that is the case once again on Sunday, they could be in for a long race. Fuel runs here at Dover aren’t exactly short. Still, Logano was 6th-fastest during Saturday’s Happy Hour practice session, so hopefully some of that speed can find its way into the car on Sunday. We’re not 100% confident with this pick, but the potential for big points is so large with Logano in this FOX Fantasy Auto game that we have to take him.
Kyle Larson ($8,100) – As of this writing, only about one in four FOX Fantasy Auto teams had Kyle Larson picked, which was a pretty big surprise to us. Maybe they’re still thinking about his disappointing finish at Kansas last weekend (despite the fact that he could have won that race). Anyway, on Sunday, Larson will start in the middle of the pack alongside Jimmie Johnson and Joey Logano, but we’re expecting the #42 Chevrolet to be pretty high in the running order when it’s all said and done. It’s hard to say this early in his career that Dover is Kyle’s best track on the circuit, but in his first four starts at this track he has never finished worse than 11th and he ended up a career-best 3rd in this race one year ago. Speed-wise, the #42 Chevrolet looked solid in Practice #2 on Saturday morning, posting the 6th-fastest lap and also ranking 6th in ten-lap average. In Happy Hour, Larson was 12th and 7th on those charts, respectively. If Larson is able to finish 10th on Sunday, that will net you 43 points in FOX Fantasy Auto–a pretty good amount for a salary of $8,100.
Martin Truex, Jr. ($10,500) – These next two picks are not quite set in stone. Essentially the four drivers we are choosing between are Martin Truex, Jr., Matt Kenseth, Chase Elliott, and Tony Stewart. So, in this roster spot, it’s between Truex and Kenseth. Neither of these guys are trustworthy right now, and they’re both starting inside the top 10. They’ve also both been pretty good here at Dover as of late. As of now we’re going with Truex, Jr. because we think he is a solid top 5 pick heading into Sunday’s AAA 400 Drive for Autism. We have him ranked 3rd, actually. The #78 Toyota has had nice, steady speed all weekend long, which is more than you can say for most of the field. Truex was 7th-fastest in both Practice #2 on Saturday as well as Happy Hour, and he ranked 2nd in ten-lap average during that final session. There’s not much room for place differential points by picking the #78 on Sunday, so we’re going more for the finish points. A 5th-place run out of Truex will net 38 points in FOX Fantasy Auto.
Tony Stewart ($6,900) – We’re going with Smoke on Sunday for a couple of reasons. One, almost half of the FOX Fantasy Auto players have Chase Elliott on their roster. If he would happen to wreck in his first Sprint Cup start here at Dover, we’re looking at an opportunity to gain a whole bunch of points. The second reason we like Tony Stewart in this game is because he starts 34th. Because of him wrecking in 1st Practice and then qualifying getting rained out, Stewart is going to be back there with a bunch of cars that he should be faster than. Third, we like Smoke because in he has been consistent since coming back from his injury, finishing 19th at Richmond and then 12th last week at Kansas. We’re not expecting another top 15 out of the #14 Chevrolet this weekend, but if Smoke could somehow manage to finish 20th on Sunday, we’re looking at 35 points in this FOX Fantasy Auto game. He’s a three-time winner here at Dover and has finished inside the top 10 in more than half of his starts here at Dover. As mentioned before, you could also afford Chase Elliott in this roster spot, as well as Aric Almirola and A.J. Allmendinger–a couple of sleepers that we like this weekend.
