It’s getting down to crunch time for teams to get everything lined up for the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series season, and this time of year, the longer it takes to hear something, the worse the news typically is. For example, nobody has a clue about the NY Racing Team and its status, and we’re two weeks away from the start of the season. We’ve seen this happen before, and while the NY Racing Team has said it plans to run the full year, don’t be surprised if they don’t.
Also don’t be surprised if Ryan Preece only runs a partial schedule in 2021.
In addition to Preece being mentioned in my article a few days ago about drivers that could miss out on this year’s Daytona 500 because the team doesn’t have a charter, Bob Pockrass tweeted today that the the #37 car only has funding for 24 of the 36 scheduled races in the upcoming season.
Bob also mentioned in his series of tweets about the JTG team that they were evaluating the charter market to see if it made sense to be a 1- or 2-car operation. And all signs are pointing to JTG downsizing to one car in the future, especially since they do not own a charter for the 37 car. It doesn’t make sense financially for them to do so.
One more thing to consider here: if Ryan Preece misses out on the Daytona 500, that’s going to be an even bigger financial hit for the JTG Daugherty organization, as the Daytona 500 purse is the largest of all races in a season.
Ryan Preece’s Fantasy Value in 2021
Of course all of this is speculation, and it’s possible that additional sponsorship could find its way to Ryan Preece and the 37 team, but that’s certainly not guaranteed.
From a Fantasy NASCAR perspective, the biggest impact this news has is for full-season leagues, such as the Salary Cap Challenge here at Fantasy Racing Online. Preece suddenly becomes a very risky driver to take in full-season leagues, as there’s a decent possibility that he won’t earn you any points for several races during the year. I personally love to gamble, but I wouldn’t take the risk with Preece in any season-long NASCAR Fantasy games this year.
