Oh, good ‘ol Daytona. If you’re new to NASCAR, Saturday night’s race is going to be one that is very action-packed from a viewer perspective, but frustrating from a player’s perspective. With most race weekends, there are only a handful of drivers that have a legitimate shot to win the race, and you could throw in a couple more if it turns into a fuel mileage event or some other strategic ending. But with the races at Daytona and Talladega, literally anyone in the field can win: it’s all about timing and being in the right place at the right time. On the other hand, one wreck can take out your entire DraftKings team, just like that. In other words, you could make a case for putting pretty much any driver on your team this weekend. However, we’re here to tell you which ones you should probably avoid on Saturday night.
DraftKings Drivers to Avoid for the Coke Zero 400 at Daytona
Tony Stewart ($8,300) – Tony Stewart used to be the king of the summer, and there were many people that brought that up when he broke through to victory lane at Sonoma last weekend. But now Smoke has a totally different agenda during the second half of the season: making it into the top 30 in points so that he is eligible to claim that Chase spot. So, it really makes you wonder just how aggressive he’s going to be here at Daytona on Saturday night. Tony is already one of those drivers that likes to hang out at the back of the pack for most of the race, but that strategy really only works out if there is a big wreck and they can avoid it. Smoke finished 14th in this race one year ago but in his previous three starts at Daytona he never ended up better than 35th. He’ll start from 19th in this year’s Coke Zero 400–so there’s room for place differential points–but we just don’t see Stewart being too aggressive this weekend and we want drivers on our team that are going to be going for the win. Plus, that $8,300 price tag is pretty high for a guy like Smoke this week.
Martin Truex, Jr. ($9,500) – Martin Truex, Jr. almost won this year’s Daytona 500, and now he’s on the “avoid” list for Saturday night’s Coke Zero 400. How does that saying go…even a blind squirrel finds a nut every once in a while? We like Truex and think he’s a good racer, but we’re not sold on him as a plate racer yet. That 2nd-place finish in this year’s “Great American Race” was his first top 5 of his career here at Daytona and only his third top 10 (in twenty-two career starts). But that’s not the main reason we’re saying avoid the #78 Toyota on Saturday night. Reason #1 to avoid Truex? He’s going to be a popular pick. Try and capitalize on that. He’s nowhere near a reliable Fantasy NASCAR pick, especially here at Daytona. And that brings us to reason #2: this team has under-performed all season long–with the exception of the two biggest races, the Daytona 500 and the Coca-Cola 600. Truex only has three top 5s and seven top 10s in 2016 thus far, well below expected. He’ll start 15th on Saturday night but there’s actually a decent chance that he finishes worse than that.
Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. ($6,700) – This can’t come as a total surprise. In order for drivers that start up front to be viable options in DraftKings, they have to be aggressive enough to go out there and lead some laps. That definitely doesn’t describe Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise us one bit if he was running outside of the top 20 by lap 5 on Saturday night. Stenhouse is one of those drivers that likes to hang out at the back of the pack for most of the race and then surge to the front at the end. That used to work quite well for him but in the last four Daytona events, Ricky hasn’t ended up better than 19th. We think that Stenhouse is a nice Fantasy NASCAR pick in many other racing leagues this weekend, but not DraftKings. We would stay away from him and his teammate, Greg Biffle ($6,500), who starts from the pole.
Chris Buescher ($5,000) – This is one of those weeks where it might be a good idea to throw one of the lower-priced drivers on your roster, but we’d highly recommend staying away from Chris Buescher and instead opting for a guy like Regan Smith ($6,000) or Landon Cassill ($5,600). The thing is, Chris Buescher is a constant disappoint for Fantasy NASCAR owners, and that couldn’t be more true at the restrictor plate tracks this season; in this year’s season-opening Daytona 500, Buescher came home 39th after starting 17th, and at Talladega he wound up 37th after starting 27th. The #34 team qualified 25th for Saturday night’s Coke Zero 400 and that alone should disqualify Buescher from being a use-able driver in DraftKings this week. Maybe if he started dead last we would consider taking Chris Buescher at Daytona, but even then we’d have to think about it for quite a while.
Brad Keselowski ($8,900) – Daytona and Talladega are both restrictor plate race tracks, but they’re actually very different venues. And just because you’re good at one doesn’t mean you’re good at the other. Let’s take Brad Keselowski for example. He’s a four-time winner at Talladega and went to victory lane there a couple of months ago. He also has recorded nine top 10s in fifteen career starts at ‘Dega and owns an average finish of 13.9. Here at Daytona, however, Keselowski has an average finish of 22.1 over fourteen career starts with zero wins and just three top 10s. So while Brad has had a few good runs here at Daytona in the past, the majority of the time he disappoints majorly–and we’re not willing to take that chance. He starts 5th for Saturday night’s Coke Zero 400, and because of that good qualifying effort, we can’t see why anyone would put the #2 Ford on their DraftKings team this weekend.
