After 600 miles at Charlotte last weekend with the Coca-Cola 600, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series is now at Pocono Raceway–a huge 2.5-mile track with just three turns that are all different in structure. Nicknamed “The Tricky Triangle,” Pocono is always an interesting race from a Fantasy NASCAR perspective, which I’ll explain below in the “Strategy Tactics” portion of this article.
Before we discuss that, though, here are some helpful links to the qualifying results and practice speeds from this weekend:
DraftKings Strategy Tactics for Pocono
On a normal race weekend, there always needs to be a focus on dominator points when building your DraftKings lineups. However, with Pocono, it’s a little different. Again, we’re only scheduled to run 160 laps here on Sunday, which equals out to just 40 FPTS for laps led and probably around 65 FPTS for fastest laps.
So while it is definitely important to have the main dominator in your lineup, finish and place differential points are worth a little more this week, so don’t be afraid to build lineups with a more centric approach. Typically, you can get some good value from low-dollar drivers each week, but at Pocono, it’s such a horsepower-driven track that it’s unlikely that the low-dollar “bottom feeder” guys are going to move up much without some attrition in the form of wrecks.
Another thing to remember with Pocono is pit strategy. This is a huge 2.5-mile track, and if a team thinks that they can pit before the Stage end and not lose a lap–and then stay out during the caution pit stops–chances are they’re going to roll that dice. We’ll have to see whether Sunday’s race once again turns into a follow-the-leader event, which is typical of “The Tricky Triangle.” If that ends up being the case, chances are Kyle Busch ($11,400) is going to lead a ton of laps from his 2nd-place starting spot.
For full disclosure, Pocono has never been a great track of mine from a Fantasy NASCAR perspective, and because of that I probably won’t be playing DraftKings this weekend. So keep that in mind with the projections below, but good luck nonetheless!
Pocono 400 DraftKings Projections
You can click the headers below to sort the chart by that attribute. By default it is sorted by average projected FPTS.
Driver | Starting Position | DraftKings Salary | Avg Proj FPTS | Avg. Projected Finish | Proj Laps Led | Dollar Per FPT |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Kyle Busch | 2 | $11,400 | 58.9 | 01.6 | 57 | $194 |
Martin Truex Jr | 20 | $10,900 | 55.5 | 05.4 | 9 | $197 |
Kevin Harvick | 11 | $10,500 | 51.4 | 03.6 | 12 | $204 |
Brad Keselowski | 5 | $10,200 | 48.2 | 03.4 | 24 | $212 |
Chase Elliott | 12 | $9,900 | 46.7 | 05.8 | 9 | $212 |
Kurt Busch | 21 | $8,800 | 45.0 | 10.0 | 0 | $196 |
Ryan Blaney | 17 | $8,900 | 42.3 | 09.6 | 2 | $210 |
Joey Logano | 16 | $9,500 | 41.2 | 09.4 | 0 | $231 |
Denny Hamlin | 6 | $9,300 | 40.1 | 06.2 | 10 | $232 |
Alex Bowman | 15 | $8,500 | 36.4 | 11.8 | 4 | $234 |
Kyle Larson | 7 | $9,700 | 31.6 | 10.2 | 4 | $307 |
Erik Jones | 4 | $8,600 | 29.7 | 09.8 | 5 | $290 |
William Byron | 1 | $7,600 | 29.7 | 09.8 | 17 | $256 |
Chris Buescher | 24 | $7,300 | 28.8 | 19.6 | 0 | $253 |
Ricky Stenhouse Jr | 18 | $7,000 | 28.8 | 16.6 | 0 | $243 |
Clint Bowyer | 3 | $9,100 | 28.4 | 10.2 | 7 | $321 |
Aric Almirola | 13 | $8,100 | 28.2 | 14.4 | 0 | $287 |
Ryan Newman | 19 | $7,400 | 27.4 | 17.8 | 0 | $270 |
Ryan Preece | 29 | $6,500 | 25.0 | 24.0 | 0 | $260 |
Jimmie Johnson | 8 | $8,300 | 23.6 | 14.2 | 0 | $352 |
Daniel Suarez | 9 | $7,900 | 23.4 | 14.8 | 0 | $338 |
Ty Dillon | 25 | $6,700 | 22.6 | 23.2 | 0 | $296 |
Paul Menard | 14 | $7,100 | 21.2 | 18.4 | 0 | $335 |
Daniel Hemric | 23 | $5,800 | 21.0 | 23.0 | 0 | $276 |
Austin Dillon | 10 | $7,700 | 20.0 | 17.0 | 0 | $385 |
Corey Lajoie | 33 | $5,400 | 19.8 | 28.6 | 0 | $273 |
Bubba Wallace | 26 | $5,900 | 18.8 | 25.6 | 0 | $314 |
David Ragan | 27 | $6,100 | 18.6 | 26.2 | 0 | $328 |
Michael McDowell | 28 | $6,300 | 17.6 | 27.2 | 0 | $358 |
Matt Tifft | 30 | $5,300 | 16.8 | 28.6 | 0 | $315 |
Matt DiBenedetto | 22 | $6,900 | 14.8 | 25.6 | 0 | $466 |
Ross Chastain | 32 | $5,600 | 14.0 | 31.0 | 0 | $400 |
Landon Cassill | 31 | $5,200 | 13.0 | 31.0 | 0 | $400 |
Reed Sorenson | 35 | $5,100 | 11.4 | 33.8 | 0 | $447 |
Bayley Currey | 34 | $4,800 | 10.4 | 33.8 | 0 | $462 |
JJ Yeley | 37 | $4,900 | 09.0 | 36.0 | 0 | $544 |
Quin Houff | 36 | $5,000 | 08.8 | 35.6 | 0 | $568 |