The starting lineup for this weekend’s GEICO 500 isn’t too favorable when it comes to making a roster for NASCAR.com Fantasy Live. Overall the best restrictor plate drivers will be starting inside the top 20 on Sunday, while all of the “bottom dwellers” and low-dollar drivers will occupy the rear of the field. This is a typical starting lineup for other race weekends, but we were really hoping for some solid fantasy picks to qualify poorly on Saturday so that we could capitalize on place differential points on Sunday. Oh, well.
The Fantasy Racing Online NASCAR.com team had a decent (not great) week at Richmond last Sunday, scoring a total of 245 points. We didn’t have Kyle Busch or Carl Edwards on our roster so that was why. We’re sitting in 18,556th place overall in the 92.14 percentile with 2080.5 points on the season. Hopefully a good week at Talladega can help us a bit.
NASCAR.com Fantasy Live Picks for the Talladega GEICO 500
Jimmie Johnson ($26.50) – “Six Time” went up another quarter after the Richmond race, so that means we have him locked in at a price that is $0.75 less than market value. We’re looking to the future and we’re not willing to give that up, so he’s staying on our roster for Talladega despite qualifying inside the top 5 for this year’s GEICO 500. Hopefully the #48 Chevrolet can make its way toward the front and lead some laps on Sunday to make up for it. The good news is that Johnson is a two-time winner here at Talladega Superspeedway and has led double-digit lap totals in six of the last seven races here. He usually has a car that can contend for the win when we stop here, and we believe that is the case this weekend as well. In this race last year, Johnson also started 5th, and then he went on to lead 50 laps en-route to a 2nd-place finish. If he could replicate that here on Sunday, we’d be thrilled.
Dale Earnhardt, Jr. ($28.00) – Don’t let us down, Junior. We don’t think it’s necessary to rattle off the statistics that Earnhardt has accumulated here at Talladega Superspeedway, so we’re not even going to spend the time. The #88 Chevrolet is running one of Dale’s best chassis this weekend, and he’s starting 3rd for this year’s GEICO 500. Junior has also been consistently fast all weekend long and that should have the rest of the garage area worried. It’s certainly possible that the #88 team will go out and dominate here on Sunday, and that’s what we’re hoping happens. We need Junior to lead a bunch of laps for this pick to work out, but we’re confident that that will happen.
Kevin Harvick ($27.75) – This weekend Harvick is going to be one of the most popular picks in the Fantasy NASCAR leagues that award points based on place differential. He qualified 29th for Sunday’s GEICO 500, but the #4 Chevrolet is much better than that. This team came home with a top 5 finish in this year’s Daytona 500 and it wouldn’t surprise anyone if they ended up near the front once again here on Sunday. In fact, over the last two years here at Talladega, Harvick actually has the best average finish among all drivers and hasn’t finished worse than 15th. He ran 8th in this event one year ago after starting 24th, and in the fall race of 2014, Harvick started 39th and ended up 9th. It’s all about where you finish (not where you start), and the #4 Chevrolet should be where it typically is when the checkered flag waves this weekend: toward the front.
Cole Whitt ($5.25) – When it comes to these very low dollar drivers this weekend, it’s really just pick one and hope for the best. We’re going with Cole Whitt in the GEICO 500 on Sunday because he’s the only one we could afford. However, we’re not too upset about it because Cole actually has a decent record here at Talladega as of late; in the last four races at this track, Cole Whitt hasn’t ended up worse than 22nd, and he actually finished 13th in this exact race one year ago. He’ll start 36th here on Sunday, but if Whitt can stay out of trouble during the race, he might be one of the best low-dollar options for Talladega.
Danica Patrick ($12.50) – Our plan this whole week was to go with Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. in this spot, but he went out and qualified 6th on Saturday so that kind of blew that plan. So we’re going with his girlfriend instead. Danica hasn’t had a great run here at Talladega over his six-race career here–her best finish is 19th–but she also hasn’t been too terrible. She tends to stick to her gameplan and finish on the lead lap, and sometimes that’s all you can ask out of your Fantasy NASCAR picks at tracks like Daytona and Talladega. Danica will start near the back of the pack for Sunday’s GEICO 500, but if she can keep her nose clean, a mid-20s (or better) finish isn’t out of the question at all. So, between finish points and place differential points, that’d be a nice little payoff for a driver that only costs $12.50.
Race Winner: Dale Earnhardt, Jr.
Manufacturer: Chevrolet
