Pennzoil 400 DFS Preview

Speaker 0 00:00:00 Drivers start your engine. Speaker 2 00:00:23 What's going on? FA Nation, welcome back. This is the Fantasy Alarm NASCAR DFS podcast. Now previewing the racists following practice and qualifying on Saturdays. I'm Dan Mail and I am joined as always by the Fs w a three time NASCAR writer of the year. Matt Sells. We are previewing Vegas. Matt, how you doing on this lovely Saturday afternoon? Speaker 3 00:00:44 I'm good. Uh, apologies for getting the pot out a little later than normal. Uh, friend of mine had a surprise birthday party at lunch that had been playing for like three months, so I couldn't really move <laugh> that so nice. Um, I was able to watch practice and qualifying while at the restaurant, uh, cuz it was a sports bar. So while I was watching uh, K State flounder in the second half to West Virginia, I also watched the uh, you know, cut practice and qualifying. So Harrison Burton put the car into the wall. Uh, Tyler Reddick needed an engine change, didn't practice or qualify. Um, so yeah, we're good. But of course there's bigger news this weekend. Speaker 2 00:01:26 Yeah. Uh, the big news, uh, that broke late Friday night, chase Elliot broken leg, basically fractured his tibia. Had a three hour surgery Friday night. He is gonna be out for several weeks. Josh Berry steps in DK actually gave him a respectable price tag of $8,000. Um, Speaker 3 00:01:44 Yeah, they also put him at 20 to one on DK Sportsbook. Speaker 2 00:01:48 That's kind of insane. 5% Speaker 3 00:01:50 Brava has it's six, Bravada has him at 66 to one, which I think is, Speaker 2 00:01:54 That's probably <laugh>. Speaker 3 00:01:57 Um, yeah, if we all hearken back to 2015 when Kyle Busch broke his leg, obviously that was at a Daytona incident. Um, and uh, he was out for several weeks. It's probably gonna be about that timeline. Kyle Bus said it probably depends on if it's closer to the knee or the ankle, cuz the ankle you need more flexibility in the joint to press the, you know, clutch or the brake depending on how Jason Elliott drives his number nine car. Um, so it's gonna be several weeks. Yeah. So we'll see if it's Josh Berry the whole time, we'll see if it's just an all guy or a little bit. Uh, but I would expect it to be a shifting of guys from j r m up to the Cup series. I would, I would presume cuz they're basically a feeder team for Yeah. Hendrick. So that, that's what I would presume. I don't know if it'll be Josh Barry passed this week or not. We'll have to see. Speaker 2 00:02:53 Well we can uh, at least start talking, uh, Vegas a little bit. Obviously we hope Chase Elliot gets well soon. It unfortunately won't be soon, but uh, Friday night truck series, uh, I saw a lot of good screenshots, uh, in the Discord for people that had some decent returns on R ROI regardless of how much he played. Um, I woke up on my couch at three 30 in the morning and saw that I finished third in the happy hour. So that was a nice surprise. I fell asleep before the end of the race so, uh, that, that's what happens. It happens almost every time that there's a truck race in Vegas cuz I always know that they're gonna roll off at 9:00 PM on the East coast and that's usually around the time that I'm going to bed and I struggle to stay awake. But Kyle Bus gets the win. Speaker 2 00:03:32 He is currently running in the Xfinity Series race. He is attempting to go for the Vegas sweep coming off his big winning auto club last week. I know we'll get to the track breakdown, but you know, I kind of just wanna touch on the hometown guy first. Like, are we going to get, are you anticipating building around Kyle Busch quite heavily? I don't know if I necessarily like going back to the guy who won the previous week and plus he's been such an, he's been kind of heavily bet uh, to win at his home track as well and rightfully so. Um, but what are your thoughts on Kyle Busch this week? Speaker 3 00:04:05 Yeah, look, I guess we can get into this with the strategy, right? And, and who like is fading? Kyle Bush a good idea or not? He's the most expensive guy on dk, um, pretty sure he's at or near the top of the price list there on Bandel two. We've got 400 laps in this race for the Cup series. So there, sorry, 400 miles, 267 laps apologies, 267 laps. Um, so there's a decent chunk of dominator points that we can get, right? Getting a lap lead leader, getting a dominator at least one into your build at a mile and a half track as a must if you're going to finish high in the money. Question is that Kyle Bus? You look good in practice. Um, are he qualified? Well, he is rolling off fifth for the cup brace, but are we like, it just seems like he's had everything asked of him this weekend between the truck series. Speaker 3 00:05:10 Now he's got all of the various interviews at the hometown track about switching manufacturers and then he is running Xfinity and now we got the Chase Elliott things and now he is being asked about that and if guys should, uh, be allowed to do things outside of racing during the season. And so my question is, is he going to be just mentally exhausted about halfway through the Cup race on Sunday? Uh, I don't know. I don't know if I'm building around him. He's going to be in some lineups, but I don't think he's my top build around guy right now. Speaker 2 00:05:52 I kind of agree. Um, obviously he, he was great in the truck race on Friday night and I was overweight with exposure there. I didn't play him at all on the Xfinity race just cuz I didn't like his comments about the car. Yes. And so if you just compound like everything between like all three races, all the questions he's had to answer, maybe even the mild headache that he wasn't really given or he was, he didn't give any input on the setup sheet for the colleague card that he is running in the Xfinity series. It is kind of a lot to handle and maybe like this guy's just looking forward to a day off on Monday, but it's awfully hard to just not play him at all. And, and like, you know, I'm not, I'm not trying to build around him, but I imagine that I'll still get some exposure in my 20 lineups. Speaker 3 00:06:32 Yeah, he's not. Look will he appear in the core plays that I pronounced on almost assuredly, uh, for tournaments yet because does he have the ability to dominate? Sure. Do you need him to Yes. If he doesn't, he's not worth the price tag. Um, so I'm not, he's not my highest owned guy, but I will play him. Speaker 2 00:06:55 All right. Let's uh, discuss the track mile and a half or what they would call these cookie cutter intermediate. It's these mile and a half triable. Um, just give us the lowdown on Vegas. Speaker 3 00:07:06 Yeah, Vegas is one of the steeper ones. It does have progressive banking in the corner, which means the closer to the wall you get, the more banking you get so that theoretically there's more lines and you can carry momentum around the outside. Um, it's not really, it's higher wear track, it's pretty well kept up. It's not like in the realm of, certainly not in the realm of auto club. It's not anywhere close to Homestead or Darlington. Uh, in terms of comparable tracks, we're looking at high speed intermediate so it compares well with Kansas. We can look at Texas, we can look at Charlotte. I would even toss Michigan in there because Michigan is an a tire wear track like Auto Club. It's a high speed two mile intermediate that's got relatively similar banking to Las Vegas. So, um, those would be the similar tracks in terms of how we're approaching this. Speaker 3 00:07:56 Am I looking at what guys did last year here a little bit? Sure. But I'm really taking the second half of last year as a group and looking at how they performed at Intermediates because by the second half of last year a lot of teams had started to figure out speed in the car. Think about how much better Toyotas were in the second half of last year compared to the first half of last year. Ford's came on in the second half of last year. Aside from Blaney, who was fast everywhere in Logano was fast everywhere, but all of the other Fords came on in the second half of last year. Um, so you know, we're looking a little bit at Practice times this week. We're looking at what they did in the second half of last year at Intermediates and you know, a little bit of what they did. I, I'm not even sure last week really counts cuz it's a high tire wear track so you can't really compare the two. So that's kind of, that's kind of the lay of the land here. Um, you wanna get down to what, what slates are or what tournaments and whatnot are you playing this week? Speaker 2 00:09:03 Um, definitely playing the chrome horn. Uh, that's the $4, the 20 max. It's usually like between 10 to 20 K to first. Um, I've mostly just been doing the happy hour for the truck and Xfinity series cuz I, I don't have as much confidence in those drivers, but, you know, uh, I I love your previews and your playbooks for, uh, the Cup series every Sunday. So I usually go a little bit heavier with that. I think I'm actually gonna dabble with some cash games this week. Um, there's obvious, uh, cash game chalk that has emerged. Yeah, and I will, we'll get to that shortly, but I do feel better about playing cash games this week. There wasn't, uh, I didn't play it last week just because there was, there was too much chalk, there was too much obvious cash game chalk and it really, it really kind of felt like it came down to, you know, having the right two V two plays in your cash game line against everyone else. Speaker 2 00:09:53 So that's kind of why I laid off with, with double ups and triple ups last week. But I'm feeling pretty good about going back to the cash games this week and I think I'm going to mix it in with some, some of my 20 max lineups. I think I'm gonna start doing some of the $12 single entry, 24, maybe the $50 single entry, but a lot of three max contests as well. Um, probably just the $3 three max. Um, but definitely Chrome horn, $12, 24 and 50. Uh, the single entry contest, those are the ones that I'll probably be playing this week. Speaker 3 00:10:24 Yeah, I like the single entries this week, uh, quite a bit. I do, look, I've never really been a big favorite of the mass multiry ones. It's not a skillset of mine. At some point I will, um, hone it in a bit more, but I'd rather get, um, you know, a core of guys together and play in maybe five entry max contests and build around the core, um, and whatnot. I do think that there are some interesting cash plays this week, um, that you can build without having to stock up on the quote unquote tracky guys. Um, but in general I do think, which whi which slate do you think is more interesting to build this week's slate or last week's slate? Because last week's slate turned out to be fantastically different to be able to go anywhere with Speaker 2 00:11:23 I personally, uh, and maybe this is recency bias because this is quite literally the flavor of the week, but I prefer Vegas just cuz we do have practice, we have qualifying, we have good weather, um, you know, obviously the news with Elliot and, and Tyler Reddick who will be starting out the rear cuz he, for an engine change, um, just feel better and more confident this week. Whereas last week, you know, it it, it was fun having all those PD plays cuz we knew we were gonna see high scores in, in cash and in tournaments and those are always fun. But it, it was also kind of a bummer just because there was so much chalk and, and there like you had to really have the right pivots and the right leverage. So, um, I've done a lot of research. I've watched the betting lines move a lot throughout the week. Um, I only have one bet on this race though. Uh, so for me personally, I am more excited about Sunday's race for Vegas than I am about auto club because auto club, honestly, I didn't really entertain playing anything other than the chrome horn. I only played the chrome horn last week and I didn't make a profit or anything but, you know, I f I'm more comfortable in looking forward to building lineup for this slate much more than last week. Speaker 3 00:12:29 I would. I would agree. Um, the fact that we've seen cars on track I think certainly helps. Um, I do think there are some sneaky different directions you could go here. In terms of Lapide dominators, I think anybody starting in the top, let's say six could be a Lapide dominator, um, pretty reasonably which would be um, Laos on the pole. Byron is on the outside pole. Then you got Blaney third, um, who is four? I gotta remind myself Ty Gibbs is fourth, which is gonna be an interesting one. I think he might be pretty popular to be honest. Uh, five is Kyle Bush and six is Kyle Larson. So I think any of those could wind up being Lampl dominators and I think Ty Gibbs is probably gonna be the highest played dude under seven K. Speaker 2 00:13:18 Mm-hmm. Speaker 3 00:13:20 Right. Like Speaker 2 00:13:23 Is it that the hope is that, you know, he goes out and and is just a cheap source of maybe some dominator points? Speaker 3 00:13:31 I would say so. I mean the car looked okay. I mean it looked, it looked decent in practice. I mean the, it looked better over single la like shorter runs than longer runs. Um, but I think that a lot of people are going to try to save money and get a second dominator. Speaker 2 00:13:53 Oh for sure. This is definitely a two dominator track, Speaker 3 00:13:56 Right? If you go with a second dominator, I think Ty Gibbs is probably the most popular second dominator cuz he's starting fourth and he's 6,600, right? The next guy starting like the, we could conceivably see lead a bunch of laps. Um, maybe Alex Bowman in 11th at 8,500 or Byron second at 9,100. So you've got a huge gap there. Um, but I would say in general we're looking for two dominators in a build. Speaker 2 00:14:29 Here's my one reservation with Gibbs, um, only, and it's a very small sample size because he didn't really step into a cop car until the Kurt Busch, uh, concussion right late last year. But he only has one top 10 finish in what, what he maybe has like 17 or 18 career finishes and he's starting fourth. I don't know if, if I necessarily agree that he'll be the most popular play in this 6K range just because I think the general inclination among a lot of the industry might be that he just goes backwards and he loses points. Speaker 3 00:15:04 That's fair. So if you're not on, if you're not on Gibbs, who in this range do you think becomes the chalk in place of, Speaker 2 00:15:16 There is one guy in the seven K range that I really like just because there are so many plays starting behind him that I think he goes overlooked. But I might save that one for Discord because it's strictly a tournament play, but in this six K range, maybe even the 5K range, um, this, this won't be my favorite play of these values. I don't hate Corey Laroy at 5,200 starting P 19. I think that there might be a little bit leverage there. Now that's only gonna be a tournament play, but he finished 16th at Daytona and finished 14th last week at Auto Club. Um, it's a very low, there's very little money with that team, but he's actually made the best out of it so far with that. Yeah. Um, I could probably see myself getting back on board with Justin Haley or AJ Alman Dinger who are both right around that six K line. Um, closer to uh, Gibbs I might consider Chris Buscher at 6,900. Nice. Starting P 18. Speaker 3 00:16:16 Yeah, he did look surprisingly quick in practice. Right. Um, yeah, I I do think that there are several plays. Now let's talk about Josh Barry a little bit more cuz he's eight K on dk, he's starting 32nd. He looked pretty timid in that car. Speaker 2 00:16:42 That's the thing is that I don't really wanna play a guy that's getting his first looks in in this car. I'm hoping a lot of the field is just seeing that it's, you know, it's an $8,000 price sag and you're getting Hendrick Motorsports equipment and, and honestly a lot of the betting preview podcast that I listened to this week, they were all hyping up Chevy and rightfully so, like Chevy looked phenomenal last week. Uh, their cars seemed prepped and ready to go. Um, so I, I get that aspect of it and he's won here twice in the Xfinity series in four races. You know, he was, he's a very popular, popular DFS play for Saturday's race. But again, for a guy that's, uh, I can't remember if this is his debut or if he maybe ran one raise last year in the Cup series, but I don't love it. It's just a whole different dynamic and how difficult this next gen car is driving between, you know, the Cup series and the Xfinity series. So if he's timid in practice, I don't necessarily feel great about the play in DFS because he's AK starting P 32, so he needs 40 points and he's not even hitting value with the top 20. And I, I don't necessarily feel good about him cracking the top 20 as it stands right now. Speaker 3 00:17:51 Yeah. I saw a lot of people saying, well he had teens upside being in the number nine, the Hendrick car, you know, just assuming that it's a plug and play. But I agree with you, the driving style between the two, the Xfinity car and the cup car is so different now that, you know, I, I didn't exactly like what I saw from him in practice. Um, his 10 lap average wasn't great in terms of the guys that ran 10 lap averages. His was the third slowest. Um, Speaker 2 00:18:24 I'll say this, I don't hate him for cash games just because I think that there's a good enough floor that even if he somehow does squeak into the top 20, he's only getting you like 35 points. But I think I could live with that in cash games. Speaker 3 00:18:37 Yeah. I just think he's, I I just don't think he's, he's tournament playable. Um, I think there's other places you could go for a cash game play outside of Josh Berry cuz I think right now he's just trying not to destroy the car. Speaker 2 00:18:55 That's right. Speaker 3 00:18:56 And like yeah, Speaker 2 00:18:57 No, I would agree. Speaker 3 00:18:58 Anybody that drives, like we saw this when, when Ty Gibbs first came up last year, he was just trying not to destroy the car. Speaker 2 00:19:06 Yeah. Speaker 3 00:19:07 And I'm not, I don't really want to pay basically average price for a guy to just try to bring the car home safely. So look, I think he's gonna be popular because oh, chase Elliott's car is good. He's Hendrick Josh Barry, like you said, he won toys here in Xfinity. Um, but we'll let other people play in that pool. Uh, not sure. Now what are, what are we doing with Tyrek? Speaker 2 00:19:38 Uh, I feel like you just have to play him in cash games in tournaments. I understand that wanting the leverage of being underweight. Um, I you have to imagine that for any tournament contest he's probably gonna be at least 40% owned uh, in cash contest. He should probably be at least 70% owned. I know he's not getting practice. I know he is not getting qualifying. Uh, the results through two races have not been good. Speaker 3 00:20:07 You mean he is 30, 35th finished 34th last week at auto club. Speaker 2 00:20:14 Yeah. A track that we all, did he have any issues? I can't remember honestly, I fell asleep and I missed the end of that. I'm really good at falling asleep during NASCAR Speaker 3 00:20:23 Race <laugh>. Um, I wanna say he had an issue but I can't, I can't like he wasn't just that slow. Speaker 2 00:20:32 I'm Right. But it just hasn't been a good debut for him since joining Toyota. Speaker 3 00:20:36 Correct. So I don't know, I'm with you. I think in tournament plays I think I'm off of him. I think in cash Speaker 2 00:20:45 You can, I'm fine eating the chalk because he is, if he, even if he busts, he's probably hurting everybody's lineup. So you still have a path to making money and doubling up. Speaker 3 00:20:53 Yeah, I, I agree. Um, but yeah, I would, I would say it's still a more, more of a GPP slate than a cash slate, but cash is more playable this week than it was last week cuz there's a lot less truck. Speaker 2 00:21:10 Um, you can, you can feel good about just making your own lineup and not making a lineup that's gonna be played by 30% of the field. Speaker 3 00:21:17 Exactly. Yeah. Um, I think there's less chances for lineup trains this week. There's less obvious lineup trains this week. Speaker 2 00:21:23 Correct. Speaker 3 00:21:24 Um, then there was last week. Um, but in general, yes. Speaker 2 00:21:34 You know, do you have a favorite dominator that stands out to you so far? Speaker 3 00:21:41 Um, I think Larson's gonna be very popular, but I'm not sure that I'm going that route. I think a guy that might not be played quite as much as William Byron, Speaker 2 00:21:59 See I can't decide if he's gonna be popular or not because he's too cheap and he's already on the front row. So all he has to do is just get around. Joey Logano who Joey Logano was a very good resume of Vegas. Uh, but also Byron had one of the fastest cars, I believe late in the year on these kind of like medium to right we'll call it medium tire where intermediates. And so, I mean there's no Chase Elliot. Like he, he could be a guy to kind of just, you know, pick up the, uh, I get, I don't know. Speaker 3 00:22:28 See I, I think why Byron may not be as popular is because the guy was on the poll who's very good at Vegas and intermediates and leading laps. You have Larson six, you have Kyle Bush's fifth who's been all, all the talk this week. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, right. Ryan Blaney who has still been fast. He's starting third like, you know, he may not be. I think if you give people the choice between Blaney and Byron, I think more people choose Blaney than Byron in that scenario. I, I think, I think Byron might get over overlooked Speaker 2 00:23:11 If he does. I love it. I love the price tag of just 9,100 on dk. Um, one guy I do actually like that we did not mention, uh, is Ross Chastain, Speaker 3 00:23:20 He's been really fast. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:23:22 Uh, finished third last week led 91 laps, 22 fastest laps for 79 points on DraftKings. Um, even last year, like Track House was surprisingly good. Um, I'm not gonna give away the name but like that, that sneaky gpp play that I said I would leave for the Discord, it's his teammate <laugh>. Um, but I really like track. Speaker 3 00:23:41 I've been, I've been on his teammate because like Vegas put SW as a 50 to one to start the week and DK closed it to 25 to one pretty quickly. Right? Yeah. Speaker 2 00:23:53 I Speaker 3 00:23:53 Was, Chastain was still eight to one. So like if you like Chastain at eight to one, why wouldn't you take a shot <laugh> on triple the return on his on his teammate. Now his teammate is starting further back. Sure. But he's also had a better faster car arguably um, for the last, Speaker 2 00:24:13 I almost like Suarez enough for cash games too. Speaker 3 00:24:16 I kind of do too. Speaker 2 00:24:17 I don't think anyone's gonna play in cash Speaker 3 00:24:19 Games <laugh>. I don't think so because he kind of like he's starting 24th. Right. But like there's enough, you're right, there's enough guys starting around him or behind him that I think he gets a little bit lost. Speaker 2 00:24:33 Yeah. Speaker 3 00:24:35 In the flow. Like Speaker 2 00:24:39 I haven't looked at, I subscribe to a few websites and I haven't really looked at ownership projections cause I don't know if they're out yet. But I love Suarez if he's gonna fall in like an eight to 12 projected ownership and I'd go at least double that in my builds. Speaker 3 00:24:55 Yeah. Speaker 2 00:24:56 Maybe even triple. Like I'm not afraid to go heavy on Suarez Speaker 3 00:24:59 Tomorrow. I mean he's 7,600 and Josh Barry's eight grand and Barry's gonna be played more I would think Tyler Reddicks 8,800, he's gonna be played more. I think you can go down and people would play, would take more shots on Almond Der and Hailey and Toss Ty Gibbs in there for a dominator and a cash game. I Speaker 2 00:25:24 Think Ty Gibbs and a cash game, Speaker 3 00:25:27 I think some people will build it for Tide gives being the dominator in a cash game to save money. But I wouldn't do it. Speaker 2 00:25:35 I'm not doing that. Speaker 3 00:25:36 I think some people's gonna be stupid but <laugh> can't fix stupid. Um, in terms of builds, we're looking for one dominator in a cash game and the rest is PD for gpp we're looking for two dominators and the rest Speaker 2 00:25:50 Is, I would also say, um, I know this doesn't typically happen on the intermediates, but I always do commit some at least two or three tournament builds. If you're doing 20 or more lineups, I would still try to get some tournament builds that are just one dominator cuz it on the off chance that it does happen and you nail that dominator and you have five other, you know, good PD plays because odds are that it's gonna be, there're gonna be two or three guys that collect a lot of the dominator points. I guess you, you probably want what between 2025, maybe even 30 dominator points if you are target, you know, per per dominator. Uh, but if this is just an off chance where it's one of those guys that you know, just dominates the whole race, leads a ton of laps, has the fastest laps and he's just going over 120 points on DraftKings, then you, you like having that guy as your solo dominator while having five other dries that just move up and finish well. Um, so I would say, you know, don't go all the way in on two dominator builds. Do reserve some wiggle room for just one solo dominator lineups. Speaker 3 00:26:52 Yep. I agree. Speaker 2 00:26:56 Anything else you wanted to touch on? Any drivers that we may have skipped or if you just wanna save 'em for the playbook, totally understand, you know, we're not trying to give a full field breakdown because this is a free podcast. We just wanna kind of preview our, our favorite plays and a little bit of contrarian, uh, options as well. But, you know, we'll be in the Discord, you know, tonight and tomorrow heading into the race. Speaker 3 00:27:14 Yeah, no, I think we'll, um, keep the rest for, um, for Discord and the playbook. Um, yeah, I I don't really have much to add strategy wise. I think it's, you know, a fun race to build four lineup block on DK I believe is 3 47 Eastern Sunday afternoon. Um, um, check for FanDuel cause they usually do different and FanDuel might lock earlier, um, than dk Speaker 2 00:27:51 Give fan credit. Uh, I, I don't like fanduels like scoring. We, we crap on it all the time, but I actually like that they at least offer five entry max contests. I prefer those over like three entry. Speaker 3 00:28:04 I would Speaker 2 00:28:04 Agree. That's the only thing that they, thanks. Speaker 3 00:28:07 Yeah, I would agree. Also by the way, they have as of, uh, five 30 Eastern on Saturday, not added Josh Barry to the player pool. I would not expect them to add Josh Barry to the player pool. Um, Speaker 2 00:28:20 That's so nice of them. Speaker 3 00:28:21 <laugh>, just as a heads up, they, they usually, once it's set they usually don't add a guy and they've already had a day at this point to do it. So, uh, I don't expect them to to Adam. So if you wanna play Josh Barry, your only option is on DraftKings. Um, but yeah, so, so check out the playbook, uh, or keep reading it if you're listening to this at top, the playbook. Um, and we'll have, uh, you know, projections out Saturday evening and court plays out Sunday. Um, and then any adjustments needed, uh, prior to the race on Sunday in Discord. Speaker 2 00:29:07 All right. Well Matt, thank you so much for your time. Best of luck to you Sunday at Vegas and best of luck to the FA Nation.