In all three of NASCAR’s national series, will the regular-season champion cap the season with the overall title?
All three – Tyler Reddick in Cup, Cole Custer in Xfinity and Christian Eckes in trucks — are still alive going into the Phoenix Raceway finale weekend.
In each series, four drivers have survived elimination rounds to be eligible for the title. While the races have their full fields, only four drivers compete for the title with the driver among those four who finishes best in the race being crowned the champion.
So here are my picks for the championship weekend, which consists of a 150-lap truck race Friday night, 200-lap Xfinity race Saturday night and a 312-lap Cup championship event Sunday afternoon on the 1-mile oval.
Cup Series
Reddick makes his first Cup championship appearance. It also is the first for his crew chief, Billy Scott. And if that’s not somewhat nerve-racking, it’s hard to ignore that his race team, 23XI Racing, co-owned by Michael Jordan, is in just its fourth year of existence. Not to mention that the team also is suing NASCAR for better charter agreement terms.
NASCAR won’t do anything to keep Reddick from winning the title, but Reddick and the team have done that enough to themselves, at times, this year, to eliminate themselves from contending for wins. Reddick did win the opening stage at Phoenix in the spring and finished second in another stage before placing 10th.
Ryan Blaney won last year in his first Champ 4 appearance, so Reddick could certainly follow in those footsteps. Or Blaney could go back-to-back — the first driver to do so in the elimination-style playoff era. And Blaney’s two-time Cup champion teammate Joey Logano seems to perform best when it matters most.
William Byron returns to the Champ 4 but takes a 27-race winless streak into Phoenix. So it would seem he doesn’t have a chance.
And that’s why I will pick Byron. This seems to be the season of expecting the unexpected. He’s been through this before. He has a little bit of a chip on his shoulder. He has the full weight of Hendrick behind him. His pit crew seems solid. And he knows how to run in the top 5 at Phoenix.
This season is about expecting the unexpected. Byron for the win.
Xfinity Series
Custer is looking to go back-to-back in winning Xfinity Series titles before returning to Cup next season as part of the revamped Haas Factory Team.
A fierce competitor, he has Justin Allgaier, AJ Allmendinger and Austin Hill to challenge him.
Allmendinger and Hill have been inconsistent this season when it comes to having fast cars. Allgaier has run fast nearly every week but has had several races where he doesn’t get the finish to match the performance of the car.
So this pick might be from the heart as much as the head — Allgaier has finished top-four in points eight times in the last 13 years. This will be the year the JR Motorsports driver hoists the championship trophy.
Truck Series
Eckes won the regular-season title and won Friday at Martinsville, so he has the momentum as he battles Grant Enfinger, Corey Heim and Ty Majeski for the championship.
Enfinger, who should have won the title last year driving for GMS Racing if not for drivers behind him retaliating against each other and bringing out the caution, won the first two races of the semifinal round but is driving for CR7 Motorsports, an organization in its first playoff run. Majeski has run well at short tracks but execution has not been consistent.
This likely will come down to Eckes and Heim. They have combined for 10 wins this year in the 22 races, with Heim having won six times and Eckes having won four. They both have the ability to dominate.
Giving the nod here to Heim, whose foundation of being primarily a Toyota factory driver and with the resources provided to the Tricon Garage team should give him an edge.
Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including over 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass.
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