The 2022 NASCAR Xfinity Series has not failed to disappoint. We’re seeing a fantastic battle for who could de-throne Daniel Hemric as the Xfinity Series champion, since Hemric certainly hasn’t done much to defend the crown. Ty Gibbs has looked like the driver to beat this year, but Noah Gragson won last week’s race at Talladega, yet I still get goosebumps thinking about the run Jeffrey Earnhardt got in the 3-car with Larry McReynolds cheering him on to win the race. Ultimately, Earnhardt finished second. However, it was a very nostalgic week, and certainly one that NASCAR fans will not forget.

 

We are in the middle of coming down from a strong high after Talladega and seeing more and more throwback schemes for Darlington next week. Behind the scenes I’ve told Selz that Dover is feeling more and more like a pallet cleanser between races. We go from Dega to Darlington and sandwiches in between is Dover. Does that mean I’m mailing it in this week? Absolutely not. However, some of my hesitancy resides in the fact that the Cup Series NextGen car hasn’t looked great on short tracks aside from Richmond. But we’re talking about Xfinity so let’s dive in.

We managed to get a practice and qualifying session in Friday. So we have an idea of who is fast and who are the good DFS plays for Saturday afternoon’s race. Here are the practice results from Friday’s session:

First thing to make note of, Saturday’s race is at 1:30pm ET. So for you West Coasters, please be aware of the earlier start. We usually see Xfinity kick off about two hours later than this so just be prepared. We have 200 laps for about 120-140 dominator points. That’s a good amount to target and build around for Saturday’s action. For the most part, we haven’t seen too many cautions over the last few Xfinity races at Dover. But we could see about five or six that could consume 10-20% of the laps in this race.

Here is my best piece of advice to get a feel for Saturday’s race; go on to YouTube and watch a previous Xfinity race at Dover. Hell, watch a Cup race at Dover. Get a feel for the difficulty in passing here. Even with an abundance of laps that are run, there aren’t many green flag passes. Penalties can be crucial here. In 2021’s lone Xfinity Series race, there were 795 green flag passes (5.1 per lap). In the first 2020 XFIN race at Dover we saw 1,079 green flag passes (6.1 per lap). And in the second race we saw a total of 603 green flap passes (3.5 per flap). That’s kind of what we should expect on shorter tracks. 1.5-mile intermediate tracks can provide about 20-40 green flag passes per lap. But at Martinsville this year there were only 9.3 per lap and Richmond saw less than five per lap. Part of this is due to the fact that with more drivers falling off the lead lap in the race, there are fewer opportunities to move up. In a sense, drivers get stuck. We should expect that trend to continue on Saturday. Last year only a dozen drivers finish on the lead lap. In Dover-1 in 2020, only SEVEN drivers finished on the lead lap. In Dover-2 of that year, there were 17 drivers finishing on the lead lap. In the last three races we’ve seen 15 drivers gain ten spots of PD, and only five drivers have gained 14+ spots of PD. So this isn’t exactly a track to target significant PD especially since we can predict that at least half the field finishes a lap down. I’m not letting Dash For Cash implications impact my own personal exposures, but if you need a reminder this week it’s Noah Gragson, A.J. Allmendinger, Ryan Sieg, and Landon Cassill racing for $100,000.

Driver Pool

Ty Gibbs ($11,400; Starting P5) I simply can’t leave out the odds-on favorite to win the race. Gibbs had won three of the last seven races and is +500 to win Saturday. While it’s not a bet I’d recommend, he does warrant some DFS exposure. He will need to get to the front and collect some dominator points. I will have one or two lineups focusing on just him and Brandon Jones as my dominators, but I will also go the route of just Gibbs as the lone dominator in some builds. That may blow up in my face if he doesn’t get to the front early on, in which case I’d really need him to dominate stages two and three. We may not like his personality, but we know what the upside is for DFS.

Noah Gragson ($11,100; Starting P3) Gragson rolls off P3 for Saturday’s race and he’s coming off a huge win last week at Talladega. He won Phoenix back in March and has consistently had one of the fastest cars in the Xfinity Series. Now he didn’t have the greatest luck during the short track stint earlier this month with poor finishes at Richmond and Martinsville. His finishes at Dover have been okay. He has plenty of top tens, but he’s only led 38 total laps here. As of Friday night I’m leaning towards being underweight on Gragson, but we know he can pilot this ride to a win and make it look easy.

John Hunter Nemechek ($10,600; Starting P9) Feels a bit strange to say, but JHN has almost had a better year at Xfinity (on a part-time schedule) than in the Truck Series. He started and finished second at Richmond but led 135 laps with 32 fastest laps. He also had a solid showing at Phoenix. So we have JHN looking strong at a short track and his ten-lap average was almost a full half-mile per hour faster than the next closest driver. He offers a little PD which is always nice and he’s popping off at +750 to win and he’s -110 for a top five finish. And if he has track position he could find his way to the front for dominator points, which we will need at this price tag.

Justin Allgaier ($10,300; Starting P7) Historically, this is one of those tracks that Allgaier absolutely kicks ass at. In 11 races at Dover since 2016, he has two wins, and eight finishes in the top three. He’s led at least 65 laps here in four of his last seven races. He offers a little PD and it’s just nice to see him stringing together strong practice sessions with good qualifying runs. Given how chalky Allgaier might be, if you chose to pivot to Josh Berry, I wouldn't blame you. I'll mix him into some builds but he was the runner-up here last year and excels on short tracks.

Brandon Jones ($9,400; Starting P1) Here’s where you can hang your hat on the polesitter at Dover, over the last nine Xfinity races at Dover, the polesitter has finished in the top ten in each race. Only one (Brett Moffitt in Dover-1 during 2020) finished off the lead lap and he was only one lap down. Even then, he still led 25 laps with seven fastest laps. Over the last nine races, the polesitters have led over 550 laps combined. Now the caveat to this is that Brandon Jones is a risky play. Jones did win Martinsville a few weeks back, but he still comes with variance. He was fastest in practice and fifth-fastest in ten-lap averages so if he runs clean, there’s merit to him finishing well. As is always the case with Jones, tread carefully.

Daniel Hemric ($9,200; Starting P17) Pretty simple analysis here, he’s a PD play. The finishing results have been all over the place this season and he hasn’t led a lap since Auto Club so you better hope he can finish in the top eight and be optimal. Ownership should be moderate, so I’ll mix him in for the sake of spreading exposure around. However, I’m not particularly ecstatic about his speed during practice.

Austin Hill ($9,000; Starting P20) It’s been an up-and-down season for Hill after winning Daytona to kick off his first year in the Xfinity Series. He was dominating last week at Talladega before a late wreck, at no fault of his own, killed his chances of winning. But he did grab top five finishes at Atlanta, COTA, and Martinsville so he’s excelled on different tracks. He posted the 13th-fastest lap during practice and he’ll be among the more popular options in Cash games since he has great equipment and is one guy that one paper should move up.

Ryan Sieg ($8,200; Starting P38) Holy hotdogs is that Ryan Sieg sporting an $8K price tag this week for the Xfinity race? As I wrote up last week, next to A.J. Allmendinger, Sieg has arguably been the most consistent driver in the series with plenty of finishes inside the top 12. There is some concern this week, however. Sieg had an axle issue and failed to post a qualifying lap. Therefore, he’s starting dead last. His team worked up until the garages were closing to fix the issue. Does that guarantee that he’s good to run the race? No, I haven’t seen too many reports offering clarity. But there’s a chance we hear something in the morning or just before the race so keep an ear to the ground. He’s a Cash game lock if the problem was fixed, but either way he can’t get you negative PD.

Landon Cassill ($8,000; Starting P18) Here’s a much cheaper pivot off his teammate, Daniel Hemric. Cassill starts P18 and is priced down to $8,000. I don’t quite know why? This could very well be a trap. Why? Because it feels like a trap. He hits 5X value if he finishes in the top ten, which we’ve seen him do plenty of times this year. He’s posted at least 39 points in six of his last seven races. Dover may not be his best track statistically, but this is easily the best equipment he’s ever run. He’s a solid option and one that may carry less ownership since Ryan Sieg is only $200 more.

Myatt Snider ($7,600; Starting P25) Snider is going to really have to put on one hell of a performance on Saturday. Historically, he hasn’t been terrible here with finishes of 16th, 17th, and 18th but those came in better equipment. This 31-car isn’t as reliable, but he’s stating far enough back that a top 20 could be helpful for DFS. 5X value may be slightly out of reach, but he could flirt with it. I may prefer just utilizing him in GPP’s this week.

Brandon Brown ($7,400; Starting P22) Per usual, Brandon Brown is in play again. He’s in a friendly starting spot to give us PD and he might be on the lead lap come race’s end. His last five races at Dover in particular have been very strong. He’s finished 10th, 16th, 14th, 11th, and 13th so the top 15 upside is certainly appealing from a DFS standpoint. I don’t hate him for Cash games either since he should be able to move up from this spot.

Parker Retzlaff ($6,200; Starting P23) Remember a few weeks ago when we, as a group, collectively decided we weren’t going to sleep on Retzlaff anymore? That was when his price crept up to $7,000 and apparently three weeks off means DK will drop your price back down. Was Retzlaff fast in practice? Not particularly. But in a small sample size we’ve seen him creep up throughout the race and finish in the top 12 this year. He has prior Dover experience in the ARCA East Series and he has made comments that he likes how Dover is a track about hitting your marks and not making too many mistakes. Sure, he’s a part-time rookie but they’re still giving us a discount on a young wheelman that has far exceeded expectations this year. If you want to save some money while targeting a little more PD you can consider Ryan Ellis, who had decent results at Vegas and Phoenix.

Josh Williams ($5,600; Starting P33) Williams isn’t a phenomenal play by any means, but he’s cheap and maybe he sneaks away with a top 25 finish. In this price range and at a cheaper price tag you can consider Patrick Emerling. But I have a little more faith in Williams, but the 35-car that Emerling has raced in has had decent finishes. I like Williams from an attrition standpoint. His worst finishes this year have been to mechanical issues, but if he can stay clean and be running at the end then he should have gained at least five spots of PD. 

Rajah Caruth ($5,500; Starting P15) Here’s the good news with Caruth for Saturday; we know not to play him in Cash games. He’s starting too high and likely goes backwards. However, he posted the eighth-fastest single lap during Friday’s practice, but he only ran 13 total laps. He did run in Friday’s ARCA race (finished fourth) so we are strictly only taking the gamble in GPP’s hoping that he stays on the lead lap long enough to hold his position without making a mistake and dropping back. 

Matt Mills ($4,800; Starting P37) He will absolutely not finish on the lead lap. In fact, he probably finishes multiple laps down. But similar to Ryan Sieg, he can’t get you negative points. His floor is literally two DraftKings points. On another point, similar to Sieg he seemed to have a mechanical problem after posting a very slow lap toward the end of his qualifying session. So we’ll be looking for clarity on his car leading up to the race, but since he’s a bit of a back marker, we likely won’t hear much. He’s almost hitting 4X value if he grabs a top 30 finish which he’s done in four-of-seven races this year.

Example Lineups

The Example Lineups will be posted separately around 11:00am ET.

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