It’s time to go to drafting at Talladega Superspeedway! NASCAR wraps up the superspeedway and drafting races Sunday afternoon. Talladega is the largest track on the schedule. The Daytona 500 may be the biggest race every year, but the track is just a bit smaller than Dega, and not as wide. I do apologize for not having a preview article earlier this week. However, for the YellaWood 500 picks, the preview article likely would’ve featured similar drivers in the Daytona, Atlanta, or prior Talladega preview. As is always the case when building NASCAR DFS lineups for Dega, we’re kind of using our best guess. All the research in the world could amount to very little success. We’re likely going to see big wrecks. Chalk will bust. Dominator points hardly matter. Here are this week’s NASCAR DFS YellaWood 500 picks!
YellaWood 500 Picks: The Top 10
- Michael McDowell (#34 Front Row Motorsports)
- Austin Cindric (#2 Team Penske)
- Todd Gilliland (#38 Front Row Motorsports)
- Kyle Busch (#8 Richard Childress Racing)
- Ryan Blaney (#12 Team Penske)
- Joey Logano (#22 Team Penske)
- Austin Dillon (#3 Richard Childress Racing)
- Denny Hamlin (#11 Joe Gibbs Racing)
- Harrison Burton (#21 Wood Brothers Racing)
- Daniel Hemric (#31 Kaulig Racing)
The only driver that doesn’t make a lick of sense from this group is Daniel Hemric. I’m not surprised Front Row Motorsports won the pole with McDowell, nor am I shocked his teammate lines up right behind him. All three Penske drivers are in the top six. Moreover, their “satellite teammate,” Harrison Burton, starts P9 and he won at Daytona just a handful of weeks ago. We also have the RCR drivers, who are both good in drafting races. And Denny Hamlin is a three-time Daytona 500 winner. It’s actually quite the impressive top 10. While we can take away some win equity here, we do know that we likely aren’t loading up on more than two of these drivers for our YellaWood 500 picks. Position differential is the name of the game on Sunday.
Which Value-Priced YellaWood 500 Picks Got A Points Movement Bump?
- Martin Truex Jr. – Starting P24
- Ross Chastain – Starting P27
- Alex Bowman – Starting P23
- Daniel Suarez – Starting P31
- Chase Briscoe – Starting P36
- Ricky Stenhouse Jr. – Starting P32
- Justin Haley – Starting P35
- J. Allmendinger – Starting P25
- Erik Jones – Starting P30
- Carson Hocevar – Starting P37
- Corey LaJoie – Starting P28
- John Hunter Nemechek – Starting P29
- Zane Smith – Starting P39
This is easily the largest group of drivers I’ve ever listed for value-priced options offering place differential. And if I’m being honest, I even left out some options. But these are the more affordable options on both DraftKings and FanDuel for Sunday’s race. Ross Chastain got his random win of the year last week, and disrupted the playoffs a bit as nobody was able to lock themselves into the next round. But we have so many options in this range for the YellaWood 500 picks. Truthfully, cash game lineups should be composed of just drivers from this list. Yes, you’ll leave money on the table. And these drivers will be popular. But they also offer the safest “floor” on the slate because they start deeper in the field. If they wreck, the negative PD won’t hurt their score as much as it would for drivers starting further up.
Which Higher-Priced Drivers Got A Similar Bump?
- Brad Keselowski – Starting P13
- William Byron – Starting P16
- Tyler Reddick – Starting P14
- Chris Buescher – Starting P20
- Bubba Wallace – Starting P26
We don’t have a ton of great position differential options among the top-tier as we normally do. There’s even a little win equity with these five drivers. Brad Keselowski is considered one of the best drafters in the field. Chris Buescher won at Daytona last year. Bubba Wallace has a win at Talladega on his resume. William Byron won this year’s Daytona 500. Tyler Reddick won at Talladega about six months ago. So they may not have the position differential the value drivers do. But they can move up and score well. And I won’t write off any of them for the YellaWood 500 picks because they have the potential to win this race.
YellaWood 500 Picks
DraftKings
- Bubba Wallace – $8,500; Starting P26
- Christopher Bell – $8,000; Starting P21
- Alex Bowman – $7,600; Starting P23
- Chase Briscoe – $7,300; Starting P36
- J. Allmendinger – $6,500; Starting P25
- Carson Hocevar – $6,100; Starting P37
In general, this is probably a better cash game lineup than it is a tournament build. I only do one lineup for races at Daytona and Talladega this deep in the year, so I’m not as brash and bold playing some drivers starting in the top 15. So I’ll enter this in tournaments, but mostly cash games as well. This lineup doesn’t play a single driver in the top 20, but I do think it finds ways to be unique. We have a nice Toyota stack with Bell and Bubba. Both are popular, and both have upside. Even Alex Bowman, while projected to be popular, has some upside on drafting tracks. Allmendinger is a good way to get somewhat contrarian while rounding out the build with chalky YellaWood 500 picks like Briscoe and Hocevar. This lineup leaves $6,000 on the table for pivots.
FanDuel
- Brad Keselowski – $13,500; Starting P13
- Ross Chastain – $7,800; Starting P27
- Alex Bowman – $7,200; Starting P23
- Daniel Suarez – $6,500; Starting P31
- Erik Jones – $3,800; Starting P30
This lineup takes some more risks than the DraftKings build, but not many. It leaves a whopping $11,200 on the table. Get comfortable locking in uncomfortable lineups this weekend. We actually have a nice Trackhouse Racing stack with Ross Chastain and Daniel Suarez. If it comes down to it and those two are in contention toward the end of the race, Chastain should follow team orders and push Suarez to the win. Chastain got his win out of the way last week. It’s time to help his teammate get to the next round of the playoffs. We’ve touched on Keselowski’s drafting prowess as well as Bowman’s upside. Erik Jones may not excite many people, but he does have a win at Daytona on his resume during his time with Joe Gibbs Racing.
White Flag Thoughts Before You Go
I say this time and time again when we get to drafting tracks. I can’t recommend managing your bankroll enough for this race. If you have the luxury of max entering NASCAR DFS contests with the YellaWood 500 picks, by all means play around with your lineup generator and find your spots for leverage. If you’re the kind of player that may normally only do 10-20 lineups, then perhaps scale back your level of play. We’re trying to avoid having too many drivers in the big one. All the research in the world can’t beat the one lineup that was made blindly by throwing darts. So I do apologize for the brevity of this week’s YellaWood 500 picks. I am on vacation, but I hope you all crush your NASCAR DFS contests this weekend!