The start of the NASCAR Cup Series season is so close you can smell it! A unique short track Clash at the Los Angeles Coliseum unofficially kicks things off on Sunday, February 6th. Of course, the start to the points season is marked by the epic Daytona 500 two weeks later. With nine months of action ahead, making preseason futures bets isn’t the wisest thing we could be doing with our money. But futures can be a good way to cash in on a handicap that requires the full season to resolve.
As state-by-state legalization of sports betting in the United States continues to spread, we’re starting to see some diverse offerings in the NASCAR futures markets. DraftKings is one of several domestic books upping their game for bettors as long as they’ll keep taking our action. And this season, they rolled out a nice slate of season win totals for 16 Cup Series teams. This article focuses on defending Champion Kyle Larson’s over/under 6.5 win proposition and makes the case for where I put my money.
An Epic 2021 Season
The numbers truly speak for themselves. Kyle Larson jumped into a new #5 team under the Hendrick Motorsports stable and never looked back. Sure, the 10 wins are truly astounding – but 26 top 10s in 36 races?!? Yet after all of that, Larson’s season win total sits at a modest 6.5. What’s the catch?
Precedence For a Dominant Encore
The #5 team has such a high win total because they won 10 freaking races last year! In fact, Larson’s 6.5 mark is three wins higher than the next highest offering of 3.5 wins to Chase Elliott and Denny Hamlin. Because everybody knows how dominant Kyle Larson just was, he has to compile back-to-back seasons in dominant fashion to go over in 2022. That’s a Captain Obvious statement for sure, but it captures the root of what bookmakers are asking this team to do – and specifically that’s win 7+ races once again.
The Close Calls
So the first thing that crossed my mind was: how infrequent is it for a driver to win 7+ times in consecutive seasons? Let’s start with the close calls.
- Denny Hamlin, 2019-2020: technically the closest in recent seasons, Denny won 6 races in 2019 and 7 in 2020. Close but no cigar.
- Kevin Harvick, 2018-2020: won 8 races in 2018, dipped to 4 in 2019, then crossed the threshold again with 9 wins in 2020.
- Martin Truex, Jr., 2017-2019: MTJ’s 2017 Championship season featured 8 victories, dropped to 4 in 2018 like Harvick, then rebounded with 7 wins in 2019.
- Carl Edwards & Kyle Busch, 2008-2010: both drivers pulled off the two out of three ain’t bad when Edwards won 9 in 2008 & 2010 and Busch won 8 in those same years.
The Real Deal
I had to go all the way back to the 2007-2009 days to find a guy you may have already heard of: Ol’ Seven Time Jimmie Johnson. Jimmie stacked up three straight 7+ win seasons in the midst of five straight Cup Series Championships with the #48 team. Perhaps not so coincidentally, Johnson tallied up 10 wins in 2007 then followed up with 7 next season. Enough to cash an over 6.5 wins ticket. And then he won 7 times again in 2009 before falling short with 6 victories in 2010.
Friend of the BetCrushers, Paul from the Playing the Odds Nascar Style podcast (nascarstyleodds.com) reminded me the other night just how awesome the #48 team was from top to bottom. That type of comparison is a tough ask of this #5 team headed up by Cliff Daniels, though they were one of the fastest crews out there – if not the fastest – on their way to the Championship. So another top tier year from Daniels and company could give Larson the type of leg up on the competition that Jimmie and Chad Knaus did.
PRESEASON WAGER: Kyle Larson UNDER 6.5 Wins (-120)
I didn’t get too deep into speed and other data like I usually do for in-season handicapping. (But when I do get into those details, my guy Ryan at ifantasyrace.com has the goods.) Determining the likelihood of back-to-back 7+ win seasons requires a much more macro level view of the situation. At least that’s how I see it anyways. Based on the historical breakdown above, I put a much lower probability onto Kyle Larson achieving this than the implied odds of -110 on the over represent. The dude can drive his ass off in pretty much any vehicle on any surface. Bold statement or not, I’m not quite ready to put Larson in the company of Jimmie Johnson. And that’s good enough to get a few of my bucks into a 2022 futures bet on the under.
I still have to deal with the reality that my wife so bluntly stated: “What if he is the next Jimmie Johnson?” Well, it’s gonna cost me then.
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