By Cole Cusumano, Staff Writer
The NASCAR Cup Series playoffs roll out of Las Vegas and into the former site of the championship race at the revered Homestead-Miami Speedway. After opening up the Round of 8 with a successful weekend of analysis, The Money Stop is eager to replicate (and improve upon) their advice for yet another 1.5-mile track, ensuring bettors a haul from Homestead.
Although they couldn’t sustain their 70% top-10 finisher rate attained the prior two weeks, the Cusumano brothers highlighted four drivers who placed seventh or better, including Steven’s winner pick of William Byron in fourth, and the top-two of Joey Logano and Christopher Bell. They also correctly predicted six prop hits between finisher positions, driver matchups and better-worse results.
Entering the Straight Talk Wireless 400, seven drivers will seek to lock themselves into the Championship 4 with Logano, while 31 others attempt to play spoiler. Who should bettors have their eyes on as potential money makers in Miami? The BetMGM race winner lines opened with these playoff contenders as the five most probable to secure the checkered-flag:
- Kyle Larson +325
- Christopher Bell +600
- Tyler Reddick +650
- William Byron +700
- Denny Hamlin +1000
Favorites
Once again, Kyle Larson opens as the heavy favorite for a second consecutive week, and for great reason. As mentioned when previewing Vegas, the 2021 champion has proven to be the best of the best on 1.5-mile tracks in the Next-Gen era with four wins, four runner-ups and over 1,200 laps led. Homestead also profiles as one of his best tracks on the circuit.
Numbers aside, Homestead caters to Larson’s driving style and dirt racing upbringing, where he can rip the highline to make speed. The 2021 champion won his first race at Miami back in 2022. In his career, he’s placed top-five in half of his 10 starts with the most laps led in the series (625). Last year, the driver of the No. 5 fell victim to a late-race crash, relegating him to a DNF after leading over 95 laps.
As the definitive favorite, Larson can be considered for any range of prop finishes, including race winner. His third-most expensive Daily Fantasy value of $20 million per GridRival will make him tough to include in lineups, but he should be well worth the cost.
If Larson is considered the heavy favorite, Tyler Reddick should be the driver next-most likely to find victory lane – even entering with the third-shortest odds to do so, and as someone who has yet to win at the 1.5-mile track in his Cup career. After running into trouble at Vegas, the 23XI Racing driver finds himself in a potential do-or-die moment, sitting 30 points below the cutoff with Martinsville Speedway looming – a track he’s struggled to get a grasp on.
From persevering through a stomach flu to win the regular-season title by one-point, to executing a masterful rally at the ROVAL to make the Round of 8, Reddick may need to produce another big-time moment in order to keep his championship hopes alive, and he seems primed to do so.
Much like Larson, Homestead is a track that’s alway accentuated Reddick’s style of racing. In four Cup starts, he’s scored three podium finishes, including a career-best runner-up in 2021 and third last year. Although yet to win there at the sport’s top rank he did score a pair of wins at the 1.5-mile track in the NASCAR Xfinity Series.
Bell may seem like the more logical pick to win, factoring in momentum and the fact he won the most recent race at Miami, but don’t sleep on Reddick. Like Larson, he could be considered for all prop predictions, and actually serves as a more than worthy compromise for the Hendrick Motorsports driver in Daily Fantasy with a salary of $16.7 million – only the 12th-most expensive.
Sleepers & Spoilers
Serving as the former site of the championship race, it should come as no surprise that only former champions make up the sleepers section for Homestead. It’s almost impossible not to think about the prospects of the reigning champ Ryan Blaney, who is 47 points below the cutoff as the seventh-ranked driver in the Round of 8.
Blaney is coming off a career-best showing at Homestead, where he finished second, placed top-three in both stages and led the second-most laps of the event with over 50. While he only has two top-five finishes in nine starts, both have come over his last four races in Miami.
Although 47 points is a significant gap, Homestead won’t be a must-win for Blaney. Last year, he went on to finally get an elusive win at one of his best tracks in Martinsville, propelling him to his first title. With success at both upcoming tracks in mind, expect the No. 12 team to approach this race aggressively, yet smart. Definitely consider Blaney as a top-five play (with winning upside at +1000) and especially for Daily Fantasy at $17 million.
Finally, Martin Truex Jr. put together a complete race and scored his second finish of sixth or better over the last four weeks. To the eye test, the No. 19 team has looked much more competitive, and now we’re starting to see results, as the former champion looks to close out his full-time Cup career with one more win.
Bettors can start to put more trust into Truex, especially going into one of his best tracks – one where he won the race and championship back in 2017. In the Next-Gen era, he has a sixth-place finish and an outlier DNF from last year, after succumbing to an engine issue from the pole. Truex has led laps in six of his last seven starts at Homestead, with 12 top-10s and a 10.7 average in 19 starts.
Truex will be more of a risky pick for props, but he should be one to watch as a spoiler for this weekend at +1400 for the win and a modest $16.4 million in Daily Fantasy.
Values
Shockingly, there are only two drivers with top-10 finishes in both Next-Gen starts at Homestead. The crazy thing is – even with names like Larson and Reddick already mentioned – both have yet to be featured and are legitimate values for this weekend.
The first driver is Austin Dillon, who is the fourth-least expensive Daily Fantasy driver at $10.6 million. The grandson of Richard Childress finished a career-best fourth in 2022 and has a worst finish of 25th, all the way back in his first Cup start at the 1.5-mile track. Since then, he has yet to place outside of the top-15, with four top 10s and an impressive 11.4 average. This means the driver of the No. 3 has a very high floor and should be a sneaky-good value for Sunday.
Dillon boasts great career numbers at Homestead, but there is statistically no one better in the Next-Gen era regarding finishes than A.J. Allmendinger. The veteran, known for his road-course prowess, is the only driver to finish top-five in both starts with the current car.
In addition to proven results at the 1.5-mile track, he’s shown speed in his limited Cup attempts this year, most recently scoring his fourth top-10 of the season at the ROVAL two weeks ago. Not to mention, confidence should be sky-high for the ‘Dinger, as he became the first driver to lock himself into the Xfinity Series Championship 4 with a win at Vegas. It goes without saying, but Allmendinger should be a lock for all Daily Fantasy lineups and heavily considered for a top-10 finisher prop.
Big-Money Bets
Big-Money Bets are more attainable props – such as top-10 finishers, winning manufacturer, etc. – bettors can feel confident placing a larger chunk of change on, as opposed to outright race winner bets. Typically, The Money Stop will only advocate for props with an above-even payout, but it’s not out of the question recommending favorites to score a top-five finish with below-even payout.
For the sake of not revealing everything in these columns, two Big-Money Bets will be provided each week. The same applies to the upcoming Better-Worse and Head-2-Head predictions provided by GridRival. You can hear all of The Money Stop’s prop recommendations and predictions by streaming the podcast.
- Ryan Blaney (Top-Five) +130
- A.J. Allmendinger (Top-10) +190
Better-Worse Finish
GridRival has a unique game – not available on sportsbook apps – where users can predict if a driver will place better or worse than the finishing position provided. Users have the luxury and flexibility to get creative by combining multiple Better-Worse predictions and Head-2-Head matchups.
- Tyler Reddick 5.5 – Better
- Austin Dillon 17.5 – Better
Head-2-Head Matchups
Much like traditional sportsbook apps, GridRival’s Head-2-Head matchups are pretty self explanatory. Users predict which driver will end up with a better result than the other. The big difference with GridRival, is the fact not all matchups are straight-up one driver over the other.
For some matchups, there are positional buffers, where favorites must finish ahead by a certain amount of positions, while the underdog can finish within a set amount of spots. Positive numbers mean the driver the user is picking can finish within that number of spots (i.e. +2.5 can finish within three spots of the opposing driver). Negative numbers mean the driver being picked is a favorite and must place x-amount of spots higher than the opposing driver (i.e. -2.5 must finish three spots better).
- Austin Dillon (+2.5) > Chase Briscoe
- Tyler Reddick (+2.5) > Kyle Larson
For two more favorites, sleepers and values each, as well as prop predictions, stream The Money Stop podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and Kickin’ the Tires’ YouTube.
GridRival is a motorsport-specific gaming platform, where people can enter contests and make predictions via numerous unique methods not available on other apps. You can download the app and use the code “KICKIN” upon signing up to get a $100 deposit match, location pending.