NASCAR DFS: B&L Transport 170 Playbook

We’re going back to some road racin’ this weekend! The Cup series returns to Sonoma, a track they did not get to run last season, and Xfinity will be heading back to Mid-Ohio, a track not run in 2020. I’ll include a brief track breakdown below as I don’t believe I previously covered this track in a XFIN playbook. We’re back to no qualifying and no practice this week so it’s just a show up and race format. Given that we have a road course, we don’t have a ton of dominator points to look at here. If we do the math right we have about 52.5 dominator points on the docket so we’re mostly looking at drivers that can give us position differential as well as a solid finishing position. Could a laps led dominator emerge and end up in the GPP winning lineup? Of course, but a simple rule of thumb this week is to look for PD. Also keep in mind it’s difficult to lose laps on a road course because of the length. However, if a driver does lose a lap it can be increasingly difficult to get it back unless they’re the lucky dog position on a caution.

Not as long and not as many turns as COTA, so we’re getting more laps. The track has gone through some refurbishments over the years so as it stands right now it has 13 turns and runs 2.258 miles long.

This race is no stranger to cautions. In the last five races at Mid-Ohio we’ve seen anywhere from six-to-nine cautions ranging from 17-to-32 laps. That kind of sucks given these drivers haven’t run here in two years and they won’t get practice. So we can probably expect a fair amount of cautions and in all honesty, maybe we’re looking at some cheap laps led. Again, that equates to maybe four or five total DFS points so we’re not talking about an Earth-shattering total, but worth keeping in mind. And with the higher number of cautions we’ll likely see a handful of drivers not finish the race. The ARCA race on Friday night had a field of 17 drivers and about a third of the field didn’t finish.

Driver Pool

Austin Cindric ($10,900; Starting P1) – Cindric will be on the front row for Saturday afternoon’s race and he’s no stranger to starting up front at Mid-Ohio. In two races here he’s started on the pole and finished first and second leading a total of 105 laps combined. Also, he’s won and finished second at DRC, he’s finished third (twice) at the Roval, he won at Watkins Glen, got a top five while leading 21 laps at Indy’s road course, blah blah blah. He’s good on road courses.

A.J. Allmendinger ($10,700; Starting P12) – Can’t have a road course playbook without road ringer Dinger. Allmendinger’s won the last two races at the Roval, finished second two weeks ago at COTA, third at this track back in 2019 and he won here back in 2013. Additionally, he has top five’s at DRC, Watkins Glen, and Road America. He’s Cash and GPP eligible this week given the PD. He will need to collect dominator points to return value, but the PD will be very appealing to the field this week. I will also add that Allmendinger hasn’t quite looked like himself lately. The results have been relatively mediocre by his standards and he hasn’t led a ton of laps lately. But still, starting 12^th on a road course will make him popular.

Ty Gibbs ($10,400; Starting P2) – He’s running part-time in Xfinity and already has two wins. He won last week at Charlotte and he won DRC earlier this season in his debut. I won’t be playing him and Cindric together, but if doing 20 lineups you can experiment with one build going that route and hope they can split the dominator points and finish top two. That’s basically the only path for that to work. Coming to a new track with no practice is a little concerning so I’d probably favor Cindric over Gibbs, but the latter got plenty of practice Friday night as he ran away with the ARCA race on this track… So count that as his practice.

Justin Allgaier ($9,900; Starting P5) – Allgaier’s a pretty decent road course driver that probably doesn’t get enough credit. In five races at Mid-Ohio, he has four top tens including a win back in 2018. The lone race he finished 31^st was due to an accident. At Watkins Glen he has three straight top five’s and six straight top ten’s. He also finished third two weeks ago at COTA and at IRC last summer he finished seventh overall but finished second in the first two stages. If the field is going to jump on Gibbs and Cindric for early laps led, why not get some leverage and look at Allgaier for some GPP lineups or even a cheap single-entry build?

Josh Berry ($9,700; Starting P31) – So Josh Berry is not in his normal 8-car this weekend. He’ll slide over to the 31-car for Jordan Anderson Racing. Berry doesn’t have any Xfinity road course experience, but given the car he’ll be in he’s going to start pretty far back so we’ll have PD to consider. Tyler Reddick managed a top ten out of this car at COTA, but Reddick is a far better driver than Berry. However, Berry did grab a win at Martinsville which isn’t a road course, but the flat surface and tight turns can draw comparisons to road course racing. But I’ll reiterate the lack of practice doesn’t do him any favors.

Miguel Paludo ($9,300; Starting P29) – So I wasn’t on him for DRC and he got a top ten. Then I was on him for COTA and he finished 34^th. I hope this isn’t some kind of sick, diabolical pattern the universe is throwing at me. But I’m going back to him on Saturday. He’ll be in Josh Berry’s 8-car for JR Motorsports and he has road course experience. And like most road course specialists subbing in for this race, he offers PD this weekend.

Andy Lally ($8,900; Starting P27) – Lally is stepping back into a ride for the Xfinity series race this weekend and he’s a notable road course driver. He’s raced in four of the last five Xfinity races at Mid-Ohio and he’s finished 21^st, seventh, fifth, and 15^th. A little variance, sure. But all in all without practice we can probably trust a road ringer in this format. At other road courses at the Xfinity level he has four top 15’s at Road America including two top tens, and he grabbed a top five in last year’s race at DRC. He’s going to be a popular PD target this week given his resume and equipment. He also acknowledged on Twitter earlier this week that this could be his last Xfinity race of the year. He has a scheduling conflict during the weekend of Watkins Glen and he doesn’t have an invite/offer for IRC or Road America. So for now, I’m operating under the assumption he’s looking to go out with a bang.

Brandon Jones ($8,700; Starting P7) - He has a mixed bag of results on road courses. He has a pair of top five finishes at DRC, but other than that the results aren't great. However, he's a reasonable price with a good starting spot and he ran the ARCA race to get practice laps Friday night. Brandon Jones' name recognition alone is associated with variance so keep exposure to just GPP's, but don't hesitate to throw him into 15-20% of your builds in case we find lightning in a bottle.

Preston Pardus ($7,900; Starting P39) – Pardus is another road ringer that will likely have less ownership than Lally. He’s stepping into the 90-car for DGM Racing and in another DGM car (91) two weeks ago he got himself a top 15 at COTA. Alex Labbe drove this car two top 15’s at Indy and Road America in 2020 so the car is capable of getting there. Pardus got a top ten in DGM’s 36-car last year at IRC and a top ten last year at Road America. He’s probably more of a GPP play because DGM cars can either get a top ten or finish outside the top 30. But Pardus really can’t get you negative PD this week.

Alex Labbe ($7,400; Starting P16) – Labbe qualified top five a couple weeks back at COTA but ultimately finished 20th. Don’t be misguided he’s still a decent road course driver. He grabbed a top ten in his lone race at Mid-Ohio in 2018, but he also finished eighth at IRC last summer and fourth at the Roval during the playoffs. The starting spot tells me he could be more of a GPP play, but I’ve played with him in some preliminary cash builds and it’s possible to build a competent lineup with him in it.

Landon Cassill ($6,800; Starting P20) – I like Cassill this week for a couple reasons. There are a lot of obvious plays on this slate. So that means the field will be paying up, and down, on the same drivers. But Cassill falls right in this spot where he’s priced to the point the field might night be able to fit him in, plus he’s starting higher than what we’re used to. Is he a recognizable road course driver? No. But he finished 12^th at DRC earlier this year and despite the conditions at COTA he moved up eight spots and finished 22^nd. And as mentioned in the opening paragraphs, we’re expecting some drivers to not finish the race. And I’m just hoping for a clean run from Cassill and maybe he steals another top 15.

Jeremy Clements ($6,600; Starting P8) – Clements is a good road course driver, but Mid-Ohio probably isn’t his best track. He has a top ten from way back in 2013 and he finished 11^th here two years ago, but his other five finishes were outside the top 15 and given that he’s had a really solid season he’s starting pretty high so the PD upside won’t be as abundant for this weekend’s action. For that reason he’s mostly a GPP play. He has a pair of top ten’s at DRC, three top 15’s at Watkins Glen, and he won at Road America back in 2017.

Kris Wright ($6,200; Starting P33) – Wright opens up salary and offers lineup flexibility and he has road course experience. He had engine issues at COTA, which helped the FAmily since we weren’t on him. However, I’ll change my tune this week and hope we pick correctly on Wright this week. He normally runs the truck series, but he has road course experience that we need to consider since he’s raced here before. I don’t think ownership will be as high as it was two weeks ago for COTA so this is a good opportunity to mix him into some builds. He needs to finish 22^nd to hit 5X value, but given the chaos we’ve seen at Mid-Ohio previously, that’s not entirely out of the question. But he does need a clean race. On Friday, he finished a lap down, but still got valuable practice laps in for the ARCA race.

David Starr ($4,800; Starting P36) – If I’m being honest, this is purely a gut call. I started writing this Playbook on Monday when I got the initial entries for this race and I thought Stephen Leicht would be running the 61-car for Hattori Racing. And while I have more faith in Leicht on road courses, I still want to give Starr a shot this week because I think most people will view the next driver as a punt. David hasn’t exactly earned a Gold Starr (pun intended) on road courses. But at this price I just want him to finish 27^th or better and he’ll give us some value.

Joe Graf Jr. ($4,700; Starting P37) – I don’t want to go this low because I know there is buzz surrounding Graf as a cheap paydown option ahead of Saturday’s race. He’s been running at the end of the last handful of road course races, which tells you he can keep the car clean. Plus, he can’t kill you with negative PD since he’s starting on the second-to-last row. However, he will be the popular punt option this weekend and I get the logic behind it. But this is a race with a lot of cautions. Xfinity hasn’t raced here in two years, they won’t get practice or qualifying, so while I’m going to throw him into two or three builds, I’m hoping I don’t have to dumpster dive too low here.

Core Drivers