Here are my early driver rankings for this week’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Martinsville. I compiled them by crunching:
- The loop data for the past 15 Sprint Cup races (excluding Daytona and Talladega);
- the loop data for the past four races (excluding Daytona and Talladega);
- the loop data for the past four races at Martinsville;
- the loop data for the past eight races at the other tracks in the Flats track group (i.e., Richmond, Phoenix, Indy, Pocono and New Hampshire);
- the practice and qualifying data for the past four races at Martinsville; and
- the practice and qualifying data for past eight races at the aforementioned Flats.
The results:
- Jimmie Johnson
- Kyle Busch
- Jeff Gordon
- Clint Bowyer
- Kasey Kahne
- Dale Earnhardt Jr.
- Brad Keselowski
- Kevin Harvick
- Matt Kenseth
- Mark Martin
- Brian Vickers
- Martin Truex Jr.
- Ryan Newman
- Carl Edwards
- Paul Menard
- Greg Biffle
- Tony Stewart
- Joey Logano
- Aric Almirola
- Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
- Juan Pablo Montoya
- Jamie McMurray
- Kurt Busch
- Jeff Burton
- Marcos Ambrose
- Bobby Labonte
- Regan Smith
- David Ragan
- Casey Mears
- David Reutimann
- Danica Patrick
- Landon Cassill
- Dave Blaney
- David Gilliland
- Travis Kvapil
- Michael McDowell
- David Stremme
- Joe Nemechek
- Josh Wise
- J.J. Yeley
- Scott Speed
- Ken Schrader
- Scott Riggs
- Mike Bliss
Good picks and great site! I’ve been checking your stuff out since the beginning of the year, and figured it was time to post.
I’m always intrigued by Kyle Busch and where he might end up. I’ve got him with the 3rd highest win probability, but only the 11th highest projected points, because he’s got such a high chance of crashing.
How do you deal with special cases like Regan Smith?
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Dave: I set you up with a subscription to my email notification system. So when I post new rankings, you’ll get an email alert. Good?
Erik: Yes, KyBu is interesting. Probably the best pure wheel man in the game, and right now the Gibbs cars look very strong, too. He had such bad luck last year. If he can get just average, break-even luck this year, he should have a great year.
Ah yes, Regan Smith. On one hand, he gets an undeserved bump in my formula because he’s now in lesser equipment and the formula includes data from when he was in better equipment. On the other hand, he’s missing races, which hurts him in the formula. So, I figure it evens out sorta, and I’ve therefore refrained so far from manually moving him up or down in the rankings.
From a Yahoo fantasy perspective, though, it’s pretty simple: If he’s an option in Group C, he’s almost a slam dunk starter. Both for value, and to help save Stenhouse, etc., starts.
I should probably see what his standard deviation is (i.e., his predicted finish in my formula vs. his actual finish) and compare it to the overall average. That would tell me if I’m on the right track with him. If I get time, I will.