CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — It seems everyone except champion Joey Logano is eager to see a change in NASCAR’s playoff format.
How to fix this remains up for debate.
Logano won his third Cup Series championship earlier this monthreigniting the conversation about whether the current playoff format is the best way to determine a worthy champion. Logano ended up winning four races this season, but only finished in the top 10 13 times in 37 races and clearly didn’t have one of the best cars during the season.
Logano, it seemed, was doing just enough to get by.
He also had his share of breaks, using what amounted to a Hail Mary victory in Nashville – stretching his empty fuel tank for five overtimes – to advance to the playoffs. He was actually eliminated from the playoffs in the second round, only to be reinstated after a competitor’s car was deemed illegal.
Logano’s title run has left some drivers wanting to see the system tweaked, with suggestions ranging from minor tweaks to major changes.
“I think the message we’re trying to send is: Make the regular season more important,” said Denny Hamlin, driver of the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing car and co-owner of the 23XI team. Racing. He suggested increasing the bonus points a driver gets during the regular season.
“The (Christopher) Bells, (Kyle) Larsons deserve to have a really good buffer there to get through the (playoff) rounds,” Hamlin said. “We’re in a sport where you can get caught up in so many accidents and different things that can happen. … There are 26 races (in the regular season) and they don’t turn out to be that important to winning a championship and that’s not something you want.
Hamlin suggested that over the past three years, Team Penske’s champions — Logano twice and Ryan Blaney once — “haven’t had to do much” during the regular season.
“And that’s probably not good,” Hamlin added.
NASCAR likes the current playoff system because of the emphasis it places on each race before the final stretch of the season in its never-ending quest for Game 7 moments. Stock car racing’s governing body remains open to changing the format if it improves the sport.
“I love that aspect of it,” Bell said of the focus on playoff races, “but maybe adjusting the points system to make sure we have the right cars in the race event championship would be awesome.”
Blaney said it’s up to drivers to adapt the current rules. But he said that in his “ideal world” he would like to see the top 16 drivers in points in the regular season qualify for the playoffs. He said race winners should get 10 or 15 points instead of five, and the regular season champion should get 30 extra points.
Blaney’s latest suggestion involves fewer playoff races.
He suggested the 16-car field should be reduced to eight after five heat races, with the remaining eight drivers competing in the final five races of the championship.
“I would like to see a group of races to end the year where no one is running away with it and where you have three to five races and you still have really good competition,” Blaney said.
Logano just shakes his head and offers a sarcastic smile at all this talk.
He insisted the system didn’t need to be changed after his breakthrough win in Phoenix and didn’t stray from that belief at the annual awards ceremony Friday in Charlotte.
When asked if any changes needed to be made, Logano said, “Nothing, personally. I wouldn’t change a thing,” adding that he thinks the format is “super entertaining.”
Of course, if you’ve won three championships since 2018, why would you want to change?
“I think we all need to understand why we changed it in the first place, it was because the fans said they didn’t like the way it was, so we changed it,” he said. Logano said. “And then everyone loved it. And it was great. And now, oh, are we going to complain about it again? Come on, guys. Damn.
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