Off weeks during the Sprint Cup season are a great time to reflect on what has happened and how that affects fantasy NASCAR. So four races into the 2010 season, what have we learned?

1. Richard Childress drivers once again have fantasy value.

After a horrible 2009 season, Clint Bowyer, Kevin Harvick and Jeff Burton have been much faster this year. Harvick is currently the points leader while Bowyer and Burton rank 5^th and 6^th in the standings, respectively. Each of these three drivers are in Yahoo’s B List and look to be locks for nine starts in 2010.

2. Dale Earnhardt Jr. is back. Well back-ish.

Earnhardt was downright awful in 2009 and has shown signs of life through four races this year. Junior currently ranks 13^th in the points and 5^th among B List drivers in points per race. With Bristol and Martinsville up next on the Sprint Cup schedule, we’ll find out very soon just how good this 88 car can be.

3. Joey Logano is getting better every week.

More seat time means more experience. After scoring seven Top 10 finishes in ’09, Logano already has two in only four starts this season. With Harvick, Kenseth, Bowyer, Burton and Kasey Kahne looking to be nine start drivers, Logano is showing the consistency needed in fantasy NASCAR to help us hit the magical 72 B List starts needed each season.

4. The big guns at Joe Gibbs Racing are struggling.

Coming into the 2010 season, many people (including myself) picked Kyle Busch and Denny Hamlin as the frontrunners to end Jimmie Johnson’s championship streak. Through four races, these two drivers have zero, yes zero, Top 10’s combined in eight total starts. I’m not ready to panic yet, but bad runs at Bristol and Martinsville, two racetracks these two drivers historically dominate, would be very troubling for Joe Gibbs Racing.

5. Hello C List depth.

When Yahoo unveiled this year’s driver groupings, we all said the same thing, “Wow, the C List looks awful.” Sam Hornish Jr. and A.J. Allmendinger looked like nine start locks, but where would our other 18 C List starts come from? Enter Paul Menard and Scott Speed. Menard and Speed currently rank 1^st and 2^nd in C List points, respectively, and average a full 12 points more per race than the 3^rd ranked C Lister. With Robby Gordon at the road courses and drivers like Bobby Labonte and Regan Smith at the plate tracks, saving C List starts looks a lot less important.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 8th, 2010 at 3:51 pm and is filed under Fantasy Advice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.