Rules are meant to be broken, according to some.
How about unwritten rules?
Sure, what’s it hurt?
Generally, your resident NASCAR power ranker doesn’t like to change the pecking order of his previous week’s top 10 after this week’s plate-race at Daytona or Talladega (or, of late, Atlanta). You don’t learn much about strengths and weaknesses in a style of racing where so much is out of the driver and team’s hands.
But this one has a different feel to it, maybe because it’s the last week of rankings before we run a playoff race. More likely, however, it’s due to one driver, almost exclusively one driver, showing up week after week over the past two months and haulin’ a little mail.
Yes, that would be Ryan Blaney, whose recent streak of solid results culminated in his dash to the checkers Saturday night at Daytona. Can you blame me? Probably not.
Harder to explain, however: How can we see Denny Hamlin atop our list for so many consecutive weeks and then see him drop four spots, to fifth, after the aforementioned “plate race” at Daytona? Because, frankly, you could take positions 2-through-5 and put them in a hat.
Someone has to be second, someone has to be fifth. You could invert positions 2-through-5 here and you’d get no argument from me.
1. Ryan Blaney
Momentum can go away with one bad pit stop or one bad tire, but by golly, for now, he has Big Mo.
2. Chase Briscoe
We had a surprisingly hard time determining a No. 2 driver here. And not necessarily for a great reason.
3. William Byron
Mr. Hunch says Billy the Kid will finish fourth at Darlington.
4. Kyle Larson
This would be a good time to find that eighth cylinder on a consistent basis.
5. Denny Hamlin
Here we go again … Year 20 and still looking to bag NASCAR’s biggest prize.
6. Alex Bowman
Ever escape a near-miss unscathed? Blaney’s Daytona win saved Alex’s season, and the adrenaline alone should be worth some horsepower at Darlington.
7. Christopher Bell
Wake him when the Round of 8 rolls around.
8. Bubba Wallace
Is Bubba too high-profile to be a playoff sleeper?
9. Joey Logano
Did they save their magic toolbox (and rabbit’s foot) from last year’s playoffs?
10. Chase Elliott
Can you flip a switch to end a mini-slump? We’re about to find out, but Darlington is a tough place to make things right.
