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The NASCAR Cup Series heads to Bristol on Saturday night for the final race of the Round of 16. With non-playoff drivers winning the first two playoff drivers, it's still anyone's guess who'll make it to the next round of the playoffs. Only Christopher Bell has clinched a spot in the next round—of the other 15 drivers, there are scenarios where each could miss the next round, though it would be tough for drivers like William Byron or Denny Hamlin to miss.
This is the second visit of the year to Bristol, but the race back in the spring was run with dirt on the track, so it's not predictive of how this new generation car will race on this high-banked short track.
Below are my NASCAR DFS lineup picks for DraftKings and FanDuel this week. This slate locks on 9/17/22 at 7:45 p.m. ET. If you have any questions or want to talk about NASCAR, you can find me on Twitter at @juscarts.
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DFS Lineup Picks - DraftKings, FanDuel
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Chase Elliott
Starts 23rd - DraftKings $11,200 | FanDuel $13,000
Elliott entered the playoffs as the points leader, but the first two races of the postseason haven't gone well for him, as he's now seventh in points. And this week, just two playoff drivers qualified worse than Elliott. Is everything okay on this 9 car?
Honestly, I don't know. Elliott had a mechanical issue at Darlington and DNFed, then he was 11th last week at Kansas. But this is now the third race in a row that Elliott has qualified outside the top 20. Before the playoffs, that happened three times in 26 races.
Still, Elliott has a lot of place differential upside as he fires off from 23rd. He's never won a Cup Series race here, but he's led 20 or more laps in six straight Bristol races and looked like he might win here last year after he led 129 laps. This should be a good race for Chase.
Kevin Harvick
Starts 7th - DraftKings $8,500| FanDuel $12,000
Harvick is a little pricy on FanDuel, but I think there's some good value here on DraftKings.
This is a must-win race for Harvick. He's simply too far back of the playoff cut line to advance without a win unless things get unfathomably weird.
Good thing we're at Bristol, then. Harvick has won here three times, most recently in 2020, when he led 226 laps. Last year, he led 71 laps and finished second. I expect Harvick to move to the front quickly and to lead a good number of laps on Saturday night.
Bubba Wallace
Starts 14th - DraftKings $8,300 | FanDuel $8,800
Wallace won last week at Kansas, his second career victory. With that win, he's now finished in the top 15 in nine of the last 10 races, with four top fives in that span.
Bristol hasn't been a great track for Wallace, but it also hasn't been terrible for him, as he's finished outside of the top 20 just twice here, and one of those was in a race where he crashed on the third lap. Wallace is a nice value if you want someone who can gain around seven spots and finish solidly in the top 10.
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Daniel Suarez
Starts 29th - DraftKings $8,000 | FanDuel $7,800
Lot of place differential upside here for Suarez, who starts lowest of all the playoff drivers.
Suarez's numbers at Bristol were pretty good until the last two years, as he'd never finished worse than 18th, with a pair of top 10s in 2019 when he was driving for Stewart Haas.
It's hard to really hold 2020 and 2021 against him though. In 2020, he was driving for the Gaunt Brothers. Last year, he was driving for his current team, Trackhouse, but it was before the team took a massive step forward. I expect Suarez to gain at least 10 spots on Saturday night.
Ty Gibbs
Starts 25th - DraftKings $7,200 | FanDuel $6,500
Ty Gibbs is doing what you expect from a good young driver who is asked to suddenly take over a Cup Series car midseason: showing flashes but failing to put complete races together consistently.
Last week, Gibbs crashed out at Kansas, his second Cup Series DNF. But before that, he'd posted consecutive top 15 finishes. He only has one top 10 this year, but he's usually running between 11th and 20th.
With Gibbs starting 25th on Saturday, there's a decent amount of place differential upside here, though it's worth noting that in Xfinity, Gibbs has run into some issues here. Last night, he led 89 laps, but crashed a little over a third into the race and finished 36th.
Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
Starts 26th - DraftKings $6,800 | FanDuel $5,800
Bristol. Stenhouse. Duh.
If you don't know, Bristol is Stenhouse's best track outside of superspeedways. Of his 20 career top fives, four have come at Bristol, more than anywhere but Talladega. He has six top 10s overall here.
But Stenhouse has also struggled here since 2019, with a best finish of 20th. Three of those five races saw him fail to finish. So, this might not be the slam-dunk play that it seems like.
But, well...those results were in the old car. This new generation car has really leveled the playing field, allowing drivers to shine at their best tracks. I wouldn't be shocked to see Stenhouse fighting for a top five by the end of this one.
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