1. This is the most unfair round of the NASCAR Cup Playoffs ever
Setting aside the not inconsequential debate over whether the NASCAR Cup Series champion should be decided using a playoff system, the NASCAR Playoffs are pretty fine on paper. They reward consistency, since being too crappy for several straight races will get you bounced, and winning, since a victory automatically advances you to the next round.
On top of that, the playoff schedule tends to be nicely balanced, meaning each round requires drivers to perform at a high level across several different types of tracks.
That’s the theory, anyway. But after … whatever it was that just happened at Texas this past weekend, this Round of 12 has turned into a cruel mixture of skill and good fortune, leaning more toward the latter.
By itself, a battle royale-style test of attrition wouldn’t be so bad (though yes, it is bad that one could have the fastest car but oops, there goes a tire, randomly). The problem is that Texas is now followed by Talladega and the ROVAL, two of the top four races of the year in terms of the chances of random bad luck swallowing your chances to advance whole.
This entire round now feels like the NASCAR equivalent of trying to hit a parlay bet in sports. If you manage to avoid tire disaster at Texas, and you avoid the Big One at ‘Dega, and you somehow come through the ROVAL unscathed, then you can proceed to be one of the eight drivers to battle for the championship.
Entertaining? Probably. Fair? Definitely not.
2. Texas can’t just “try anything” to change
Sometimes there’s a difference between honest feedback and a helpful critique. For example, Kyle Larson was speaking from the heart when he said he’d like to see Texas demolished and the powers that be start over from scratch, as was Denny Hamlin when he opined that “Anything would be better at this point.”
That sentiment is all well and good, but reality, as it so often does, rains pretty hard on that parade. Even if Texas Motor Speedway didn’t literally follow Larson’s advice, any kind of major reconfiguration — like, say, turning it into a short track — of the venue would take so long that it would probably mean missing a season. Even smaller changes, like changing the banking, etc., would have to be underway within weeks to be ready for next year.
As Dale Earnhardt Jr. astutely pointed out over the weekend, whatever a “New Texas” would look like, it would need to fit in something…
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