Is Christopher Bell Now ‘The Man’ at JGR?

1. It’s Still a Little Too Early to Panic About Toyota Smacking the Field

While the teams that took smashed-up racecars home from the first two races of the season will likely disagree, what just transpired at Phoenix Raceway this past weekend made for the least interesting race of the NASCAR Cup Series season so far.

That’s an issue for two reasons.

One is that the season finale, the race that decides the championship, is at the same track. If something similar happens in November, it’s not exactly a sign that we’re all going to be on the edge of our seats anxiously watching to see who wins it all.

But the bigger issue, albeit one closely tied to the first, is why it was a little dull: Toyota had the other two manufacturers covered and smothered, in Waffle House parlance.

Consider that not only did Toyota drivers lead all but 14 laps at Phoenix, but the only interloper who kept it from being a clean sweep was Todd Gilliland. Did he heroically race his way to the front, passing a bunch of cars to make that claim?

Let me assure you, dear reader, he did not. He got to the point by staying out longer than everyone else during a long green-flag run during the race’s second stage.

Unless you’re someone with a vested interest in Toyota’s success — and particularly if you are part of Legacy Motor Club, which appears to have made the best-timed manufacturer switch in recent memory — this is suboptimal. Even the perception that Toyota has a Cup Series title in the bag somehow in mid-March is bad for the sport.

That said, it’s a little too early to be going all Chicken Little. The Cup Series season is notoriously long and fickle, usually with some momentum swings in the summer and then again in the fall. There’s also the not-insignificant matter of Toyota drivers having to make the Championship 4 to take advantage of their seeming superiority at Phoenix, and if there’s a silver lining to the playoff system that no one seems to fully love, it’s that weird things can happen once the postseason begins.

So while everyone should be tipping their caps to the Toyota camp and both Chevrolet and Ford teams have to be working overtime to prevent a repeat, there’s no reason to get all bent out of shape over Toyota backhanding the rest of the field.

Yet.

2. Is Christopher Bell the Top Gun at Joe Gibbs Racing Now? Does it Matter?

It’s fair to wonder if the internal pecking order at multi-car Cup…