Full disclosure out of the way first, my mostorsport loyalty is extremely simple, Ferrari in f1 and GT racing or in Nascar Jeff Gordon and by extension whoever drives his 24 car. Ive always been a bit of an anti Denny Hamiln guy but his open OSU fandom and embrace of our Ohio against the World mindset really endeared him to me this season and last night he was a victim one of the most eggregious sports injustices I have witnessed since I had the slow motion replay of Jeff Okuda forcing a fumble on Justyn Ross forever etched into my mind. I just cant with this Nascar playoff thing anymore!
For those unaware, the nascar championship uses a playoff format where a field of 16 drivers is selected based on fairly normal criteria, overall points standings and wins. This field then has points reset to equalize the field however specific "playoff points" the drivers collect throughout the season carry over to this new standings to preserve some of the importance of the regular season. This field is then progressively reduced down to 4 over the final quarter of the season, after every 3 races the playoff field is cut by 4 drivers and points are again reset as before. However, the season champion is crowned from the final 4 drivers based on pure finishing position in a winner take all final race. This has been highly controversial since its inception, gone through multiple iterations and rules changes and has lead to several unworthy champions, I would argue that could be said about the majority of playoff winners at this point. Last night's race is the ultimate proof that this format need to end if this sport wants to maintain any credibility it still has as a legitimate championship.
In the closing laps it was obvious that Denny Hamlin was the best driver on track, he had led over 2/3 of the laps and built a nearly 4 second lead over his nearest competition and driver of my beloved 24, William Byron who had been fighting hard to claw back the gap and take the lead. With 3 laps to go Byron had a freak tire failure bringing out a caution to force a Green-White-Checker finish. Because of this the entire field was reset and Byron's teammate Kyle Larson was able to get ahead on pit strategy after being essentially out of the running since the early parts of the race. After not leading a single Lap Larson finished 3rd, Denny 6th awarding Larson his second cup series championship. A driver with 3 wins to Dennys 6 for the season, won the entire championship because he had such an incredible swing of good luck he managed to put himself a few places ahead for 2 laps.
The biggest reason this playoff system was created was because it was not uncommon for drivers to build an insurmountable points lead over 2nd place before the final race of the season, affecting attendance and viewership of the later season races. Nascar desperately wanted to fashion a high stakes finale, a superbowlesque final chase for the cup. I suppose they succeeded on the latter goal but in doing so have reduced a season long battle to a 2 mile drag race where finishing first isnt even the goal.
11 against the world, Ohio against the World
