2014 NASCAR Sprint Cup Chase and Chicagoland Preview

Is Joey Logano a strong candidate to make final four in Chase?

We didn't see too much drama attached to last week’s final regular season race, but what the Richmond race did was give us our final 16 drivers for the 10-race Chase for Sprint Cup Championship that begins this week in Chicago.

It's NASCAR's version of the playoffs and I'm pretty excited about the first year of the new format.

The Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook, formerly known as the LVH, has also looked over the field and the 10 races ahead and have determined that Jeff Gordon is the 7/2 favorite to win his fifth Cup title and first since 2001.

This is the first time all season that Gordon has been listed by himself as the favorite. For the past few weeks, Gordon has been a 4/1 co-favorite with Jimmie Johnson, who still remains at 4.1 along with Brad Keselowski who now has a season high four wins on the season. Right behind them is Kevin Harvick at 5/1, a driver that has probably had the best car of the track on the most occasions this season, but hasn’t won since Darlington in April.

Those are your top-4 candidates to win the Chase and chances are they will likely be the four drivers competing for the best finish at Homestead which plays out like a championship game. Whoever has the best finish, wins. It’s pretty simple, and also very cool.

Every three races over the next 10, four drivers will be eliminated. The winning drivers from Chicago, New Hampshire and Dover will advance and the four lowest point totals are eliminated. Then the 12 remaining drivers go through the same process at the next three tracks at Kansas, Charlotte and Talladega. And then the final eight will duke it out at Martinsville, Texas, and Phoenix until four are remaining for Homestead.

The common thread on the 10 different tracks is that five of them are 1.5-mile layouts and we have seen the cream rise to the top in the six races run on those so far. Hendrick Motorsports claims three of the wins and Penske Racing has the other three. Although Joe Gibbs Racing won in seven of the 11 1.5-mile race last season, they haven’t been good on them this season, or at least they weren’t until Atlanta two weeks ago where Matt Kenseth finished second and Denny Hamlin third.

The JGC cars are the big wild card here and offer some interesting odds (Kenseth and Kyle Busch 12/1, Hamlin 18/1) or at least higher odds from candidates that could get their act together better than those not part of Hendrick or Penske. The key for JGR will be getting past the first three races. They should have a great opportunity to all fare well at Talladega and then if they can make the final eight, anything is possible

Here’s how I have it roughly stacked up for the next 10 races with the winner and drivers eliminated:

Read More Here....Top-5 Finish Prediction