DIXIE VODKA 400 PICKS
Date: Sunday, February 28, 2021
Venue: Homestead-Miami Speedway
Location: Homestead, Florida
Television-Time: FOX, 3:30 p.m. ET
Venue: Homestead-Miami Speedway
Location: Homestead, Florida
Television-Time: FOX, 3:30 p.m. ET
PRESS THE FIRST-TIMERS?
First-time Cup winners have won the first two races of the 2021 NASCAR Cup season for the first time since 1950 and there are few candidates with a legitimate shot at making it three straight in Sunday’s Dixie Vodka 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway’s high-banked 1.5-mile paper-clip layout.
There are 16 of the 38 drivers entered this week looking for their first Cup win and the ones that stand out the most are drivers with past victories at Homestead in the Xfinity and Truck Series.
How about rookie Chase Briscoe in his Stewart-Haas Racing No. 14 who won in Xfinity last season while also winning in the Trucks in 2017?
He’s being offered at 60-to-1 odds.
His teammate Cole Custer won at Kentucky last season as a rookie for his first Cup win and is being offered at 100-to-1 odds. Briscoe obviously has the oddsmakers' attention.
Bubba Wallace won a Truck race at Homestead in 2014 and we get to see how the No. 23 responds with the 550 horsepower package after seeing the other two packages first to start the season.
I expect the car to be competitive and very similar to a Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota.
But I think the best shot at winning from a first-timer is Tyler Reddick in the Richard Childress Racing No. 8 Chevrolet who won back-to-back Homestead races in the Xfinity Series in 2018 and 2019. In his first Cup start there last season he finished fourth after leading three laps.
The oddsmakers at William Hill opened Reddick at 25-to-1 and opened his teammate Austin Dillon at 60-to-1.
Check around for better odds at other sportsbooks because I’m sure someone in charge of creating NASCAR odds fell asleep on Reddick and Briscoe.
I’ll have a small bet on Reddick but I don’t believe we’ll have a third straight race with a first-time winner. I think it’ll be one of the well-known names in NASCAR to win, or at least I hope.
No comments:
Post a Comment