<body><div><figure><img src="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&amp;url=2qdcJZ_0vCMdy4z00" alt="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=2qdcJZ_0vCMdy4z00" width="1152" height="768" ><figcaption>(Photo: James Gilbert/Getty Images)</figcaption></figure><p><b>Did You Notice? …</b> Harrison Burton’s recent NASCAR Cup Series win ensures the driver with the <i>least</i> amount of points among full-time drivers will make the playoffs? </p><p>That’s where we are in 2024 after Burton’s surprising run to the front during the white-flag lap at Daytona International Speedway.</p><p>Since then, critics have vilified Burton as an unfair beneficiary of the sport’s playoff system. With one win, he’s leapfrogged 18 drivers in front of him to make the postseason, becoming the equivalent of a 16 seed in the yearly NCAA Basketball Tournament.</p><p>But Burton did nothing wrong to earn a shot at the title. Instead, he played along with the same NASCAR rules that have been in place for years. The issue for me isn’t win-and-you’re-in, it’s that <i>too many</i> people make it into the postseason. Nearly 50% of NASCAR’s grid (16 drivers) qualify when not once have we made it to 16 winners during a 26-race regular season.</p><p>That means underdogs like Burton automatically get their shot, when a smaller field of, say, 12 drivers would leave him on the outside looking in. One less round is really all you need to remove those longshot Cinderellas; Cup typically averages 13-14 playoff eligible winners a year.</p><p>The bottom line is a group of five drivers: Martin Truex Jr., Ty Gibbs, Chris Buescher, Bubba Wallace and Ross Chastain are left to battle for the final three spots. Another Burton-level upset at Darlington Raceway this weekend would squeeze it to two.</p><p>But does it really matter if one of these men doesn’t get the chance Burton does? Like most sports teams living on the edge of the playoffs, all of them who miss have had plenty of chances to get over the hump. Back in June, I wrote a column about how each of them had wins slip through their fingers in a year defined by parity.</p><p>Let’s look again at how each of these bubble drivers could have punched their ticket into the playoffs months ago.</p><h2>Martin Truex Jr.</h2><p>Who can forget Truex had May’s Richmond Raceway event in the bag until a caution with two laps left? Silly contact between Kyle Larson and Bubba Wallace forced NASCAR overtime, then a pit stop in between where Truex lost the lead and control of the race.</p><div style="position:relative;width:100%; height:0; padding-bottom: 56.25%;"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/qSp47WuAhlQ?start=33&amp;feature=oembed" allowfullscreen frameborder="0" style="width:100%; height:100%;top:0; left:0; position:absolute"></iframe></div><p>Truex, retiring from full-time competition at the end of 2024, really hasn’t ever fully recovered. He’s earned just two top-five finishes since, none of them since May, and has contended far less than Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Denny Hamlin and Christopher Bell.</p><h2>Ty Gibbs</h2><p>Gibbs started the season with five top-10 finishes in the first six races, rising as high as second in points. The peak of that wave came in March at Bristol Motor Speedway, with Gibbs leading 137 laps and sweeping the first two stages as multiple teams struggled with excessive tire wear.</p><p>But the very same patience Gibbs used to charge through the field wore itself out during the final stage. He overdid it with a set of Goodyears, forcing an extra green-flag stop, and wound up in ninth, one lap off the pace. That first win just hasn’t been a hump Gibbs has been able to get over, similar to how Chase Elliott and William Byron started their Cup careers.</p><h2>Chris Buescher</h2><p>Buescher has the biggest beef of anyone on this list. He could have won two races this year: Kansas Speedway and Darlington in May.</p><p>Darlington feels like the one he should have had. Buescher and Tyler Reddick were fighting hard for the win before Reddick slipped up and made contact with Buescher’s No. 17. Within minutes, both were on pit road and out of contention, causing conflict between the duo after the race.</p><div style="position:relative;width:100%; height:0; padding-bottom: 56.25%;"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ggUSMe7Uedc?feature=oembed" allowfullscreen frameborder="0" style="width:100%; height:100%;top:0; left:0; position:absolute"></iframe></div><p>It was the second straight week Buescher got hit by someone racing for the lead, getting the short end of the stick. And while he said he’d change the way he races to win, another opportunity really hasn’t presented itself to show it.</p><h2>Bubba Wallace</h2><p>For Wallace, it feels like Michigan International Speedway just two weeks ago is where his playoff hopes might have slipped away. Teammate Reddick won that event, but Wallace arguably had a faster car, leading five laps that Sunday (Aug. 18) before the race was rain delayed.</p><p>Unfortunately, when the race shifted to Monday, circumstances never went Wallace’s way. The way cautions fell trapped the No. 23 Toyota in traffic, sitting wrong place, wrong time when Kyle Larson simply lost it coming out of turn 4.</p><div style="position:relative;width:100%; height:0; padding-bottom: 56.25%;"><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/7OtkJVclxQE?feature=oembed" allowfullscreen frameborder="0" style="width:100%; height:100%;top:0; left:0; position:absolute"></iframe></div><p>Wallace was forced to limp home the rest of the race, watching Reddick cruise to victory instead. Now, he needs to close a 21-point gap on Buescher (or win) to fight his way back into the postseason.</p><h2>Ross Chastain</h2><p>Chastain had the playoffs in the palm of his hand during the Nashville Superspeedway race in June. In position to win his second straight race there, he led 45 consecutive laps in the final stage only to get run down and passed by Hamlin. A flurry of cautions followed that scrambled the running order anyway, but that was Chastain’s race to lose. And he lost it, along with his momentum; just one top-10 finish in the last six races put him 27 points below the playoff cut line with Burton’s win.</p><p>Those five are the most notable on the list. But in reality, <i>all</i> drivers fighting for the playoffs, especially with this system, are sitting there thinking of races that got away.</p><p>Kyle Busch<b>:</b> Look no further than the last lap at Daytona Saturday night (Aug. 24). Or how about the inches Busch lost to Daniel Suarez by at Atlanta Motor Speedway in February?</p><p>Chase Briscoe<b>:</b> A surprising second-place finish at New Hampshire Motor Speedway left him just 1.1 seconds behind winner Bell.</p><p>Todd Gilliland: Two races in, Gilliland had led more laps (74) than any driver this season. He was a strong contender at both the Daytona 500 and Atlanta, only to get shot in the foot by crashes not of his making.</p><p>Michael McDowell: Four pole positions this season have shown Front Row Motorsports has speed in qualifying. McDowell took that track position and posted an average finish of 23.5 in those events. Ouch. The most notable one that got away was Talladega Superspeedway, where a late block on Brad Keselowski sent him spinning. </p><p>Austin Dillon: One silly wreck between Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Ryan Preece is all that kept Dillon from becoming <i>another</i> upset win this month at Richmond. Instead, his pinball-style, video-game aggression in the overtime restart that followed kept him from becoming postseason eligible.</p><p>That’s just a snapshot of how the <i>other</i> 18 drivers who will miss out on the playoffs could have had their chances. It’s the most forgiving system of any of the major sports in America: you can have six months of terrible, but then one good week and suddenly you’re in position for more.</p><p>So don’t blame the 16 seed. These drivers who miss have no one else to blame but themselves.</p><p><b>Did You Notice?…</b> Quick hits before taking off …</p><ul><li>I was heartened to see the Final NASCAR Appeals Officer upheld keeping Dillon out of the playoffs after that Richmond finish. But I couldn’t help but think, back in 1990, whether we’d have had the same result. Is that growth for the sport as a whole or just a sign of how much Richard Childress’ power and influence has receded over two decades after Dale Earnhardt’s death?</li><li>Layne Riggs won the Camping World Truck Series at the Milwaukee Mile. The days prior, Ryan Truex won in the Xfinity Series and Harrison Burton in Cup at Daytona. Talk about passing the torch to the next NASCAR generation within the course of 72 hours. Have we ever seen this strong a family connection play itself out?</li><li>Yes, Alex Bowman has a win and will go for a championship starting next weekend at Atlanta. But he still has just 14 laps led this year. Among those who have led as much or more in Cup: Shane van Gisbergen (in five starts), Justin Haley, John Hunter Nemechek and Corey LaJoie (who was just released from his ride). It’s why the rumors about Bowman’s future persist within a Hendrick Motorsports program that struggles to accept that type of mediocrity.</li></ul><p>Follow Tom Bowles on X at @NASCARBowles</p></div></body>

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Did You Notice?: Harrison Burton Didn’t Burn Down the NASCAR Playoffs

Did You Notice? … Harrison Burton’s recent NASCAR Cup Series win ensures the driver with the least amount of points among full-time drivers will make the playoffs?. That’s where we are in 2024 after Burton’s surprising run to the front during the white-flag lap at Daytona International Speedway.

Did You Notice?: Harrison Burton Didn’t Burn Down the NASCAR Playoffs

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