NASCAR.com’s Fantasy Live game is the most popular allocation management game on the internet. It requires a different way of thinking than salary cap games like Draft Kings, and fantasy players need to take some time during the off-season to develop a game plan.
The Driver Profiles published at Rotoworld throughout the winter are a good starting point.
As of this writing, we are up to the 24th-ranked driver Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and as we count down to No. 1, take a moment to at least glance at each and note which tracks rank among the drivers’ three-best and –worst so you can be prepared to save some allocations for courses where they shine brightest.
Of course there is no substitute most weekends for momentum. When Alex Bowman rattled off his three consecutive runner-up finishes at Talladega, Dover, and Kansas in the spring there was little that predicted he would be great on each track; his best courses are Chicagoland, Sonoma, and Daytona.
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On two of those weeks, Bowman scored the second-most points in the Fantasy Live game, but it is notable that he won in Chicago and earned the most points that weekend.
Fantasy Live’s point structure rewards race points with some bonuses tossed in. A little later we will take a deeper dive into Segment Points and how they have impacted both the racing and points’ production, but for the moment we will take a few minutes to recap the total points in NASCAR.com’s game.
As expected, the Championship 4 all rank near the top of the order. Kyle Busch (1,303), Kevin Harvick (1,303), Martin Truex Jr. (1,275), and Denny Hamlin (1,273) got to the finale by dominating races and racking up Segment Points and bonuses.
Busch was the top points’ earner seven times with Hamlin and Truex topping the chart six times. Harvick was the top earner four times. On two occasions, one of those drivers was perfect: Busch swept the stages at Auto Club in route to Victory Lane to earn 60 points. Truex did the same thing at Martinsville in the fall.
There were two other drivers who also had perfect scores during the season even though they were less consistent overall. Brad Keselowski swept Martinsville in the spring with Chase Elliott performing the feat at Watkins Glen.
Denny Hamlin came close to perfection at Phoenix in the fall with 59 points and Truex almost added another flawless race at Richmond in the fall.
Harvick earned 58 points at Indy with his victory and solid showings in the Stages.
Meanwhile, the only other driver with 58 or more points in a single week last year tops the total points’ chart below. Joey Logano was outperformed in the Round of 8 and did not get a chance to defend his title, but he was the best overall value in the Fantasy Live game with 358 Segment Points and 11 wins added to his total. At the end of the year, he edged Busch by four points.
Logano was also a little more consistent than any other driver in the game with an average rank of 7.89 in 36 races. Busch (8.44), Harvick (8.75), and Hamlin (9.22) were the only others with an average rank of better than 10th.
That meant Truex – while he had clutch performances at the end of the season – was less reliable throughout the year as shown by his average ranking of 10th. Last year Truex was outside the top 20 in Fantasy Live points six times. What made this a little more palatable to players was the fact that all four of the aero-restricted superspeedways were included in that list.
If you read the weekly Fantasy Live previews, you undoubtedly remember that every time one of the wild card tracks rolled around, we suggested that you avoid marquee drivers who would be more productive elsewhere. There was a reason for that: while Busch, Hamlin, and Logano were the top three earners in the Daytona 500, Chase Elliott took top honors at Talladega 1, William Byron was the best in Daytona 2, and Ryan Blaney was best in Talladega 2.
Those are marquee names, but they did not make the top five in points’ earned by the end of the year. One should also note that Justin Haley won the summer Daytona race and earned the second-most points that weekend. Michael McDowell earned the seventh-most points in the Daytona 500 with Ty Dillon earning the fourth-most in the Coke Zero 400. Not to be outdone, his brother Austin Dillon earned the third-most in both Talladega races.
After the top five drivers in points earned, there was a big drop in productivity to Brad Keselowski. On any given week, he was liable to earn four points less than Hamlin and five fewer than his teammate Logano – but allocation management games require you to go deeper in the lineup. Keselowski earned the fifth-most or greater points 12 times, so if you caught him on the right weekend, he helped win your league.
What allocation management games do not reward are dark horses.
Ryan Newman (869 points) and Paul Menard (769) were the closest one could find to a sleeper because everyone above them belonged to extremely well-funded, multi-car teams. Newman and the Roush Fenway Racing organization was in a rebuilding year. Menard raced for the single-car satellite team of the Wood Brothers.
Fantasy Live Points | ||||
Driver | Avg. Rank | Total Points Earned | Avg. Points | Attempts |
7.89 | 1,307 | 36.31 | 36 | |
8.44 | 1,303 | 36.19 | 36 | |
8.75 | 1,303 | 36.19 | 36 | |
10.00 | 1,275 | 35.42 | 36 | |
9.22 | 1,273 | 35.36 | 36 | |
11.69 | 1,127 | 31.31 | 36 | |
12.06 | 1,073 | 29.81 | 36 | |
12.53 | 1,062 | 29.50 | 36 | |
13.50 | 1,048 | 29.11 | 36 | |
12.71 | 1,090 | 28.68 | 38 | |
13.00 | 991 | 27.53 | 36 | |
14.06 | 959 | 26.64 | 36 | |
14.64 | 944 | 26.22 | 36 | |
14.28 | 923 | 25.64 | 36 | |
16.00 | 884 | 24.56 | 36 | |
14.81 | 869 | 24.14 | 36 | |
16.61 | 832 | 23.11 | 36 | |
16.44 | 771 | 22.68 | 34 | |
17.17 | 769 | 21.36 | 36 | |
18.42 | 725 | 20.14 | 36 | |
18.58 | 718 | 19.94 | 36 | |
19.14 | 672 | 19.20 | 35 | |
20.14 | 666 | 18.50 | 36 | |
20.67 | 612 | 17.00 | 36 | |
23.14 | 540 | 15.00 | 36 | |
23.97 | 506 | 14.06 | 36 | |
24.32 | 505 | 13.65 | 36 | |
24.33 | 482 | 13.39 | 36 | |
26.58 | 401 | 11.14 | 36 | |
26.31 | 352 | 11.00 | 32 | |
27.11 | 388 | 10.78 | 36 | |
27.64 | 147 | 10.50 | 14 | |
28.86 | 308 | 8.80 | 35 | |
29.73 | 118 | 7.87 | 15 | |
29.64 | 283 | 7.86 | 36 | |
32.11 | 100 | 5.56 | 18 | |
32.50 | 51 | 5.10 | 10 | |
32.96 | 118 | 4.72 | 25 | |
32.94 | 77 | 4.53 | 17 | |
34.57 | 49 | 3.50 | 14 | |
34.20 | 35 | 3.50 | 10 | |
34.46 | 37 | 3.08 | 13 | |
35.18 | 30 | 2.73 | 11 |
2019 Draft Kings High-Cap Productivity
2019 Draft Kings Mid-Cap Productivity ($8k-$10k)
2019 Draft Kings Mid-Cap Productivity ($6.9k-$8k)
2019 Draft Kings Low-Cap Productivity
