🔥Written by 2020 FBWC and 2021 KoS qualifier @joejets19

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Rouff Mortgage 500 🏁

NASCAR continued its hot streak last weekend with another phenomenal race in Las Vegas. The west coast swing continues to the land of no daylight savings time and a track that produces great races no matter what rules package is used. The Rouff Mortgage 500 will take place this Sunday afternoon at Phoenix Raceway in Avondale, AZ. The track is an oddly shaped 1 mile, flat, tri-oval and will be the home the Championship race later this season everyone is going to be playing extra attention to how this race plays out to give them an edge later in the season.

On to Phoenix!

Scoring Breakdown

At this point, we know how the DK scoring system works, so let's see how many points are available this week:

Laps Led Points =0.25 points per lap led. This week, 312 laps will be run and 78 DK points will be awarded (plus any overtime laps).

Place Differential Points = 1 point per position gained or -1 point per position lost.

Fastest Lap Points = 0.45 points per lap not run under caution (roughly 270 laps should run under the green flag for a total of 121.5 possible DK points).

Finishing Position Points: The 40th place driver receives 4 points, and for each position gained, another point is awarded (39th=5, 38th=6…) and the winner gets 46 points.

Lineup Construction 🏁

I always feel obligated to point out that the 500 in the name of the race is referring to the number of kilometers being run, not miles or laps, for some bizarre reason but hey it's another Phoenix quirk so why not point it out. Another quirky thing about Phoenix is everyone talks about how hard it is to pass here, yet it seems like a driver that has to start from the rear wins one of the two races here this season. It apparently is difficult to pass here, when your car is mediocre, but really can't we say that about most tracks?

Now enough about the random thoughts about the track and let's dive into how I am looking to attack this slate. The strategy I outlined last week, where we spend up on place differential drivers and then spread our dominators out over a big pool, worked out pretty well again last week. Going underweight on Larson paid off and our stud place differential driver (Kyle Busch) was actually able to lead a nice chunk of laps. I think we are starting to see a trend of mid-level drivers being able to make their way up front and disrupt our "traditional" understanding of how a race will play out. Races at Phoenix can have anywhere from one to three drivers that lead more than 100 laps. Taking some notes from the previous two races this season, I would project it to be more like 4 drivers that lead more than 60 laps with only two or three that make the perfect lineup. Dominators usually started in the top 10 and I would expect that trend to continue but with the increased opportunities to lead laps, I am going to continue to expand my dominator pool. Don't be afraid to roster a bargain-basement driver this week, Phoenix has been very kind to the basement and those drivers don't even really need to do much to make the perfect lineup.

Stage 1: 60 laps, Stage 2: 125 laps, Stage 3: 127 laps

Lineup Foundation Targets

Ricky Stenhouse Jr ($7,000 DK, $7,300 FD)

God help me for using Stenhouse as a cornerstone to my cash team this week but he's starting 36th on Sunday and he can't mess that up...right? The key to the Stenhouse play this weekend is his low price. Phoenix is not Ricky's best track and he only has three top 20 finishes in his last eight races here but luckily for us, all he needs is a 21st place finish to hit 5x value. Stenhouse could quite possibly be the highest owned driver in the field, which isn't a concern for me in cash games but we have seen him crash at very inopportune times in the past so an argument can be made to go underweight in tournaments.

AJ Allmendinger ($7,200 DK, $7,000 FD)

Allmendinger is starting 29th on Sunday and can be used as a pivot off of Stenhouse in tournaments or in conjunction with Stenhouse in cash games. While we have zero practice data from Ricky on Saturday, we actually know that AJ has a decent car. Allmendinger had the 10th best single lap speed and 11th best 5 lap average in practice which gives me a significant amount of confidence going into this race. He is slightly more expensive than Stenhouse (on DK) and is starting 7 places further forward so I expect his ownership to be slightly lower, but still in the top 5. While Allmendinger has not raced here since 2018 he has still been an active driver, racing in the Cup, Xfinity, and Truck series throughout the years. He has a decent track history here, with three top 20s in his last six and no finish worse than 26th in his last seventeen. I would honestly rank Allmendinger the safer play between he and Stenhouse but I actually think Stenhouse's ceiling may be higher.

Tournament Targets

Ryan Blaney ($9,600 DK, $11,000 FD)

Blaney starts on the pole on Sunday and was very fast in practice. Blaney had the second-best single lap time as well as the second best 5, 10, 15, 20, 25 and 30 lap averages. He was fast over the short and the long run, something you love to see from a potential dominator. An extra boost is the fact that the driver he was second to, Kyle Larson, will have to start in the rear of the field so he will be out of the way for at least the first stage. Blaney is no stranger to the front of the field at Phoenix, he led 35 and 33 laps in the two races here last year and led 94 laps from the pole position in March 2019. I don't expect Blaney to run away with this race by any means but I think 60-90 laps led with a top 5 finish is a very likely outcome and he is the most likely dominator in the field.

Austin Cindric ($7,700 DK, $7,800 FD)

Cindric burst onto the scene with a win at the Daytona 500 and now gets to show his talents on a track he was very successful at during his Xfinity career. Cindric is starting 8th on Sunday and provides race winning upside at an incredibly low price. Austin was great in practice, posting the best single lap time of the afternoon and followed that up with top seven 5, 10, and 15 lap averages. In his last three Xfinity races here, Cindric had two wins and led between 72-119 laps. Cindric is the type of driver that would generally be caught in no-mans land that should not be in consideration with the next generation car.

Bargain Basement

Ty Dillon ($5,900 DK, $3,500 FD)

Dillon is coming off of two straight top 20 finishes and is starting to see his price creep up. This week, he starts 21st at a track that he has had considerable success at in the past. Dillon's practice times were mediocre but his ceiling is definitely the highest in the basement (he has three top 15 finishes in his last 7 races here). There are safer drivers starting behind him but I think Ty brings tournament-winning upside for a low price driver.

Other Drivers To Consider

Here are 3 more drivers I like at Phoenix that have a chance to make some noise in no particular order:

Kevin Harvick ($9,100 DK, $10,000 FD)

Bubba Wallace ($6,400 DK, $4,000 FD)

Martin Truex Jr ($9,800 DK, $13,500 FD)

Top Driver to Avoid

Christopher Bell ($8,300 DK, $9,000 FD)

Bell is starting 4th on Sunday and qualified way better than he practiced. Bell Turned in the 20th best single lap tap Saturday afternoon and didn't fare much better in the long run either. Bell has never finished better than he started at Phoenix in his Cup career, despite his consecutive top 9 finishes last year. He has also never led a lap here which is another reason to worry about his incredibly high starting position

Pitstop Picks

0-2 last week, looking to get back into the green

4-4 (+1.45u)

Doubling down on my Bell fade here. Bowman and Reddick both like riding the high line and prefer steeper banked tracks. I see this is a 1v1 Bell vs Kes and give the edge to Kes, with great odds I may add. Historically Keselowski has run pretty well here including four top 10s in his last 5. I'm thinking a top 7 is going to win this group and I think this is the race that puts Brad's season back on track.

Kurt Busch has beaten Briscoe in both non-restrictor plate races this season and we can get him at + money. Briscoe ran well in practice and qualified well but had two poor showings last season at Phoenix. Kurt has some ground to make up but as long as he doesn't make any unforced errors he should be able to cruise past Briscoe over 500 kilometers.

Thanks for reading and good luck this weekend! Be sure to join me in the LineStar NASCAR chat!

Be sure to download the Ruoff Mortgage 500 cheatsheet and find me on Twitter Good Luck!