Kansas Lottery 300 DFS Expert Picks & Lineups: NASCAR Xfinity Playbook

It took a while, but we finally made it as the NASCAR Xfinity Series Playoffs officially kick off Saturday afternoon from Kansas! Last week we saw Cole Custer go to victory lane at Bristol while Sheldon Creed, once again, finished as the runner up. As it stands right now, Creed has now racked up 13 second place finishes in the Xfinity Series and Rick Allen has appropriate dubbed him “Silver Creed.”

As the playoffs kick off Saturday afternoon from Kansas Speedway we have a dozen drivers competing for the coveted Xfinity Series championship. Of late, the Xfinity Series doesn’t visit Kansas twice a year like the Craftsman Truck Series does. However, this is a phenomenal track that produces some of the best racing we’ll see all year. Let’s take a look at the remaining playoff drivers and lineup building strategies as part of this week’s Kansas Lottery 300 DFS picks!

Kansas Lottery 300 DFS Picks & NASCAR Lineups

Kansas Speedway plays host this weekend and we certainly have plenty of intermediate tracks at our disposal to analyze the top plays early on. Practice and qualifying for this race will happen Saturday morning starting around 11:00am ET. 

This race is set for 200 laps around the multiple grooves of Kansas. That means we’ll likely have roughly 130-135 dominator points to target once we account for cautions and things of that nature.

For Friday’s Craftsman Truck Series Playbook, we recommended a multi-dominator approach for a race with less laps. That will once again be the case for Saturday afternoon’s action. However, I am a little more willing to build out some lineups with just one dominator. In this race a year ago, John Hunter Nemecheck led 154 laps and won the race. Justin Allgaier led 40 laps from the pole, but he finished 18^th. The negative PD basically wiped out any points he accumulated running up front.

This race two years ago was shortened to just 93 laps due to weather, but they completed the first two stages, so it technically counted as an official race even with 18 caution laps. But Noah Gragson led 20 laps in a winning effort while Ty Gibbs led 66. Even in 2021’s playoff race for the Xfinity Series we saw Austin Cindric lead 151 laps and finish second. No other driver led 20 laps.

While we can certainly take some risks and try to nail the correct dominators, do try to take a bold stand and build out some lineups with just one dominator in mind. From there you can use the remaining salary to build a balanced roster with good drivers that can move up and finish well, and you won’t have to dumpster dive too much for value plays.

This Playbook will have updates in RED on Saturday once we have the practice results and know the starting order.

Top-Price Kansas Lottery 300 DFS Picks

Justin Allgaier – DraftKings: $11,000

Allgaier is the most expensive driver in the field and for good reason. He doesn’t have any wins at Kansas in his career, but he carries plenty of experience with 14 races here. He has 10 finishes inside the top 10 at Kansas including a runner up effort in 2022. And last year he led 40 laps and finished third in the first two stages but ultimately finished 18^th.

Intermediates have been where Allgaier has thrived and shown he can dominate races. He led 117 laps at Texas earlier in the year and finished third. Kansas and Texas don’t compare well aside from being 1.5-mile tracks, but Allgaier also led 119 laps in a winning effort at Darlington which has tire wear similar to Kansas. Allgaier led 40 laps at Charlotte but was caught up in a wreck and then led 37 laps at Michigan to claim his second win of the year.

There’s always the chance he can get his first Kansas win this weekend. But overall, there’s dominator potential and he could put up a huge score for our Kansas Lottery 300 DFS picks. Update: Starts P9 but still is the favorite to win today's race. A little PD never hurt anyone.

Cole Custer – DraftKings: $10,800

It might be a bit chalky and easy to start off with the two most expensive drivers in the field, especially Custer, who won last week’s race. Custer has been simply fantastic on the comparable tracks this year.

He finished second at Vegas, fifth at Texas, third at Darlington-1 (with 21 laps led), second at Darlington-2, and then at the larger high-speed tracks he won Pocono and finished second at Indianapolis with 72 laps led between both tracks.

It doesn’t get much better than that and there’s a little extra motivation for him this weekend to avenge last year’s result at Kansas after he was caught up in a wreck.

Austin Hill – DraftKings: $10,000

We haven’t previewed Austin Hill too much of late as he’s largely a better play on superspeedways and drafting tracks. Kansas doesn’t feature any of that. But he’s had some good results on intermediates including the larger tracks as well.

He has a pair of top five finishes in three races specifically at Kansas. Even earlier this year he was fourth at Vegas, sixth at Texas, second at Darlington-1, ninth at Darlington-2, then he was seventh at Pocono and sixth at Indianapolis.

One thing to be mindful of for this very race is the price tag. We likely see Austin Hill come in at low ownership because he hasn’t led many laps this year at the comparable tracks. Even in the three races he’s won this year, he’s led just 23 laps. It will be difficult for him to pay off this price tag simply by finishing well. But crazier things have happened. If he can start on the front row for this race, he has a path to earlier dominator points at least.

Mid-Price Kansas Lottery 300 DFS Picks

A.J. Allmendinger – DraftKings: $9,000

Allmendinger doesn’t have a win this year, but he still made the playoffs. As things currently stand, he enters the Round of 12 four points below the cut line. But there are definitely some drivers he could pass. Possibly even his teammate, Shane Van Gisbergen. However, Allmendinger does have some win equity for this race.

Dinger has run two races at Kansas in the Xfinity Series for Kaulig Racing. He qualified well in both races, inside the top five as a matter of fact. In 2022 he finished sixth and in 2021 he finished third with 10 laps led. In both races he had a driver rating over 100.

Dinger has been finishing well all year long, but we just haven’t seen him dominate races nor get any road course victories. But he finished sixth at Vegas, fourth at Texas, fifth at Charlotte, and he was top 10 at Pocono, Indianapolis, and Michigan. If we can get a little position differential out of him, he has a pretty easy path to 40+ fantasy points on DraftKings. Update: Starts P14 with top five equity? Yes please!

Brandon Jones – DraftKings: $8,500

We can never feel great rostering Brandon Jones. Why? Ever since he joined Jr. Motorsports it seems like he’s forgotten how to drive. In two years with JRM he doesn’t have a win and he’s missed out on the playoffs once again. At least when he was with Joe Gibbs Racing, he had win equity which is a nice segue for us…

Jones does have two career wins on his resume at Kansas from 2019 and 2020. He’s never been a huge dominator here as he led 10 laps in both wins. However, a year ago in this race he did finish second in his first tenure with JRM, and in his final Kansas race with JGR he finished fourth here.

He had a good effort last week in Bristol as he finished sixth but still came up short of making the playoffs. But on the comparable intermediate tracks this year, he finished ninth at Vegas and was second at Charlotte. Update: He'll be a GPP only option for this slate. He did win the pole which gives him a chance to lead laps early and this is still one of his better tracks. But he crushes your lineups if he wrecks.

Parker Kligerman – DraftKings: $7,500

There isn’t any win juice with this play, but Kligerman is currently below the cut line for the playoffs. He’s only a dozen points out and still has plenty of opportunities to get into the next round.

But it’s also Kligerman’s last year as a full-time driver. Apparently, that broadcasting money is too good to pass up, but he’s had a good run with Big Machine. But he had a great showing last year in this race after starting P15 and finishing fourth. 

He’s definitely had some highs and lows on the comparable tracks, but he’s also been dishing out consistent results of late. We note how we’d like PD out of several drivers, but Kligerman usually does provide that for us. For a driver at $7,500 he’s put up 40+ fantasy points seven times since the start of July with a few 50 burgers baked into that sample size as well. Update: Qualified a bit too high so I'm very unlikely to roster him.

Value Kansas Lottery 300 DFS Picks

Josh Williams – DraftKings: $6,800

This article is pretty heavy on Kaulig Racing drivers, so you’ve been warned. Williams isn’t a great driver, but he’ll likely carry some ownership across several NASCAR DFS contests on DraftKings. With that said, Williams has typically been a reliable, and affordable, source for position differential.

Williams started P32 at Vegas and finished 14^th. At Texas he started P22 and finished 12^th. That’s basically been the case with Williams at a majority of tracks. Even at Charlotte he started P36 and finished eighth while he was top 20 at Darlington-2 (but finished 21^st at Darlington-1). Update: Not cash game eligible but he did qualify well and still has a chance to finish in the top 15.

Daniel Dye – DraftKings: $6,700

Dye returns to the 10-car for Kaulig Racing. I actually like that he’s running this race. He’s getting extra laps in for Friday night’s Truck Series playoff race, of which, he is a playoff driver.

So he gets the more stressful race out of the way and can view this as a race to just better himself as a driver. Dye hasn’t had great results, but he’s still worth taking a gamble on. His running position has typically been in the top 15.

He started P36 and Dover and finished 20^th, then at Iowa he started P37 and finished 10^th. At the larger tracks like Pocono, he started P20 and finished 17^th and then at Indianapolis he started P22 and finished seventh. Dye ran in the Truck Series race at Kansas in the spring and grabbed a top 10. I do actually think he has similar upside for this very race given the extra track time this weekend. Update: Starts P30 with top 20 upside. Good play in all formats.

Leland Honeyman – DraftKings: $5,700

Honeyman might drive for a bad team (Young’s Motorsports) but that hasn’t derailed him from being a NASCAR DFS gem in the value tier. In seven races this year he’s returned 40+ fantasy points and even if we expand the sample size to 30+ fantasy points he’s returned that nine times.

Similar to Josh Williams, he’s not the great qualifier. Coming into Kansas he’s qualified outside the top 30 in five of his last six races. So we should be looking at an affordable PD play. In five of his last seven races he’s managed to finish in the top 20. If he can keep it clean for this race, he has potential for another 30-point performance. Update: Starting dead last so he has a good floor for cash games.

Kansas Lottery 300 NASCAR Xfinity Series Driver Pool