The Camping World Truck Series returns Saturday afternoon at the tricky triangle, Pocono Raceway. The significance of Saturday’s race is that it marks the final race of the 2022 regular season for the Truck Series. This marks the final opportunity for drivers to win, or point, their way into the playoffs. Two weeks ago, Parker Kligerman captured his first win in about five years at Mid-Ohio. That’s a monstrous win for Henderson Motorsports, a part-time team with very few employees and you could tell how much it meant to that organization.
Do we see another team steal a win at Pocono and lock themselves into the ten drivers eligible for the playoffs? Let’s dig into Saturday afternoon’s action for Pocono.
Truthfully, this isn’t my most favorite track on the schedule for DFS. I know for fans the experience might be great. The scenery around the track is lush and beautiful, and I’m sure this makes for a great weekend getaway in a camper. But the quality of racing is usually pretty dry. The Truck Series was off last week, but similar to New Hampshire Raceway we may get some long, drawn out green flag runs where the field is spread thin.
The good news is that this track is massive. It’s 2.5 miles in length with three turns and the longest straightaway on the schedule. The longest straightaway is 3,740 feet in length and this track also allows drivers to go pretty wide on the front stretch into 14 degrees of banking in turn one. Turns two and three are eight-and-six degrees respectively.
Saturday’s race only has 60 laps on the table. That’s not a lot. In fact, it’s fewer than the ARCA race that ran Friday night. That means we have about 40 dominators points to work with so it’s not out of the realm of possibility to take a road course approach to this race and just look for some PD. We’ve gone three straight races here without the pole sitter finishing in the top five so don’t feel like you need to force them into your build for early dominator points.
Cautions probably won’t be as abundant on Saturday, but without practice and qualifying we might see a few more. In the last five races here we’ve seen four or fewer cautions in four of them for about 8-14 laps. But cautions still chip into the 40-ish dominator points available to us. Finding a way to differentiate your lineup in a GPP will be crucial to taking down a GPP. We’ve also seen passing be a little difficult at times, but in the last two races here it’s gotten better. From 2017-2019 we saw about nine or ten green flag passes per lap but in 2020 and 2021 there were about 30. If building 20 lineups don’t go overweight on too many drivers starting at the rear. If this is a snoozefest of a race, you’ll want to have a few contrarian builds focusing solely on drivers starting inside the top 20 with maybe one or two starting deeper in the field.
Now some wet weather did cause the cancellation of practice and qualifying on Friday. So everyone is on a level playing field in terms of DFS research. Nailing the right trucks that show up fast off the hauler is crucial. Don’t shy away from PD that’s being given to us. This is a track where we can find unique ways in the value range to differentiate our builds.
Driver Pool
Zane Smith ($10,800; Starting P1) – It’s hard to leave Zane off any Playbook given the win equity we get with him. He’s run Pocono twice finishing 14th in 2020 and 8th a year ago. He’s also run up front and collected some laps led in both races. I may only play him in GPP contests for Saturday’s race. Do I think he’ll completely mail this one in? No, but he doesn’t have a ton to race for if we’re being honest. He has a 58-point cushion in the regular season standings, and he has 18 more playoff points than Ben Rhodes who is second. Could he want to score another win and more points? Absolutely, but I do think there’s leverage in fading him here knowing there are more desperate drivers chasing the win.
John Hunter Nemechek ($11,100; Starting P12) – We haven’t seen the same level of dominance this year for JHN as we did last year where he collected five wins. Pocono marked his last win during the 2021 season and that came in June of that year. Since then he has just one win (2022 Darlington) and he just hasn’t followed up on his practice and qualifying times. But based on track history I do like him this week. Like I said, he won this race a year ago and in worse equipment he’s performed well here. From 2015-2017 for his family’s old team, he finished 13th, 9th, and 4th and he finished 12th and 7th here in two Xfinity Series races. We don’t play him with the same level of confidence from a year ago, but he should run up front on Saturday.
Ryan Preece ($10,600; Starting P22) We can probably assume Preece will have speed. He’s had it whenever he’s had the chance to drive in the Truck Series in 2022. In six races in 2022 he’s finished 7th or better in five of them including his second straight win at Nashville. You can likely draw some comparisons to Nashville and Pocono. But the equipment should be top tier and he’s offering PD. We’re getting a bit of win equity but overall, this is a very good play from a Cash and GPP perspective, but ownership will be very high. By no means will I be fading him in this spot though.
Corey Heim ($10,400; Starting P17) Heim is a great GPP play (although I do like him for Cash games as well) and one that may go overlooked. If you consider most lineups will start with Preece and the next driver in the Playbook, we may be getting Heim at low ownership if most DFS players are going elsewhere in this range. Heim has a pair of wins on his part-time resume this year, but he also has five finishes outside the top 20. That level of variance is the big concern. One of his wins did come at a flat track like Gateway so there’s certainly upside and I love the fact that he might be a low-owned option offering PD and win equity in equipment better than Preece and Hill.
Austin Hill ($10,200; Starting P31) Hill makes a return to the Camping World Truck Series for the first time since the season kickoff at Daytona over five months ago. Hill’s found success with a pair of wins this year at the Xfinity level, but he’ll run Saturday’s Truck Series race in the 7-truck. Hill is virtually a lock in Cash games given the PD and lack of laps to dominate. It may take him a hot minute to work his way through the field, but we know he is capable of doing so. Given we only have 60 laps in this race, it’s possible Hill is viable in all formats if he simply finishes in the top 15. In his last two races at Pocono in the Truck Series he finished 5th in 2021 and runner-up in 2020.
Chandler Smith ($10,000; Starting P2) Smith is a good way to get some win equity while pivoting off the more popular option of Zane Smith. Smith won Vegas earlier in the year and is a top five candidate each week. We saw him lead 40 laps at Gateway and this is a driver we can feel good about showing up with a good setup. This is a GPP only play as it’s still possible he goes backward without any dominator points.
Ben Rhodes ($8,900; Starting P11) This price is easily too cheap on Rhodes. He’s the defending series champion and while the recent form/results haven’t been as elite as we would expect, he’s still in great equipment and there’s still win equity. Rhodes has raced here six times and he has a pair of top five finishes and five finishes in the top 11. He was over $10K for the last three Truck Series races so $8,900 instantly looks too cheap and it’s likely he won’t carry significant ownership in GPP’s.
Tyler Ankrum ($8,500; Starting P14) – He’s always a bit of a wild card, but I think he’s in play this week based on track experience. Prior to Mid-Ohio he rolled off three straight top ten finishes and seems to have found a certain level of comfort with Hattori Racing. In three races at Pocono he’s never finished outside the top ten including a fourth-place finish here a year ago and a runner-up effort back in 2019. Both those performances were with GMS Racing but he’s finished 16th or better in ten of the fifteen races this year including six top ten finishes. Given the track history and his growth this year I’d say he’s in play but only in GPP contests.
Matt DiBenedetto ($8,300; Starting P16) Truthfully, I don’t love Matty D for Saturday afternoon’s race. But remember, it’s the last race of the regular season and he needs a win. Do I think this team wins? Absolutely not. But he will be desperate for a win to make the playoffs. I think they’ll try and nail the track position strategy to be in position to win. The equipment still isn’t great, but Matty D has gotten better as the season progressed. He’s run here plenty of times in the Cup Series and without practice and qualifying you can only hope this small team nailed the setup while others struggle.
Derek Kraus ($8,200; Starting P7) – Nothing flashy with Kraus but you have to imagine he’ll be motivated and pushing hard to get a win. In two races at Pocono he’s finished tenth both times and he’s finished 12th or better in five of his last six races. He’s a longshot to make the playoffs but he knows he realistically needs a win to make the postseason. So that does mean there’s some variance here and I’d likely only play him in GPP’s but use your best judgment when constructing your lineups.
Tate Fogleman ($7,000; Starting P36) Heed this warning with Tate Fogleman: 1. He is not a $7K driver, and 2. “Chalk” Fogleman is never good. He’s starting dead last and has PD. But without practice and qualifying it’s really difficult to gauge where this team is at. This isn’t a great style of track for him, but he did finish 21st here. Minimal exposure is okay in the event he does avoid carnage (if there is any), but I mostly wanted to include him to express the dangers of playing him even if he’s jumping off the page as a good play.
Todd Bodine ($6,700; Starting P34) Bodine is an easy Cash Game lock for Saturday afternoon’s race. I’m unsure how much exposure I’ll get in GPP’s but he’s such an easy pay-down option for Saturday’s race. This marks Bodine’s 800th career start in NASCAR and honestly, he’s been decent despite his age this year. He’s run five races this year finishing 22nd or better in four of them and in those four races he’s gained at least eight spots of PD. This is the deepest he’s had to start in the field this year and he has the ability to finish in the top 20. Bodine, Preece, and Austin Hill are going to be a popular way to start your Cash lineups on Saturday.
Max Gutierrez ($6,500; Starting P27) I'm adding Gutierrez as a late addition to the Playbook because I find myself plugging him into quite a few of my lineups (including the Cash game examples which will be posted in Discord this morning). He's in Austin Wayne Self's truck and this truck has top 20 upside. I do worry about the lack of practice and qualifying for Gutierrez, but he starts far back enough where he could pay off the price tag.
Blaine Perkins ($5,200; Starting P28) Perkins had a rough start to the 2022 season. He didn’t finish four of his first six races and finished 25th or worse in the first nine races. But between Gateway, Sonoma, Knoxville, and Nashville he was pulling off decent finishes for a driver of his caliber (and he was exceeding expectations based on the equipment). Now he did wreck in his last race at Atlanta but that’s kind of the nature with “new” Atlanta. Perkins will likely find himself with minimal exposure if the field pivots to some of the next value plays, but I love him as a pivot if he flashes the top 20 upside that we saw at Gateway and Nashville.
Tyler Hill ($5,000; Starting P35) I tend to be one of the few people always willing to take a shot on Tyler Hill. I like to think that the price tag and starting spot will force the rest of the DFS community on to him for Saturday’s race. However, given all the other value options starting around him I’m not sure that’ll be the case. Hill has run Kansas, Texas, and Gateway this season and he’s finished top 25 in all three races, gaining some PD along the way. In two races at Pocono he’s finished 24th and 19th after starting P30 in both races. If you’re hunting for 5X value on Saturday, Hill reaches that point by finishing 26th but he’s shown the ability to move up even more. If he somehow can score a top 20 then he’s likely in the optimal lineup at over 7X value.
Jesse Little ($4,900; Starting P32) Good things have been happening with Jesse Little in the Truck Series. In nine races this season, across a variety of tracks, he’s finished top 20 in six of them. Does that make him a lock? Hardly. Young’s Motorsports equipment is tough to trust, especially without practice and qualifying so you don’t want to be too overweight here. But he was 20th at Gateway and 19th at Nashville. Those tracks aren’t as long as Pocono, but they are similar in their flat nature. I don’t love him for Cash games and you shouldn’t have to go here in that format, but I do like him as a punt in GPP’s.
Example Lineups
Saturday afternoon’s Example Lineups will be posted in the NASCAR DFS Discord Channel around 11:00am ET.
Fantasy Alarm is the home of all things Fantasy Sports. Bringing you the best Fantasy Football content all year long. Be sure to also check out the best fantasy promo codes on offer today!