Three to watch, one to avoid for NASCAR’s championship race

The 2024 NASCAR Cup Series season has gone by in a flash, and it all ends this weekend. On Sunday, the cars will take to the track for the 36th and final time this year in the Cup Series Championship at Phoenix Raceway.

Four drivers are racing for a title, while everybody else aims to repeat Ross Chastain’s performance a season ago by playing spoiler. With that in mind, here are three to watch — a favorite, a contender and a dark horse — as well as one to avoid for the grand finale.

Favorite: Ryan Blaney (+350, per DraftKings as of Friday afternoon)

Ladies and gentlemen, he has done it again. After repeating his fall 2023 performance at Martinsville by winning with his back against the wall, Blaney enters Phoenix as both the race and the championship favorite. There’s a good reason for that: he’s finished in the top five in each of his last six Phoenix starts.

The only thing Blaney lacks in the Arizona desert is a win, as even when he took the championship a season ago he did not finish first in the race (as mentioned above, Chastain did). This time, that won’t be the case. Blaney, who is listed with the best odds in the field at +350, will take the win while more importantly becoming the first driver to win back-to-back Cup Series titles since Jimmie Johnson’s five-in-a-row streak between 2006 and 2010.

Contender: Christopher Bell (+450)

Like Blaney, Bell is a bit of a chalk pick here as he’s listed as the second favorite with odds of +450. However, while he may not be in the title fight, he’ll be far more motivated than any other eliminated driver (with the possible exception of Martin Truex Jr. in his final full-time start). Bell thought he’d advanced to the championship round when the checkered flag flew at Martinsville, but was penalized for attempting to ride the wall on the final lap. Evidently, he’s using that as bulletin board material.

Bell also happens to be the most recent winner at Phoenix, where he was victorious this past spring. After Chastain proved a year ago that it’s not impossible for a non-championship four driver to win the season finale, Bell should be a force to be reckoned with.

Dark horse: Martin Truex Jr. (+2000)

Sure, let’s go for it. As mentioned above, Sunday will be the final start for Truex as a full-time driver in the Cup Series, and he’ll be driving a sick-looking throwback paint scheme to boot. He’s had a season full of close calls and misfortunes, but perhaps there’s still a chance for him to experience a storybook ending.

Considering his recent history at Phoenix, Truex could do it. He led 55 laps and finished seventh in the spring this year, and has a win there in 2021. Phoenix has also seen legends walk off into the sunset before, as Matt Kenseth did so in 2017 (though Phoenix was the penultimate round that year) in what was expected to be his final full-time season. A Truex win would help the season end on a feel-good note, and despite his odds of +2000, it’s worth a bet.

Avoid: William Byron (+650)

Out of the four championship contenders, Byron is the one who seems to have the hardest path to a title. Blaney is penciled in as the favorite, and his Team Penske teammate Joey Logano has had two extra weeks to prepare after punching his ticket all the way back at Las Vegas, the first race of the Round of Eight. Tyler Reddick and his No. 45 team also got a head start on their preparation after winning at Homestead, and he was very strong at Phoenix back in the spring.

That leaves Byron, who struggles on the flat tracks as it is. He has a Phoenix win from the spring of 2023, but the two races there a season ago are his only two top-fives at the track in his career. With his odds tied for third-highest at +650 (the same as Logano and Reddick), you’d be much better off looking elsewhere.