Time for NASCAR to lose – win and be there

You can hate Austin Dillon all you want for what he did last weekend in the final round of the NASCAR Cup Series at Richmond Raceway, but in reality, no one can really blame him.

In similar situations, many who have criticized the Richard Childress Racing driver would have done exactly the same thing – or perhaps even worse. Dillon was not only trying to salvage his season by launching a desperate attempt to make the playoffs, but also to generate around $2 million for his racing team.

Denny Hamlin said in his podcast Harmful actions that the difference between 16th place in Cup points and 32nd place is about $2 million. What would you do if you could make that much money for the team and the men and women who work endless hours to get you to the racetrack every week?

Dillon has been made into a villain when he is actually a victim of the system. The win-and-get-there playoff format made this whole scenario possible and that is why this era must end.

Before the current playoff format, which was implemented in 2014, Dillon would have accepted second place after Joey Logano beat him on the last restart. Or maybe he still sends the ball into the corner to send Logano spinning, but I can’t imagine him attacking Hamlin on the right after that.

But the extremely aggressive driving is not even the worst thing that could have happened in Richmond. Had NASCAR not decided that Dillon’s victory would not allow him to make the playoffs, a driver who is currently 31st in the points standings could be fighting for the championship.

Plus, Dillon is solid on the drafting tracks. He could hypothetically have won in the first round at Atlanta Motor Speedway and the second round at Talladega Superspeedway. That would put a driver outside the top 30 in the points standings in the round of eight. He was just super fast in Richmond – maybe that speed will translate to Martinsville Speedway and Phoenix Raceway and Dillon will be your 2024 Cup champion.

People think it would damage the integrity of NASCAR if someone ruined two people to get into the playoffs? The scenario I just described would destroy every ounce of integrity the series had. NASCAR would be the laughingstock of the sports world.

That’s why the “win and you’re in” premise is so ridiculous. Can you imagine Major League Baseball telling the historically bad Chicago White Sox, who are 29-93 so far this season, that they’ll get a playoff spot if the team wins a game sometime next week? MLB fans would riot.

Playoffs should be made up of the best teams in any sport. It’s not a charity event where you let a down-on-their-luck team win the lottery to get out of the grave they dug for themselves.

NASCAR shouldn’t even have playoffs. It worked without playoffs for 55 years. Yes, there were years when the championship was decided just a few races before the end, but would that really happen in the Next Gen era, when the field is as evenly matched as ever?

The top four in the regular season standings are currently separated by 21 points. The top six by just 78. Imagine watching these guys battle it out for the Cup championship over the next 13 weeks. It would be full of raw, organic drama and the championship would have plenty of integrity restored.

However, it is clear to me that CEO Jim France, President Steve Phelps and the rest of NASCAR’s brass would rather drop a nuclear bomb on Daytona than eliminate the playoffs.

So let’s keep the playoffs as they are, but only let the top 16 teams qualify in terms of points. The battle for the cut line was exciting this year. What’s wrong with just doing it like that, without any random conditions attached?

And I understand that the biggest problem with the Latford system that NASCAR used from 1975 to 2003 is that it doesn’t award enough winners. So a super-consistent driver could win one or two races throughout the year but exploit the field to the limit to win the title.

There has to be a middle ground between this and what the race winner currently gets far too much. My solution? The race winner should get double the points of the runner-up.

Without stage points, race winners currently receive 40 points and runners-up 35. The race winner instead receives 70 points plus stage points.

A win alone wouldn’t completely save a bad season, but it would give a rider a huge boost in the overall standings and point him in the right direction.

For example, if Dillon had received 30 more points for his Richmond win, he would be 26th in the points standings instead of 31st. Add in the 25 points he received for finishing, and he would be just two points off 25th. That’s a huge jump for a great race, but it doesn’t change his season.

Austin Cindric is currently 20th in the points standings, but his win at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway has secured his place in the playoffs. But what if he hadn’t secured it and instead got 30 more points? He would then be 18th in the standings and just 46 points below the cut line. Again, it doesn’t guarantee him a playoff spot, but the win at Gateway would have helped him be in the conversation.

The win-and-you’re-in format was fun for a while, but it’s just too gimmicky. The same goes for a one-race championship, but I’m going to die on that hill one day.

Whatever the people in Daytona believe, motorsports is a sport, not entertainment. Please stop treating NASCAR like a soap opera. The top 16 drivers of the season should be battling for the title, not so-and-so’s evil twin brother who mysteriously entered the picture last week by having an affair with the good guy’s wife before winning in third overtime at Darlington Raceway to get into the playoffs. Save that stuff for the soap operas.