Food City 500
NASCAR preview: Cup series heads to Bristol
Trey Campbell
Apr 13, 2018, 8:26 am
Kyle Busch is a monster at Bristol. Kylebusch.com
The Monster Energy Cup series heads for thunder valley at Bristol Motor Speedway for the Food City 500. When you ask a lot of people who are not familiar with the sport what tracks they have heard of, usually they name three: Daytona, Talladega and Bristol.
This is the mecca of all short tracks in this country. When you ask most drivers who race on the short tracks in the southeastern part of the country what race tracks they hope to make it to, Bristol is usually the first place they mention. This track is a 0.533 mile coliseum. There are 162,000 seats that surround the speedway, making it the fourth largest sporting venues in America and eighth in all of the world.
In 2007, Bruton Smith decided to widen the track from one lane to three. This was NOT well received by many of NASCAR’s old guard. Personally, I thought the product the new Bristol provided was fantastic. It provided more side-by-side racing, passing and closer finishes. What upset a lot of the “fans” of old Bristol was the decrease of wrecks and drama that came with it. Due to the criticism, Bruton Smith decided to make it a two lane race track instead with the outside line being the optimal place to pass. This move has been met with acclaim seeing how the track usually draws the biggest crowds on all of the circuit.
There is a very strong chance that this race will be rained out. There is a one hundred percent chance of rain on Sunday around when the race starts at 1 p.m. More than likely the race will be run Monday afternoon. (Pro tip for anyone that will attempt to watch the race at work: if you are going to do it make sure it’s on your phone and not on the TV in the office; believe me it’s not a good idea.) The favorite going into this race has to be of course Kyle Busch.
Last week Busch was able to claim his first victory of the season at Texas Motor Speedway and he is going to a track he has dominated over his career. He has won here six times including last year in the fall race and has led 2,115 laps.
Even though he has been almost unbeatable in the fall night race, it has been a different story for the spring race. For the past five seasons he has either not raced due to injury or has cut down a tire. You would have to go all the way back to 2013 to find when Busch had a top five here in April when he finished second to Kasey Kahne.
This string of bad luck will not follow him this week, as Busch will break out of his funk and have a good finish. The driver I predict will win is Erik Jones. Bristol is a special place for Jones; he made his debut in 2015, substituting for Denny Hamlin, who was suffering from spasms that flared up during a rain delay. It was here when the 18-year-old phenom was given the chance of a lifetime. He went on to a 26th place finish, and was tapped to substitute for Kyle Busch ,who was recovering from injuries and Matt Kenseth who was suspended later that year.
Last year after more time in the Xfinty Series he was moved up to full time in the 77 car for Furniture Row racing. The defining moment of his rookie season was last year’s fall race at Bristol. He led a race high 260 laps but was not able to fend off Busch.
Regardless, he went on to finish second for his best effort in the cup series. This year I think he will break through. This track caters to his driving style seeing how he cut his teeth on dirt.
This track is maybe the closest thing to a dirt track in NASCAR. My darkhorse driver this week is Trevor Bayne. The 2018 circuit has been a season to forget for the 2011 Daytona 500 champion but I think he gets back into the right direction. Bristol Motor Speedway is his home track. Bayne also has the third highest average finish here since 2016, so I see no reason why this won’t continue in 2018.
(All stats and information used in this article is brought to you by the good folks at driveraverages.com and Racing-Refrence.com the best website for all NASCAR stats)
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After finishing up with the Guardians the Astros have a rather important series for early May with the Seattle Mariners heading to town for the weekend. While it’s still too early to be an absolute must-win series for the Astros, losing the series to drop seven or eight games off the division lead would make successfully defending their American League West title that much more unlikely.
Since their own stumble out of the gate to a 6-10 record the Mariners have been racking up series wins, including one this week over the Atlanta Braves. The M’s offense is largely Mmm Mmm Bad, but their pitching is sensational. In 18 games after the 6-10 start, the Mariners gave up five runs in a game once. In the other 17 games they only gave up four runs once. Over the 18 games their starting pitchers gave up 18 earned runs total with a 1.44 earned run average. That’s absurd. Coming into the season Seattle’s starting rotation was clearly better on paper than those of the Astros and Texas Rangers, and it has crystal clearly played out as such into the second month of the schedule.
While it’s natural to focus on and fret over one’s own team's woes when they are plentiful as they have been for the Astros, a reminder that not all grass is greener elsewhere. Alex Bregman has been awful so far. So has young Mariners’ superstar Julio Rodriguez. A meager four extra base hits over his first 30 games were all Julio produced down at the ballyard. That the Mariners are well ahead of the Astros with J-Rod significantly underperforming is good news for Seattle.
Caratini comes through!
So it turns out the Astros are allowed to have a Puerto Rican-born catcher who can hit a little bit. Victor Caratini’s pedigree is not that of a quality offensive player, but he has swung the bat well thus far in his limited playing time and provided the most exciting moment of the Astros’ season with his two-out two-run 10th inning game winning home run Tuesday night. I grant that one could certainly say “Hey! Ronel Blanco finishing off his no-hitter has been the most exciting moment.” I opt for the suddenness of Caratini’s blow turning near defeat into instant victory for a team that has been lousy overall to this point. Frittering away a game the Astros had led 8-3 would have been another blow. Instead, to the Victor belong the spoils.
Pudge Rodriguez is the greatest native Puerto Rican catcher, but he was no longer a good hitter when with the Astros for the majority of the 2009 season. Then there’s Martin Maldonado.
Maldonado’s hitting stats with the Astros look Mike Piazza-ian compared to what Jose Abreu was doing this season. Finally, mercifully for all, Abreu is off the roster as he accepts a stint at rookie-level ball in Florida to see if he can perform baseball-CPR on his swing and career. Until or unless he proves otherwise, Abreu is washed up and at some point the Astros will have to accept it and swallow whatever is left on his contract that runs through next season. For now Abreu makes over $120,000 per game to not be on the roster. At his level of performance, that’s a better deal than paying him that money to be on the roster.
Abreu’s seven hits in 71 at bats for an .099 batting average with a .269 OPS is a humiliating stat line. In 2018 George Springer went to sleep the night of June 13 batting .293 after going hitless in his last four at bats in a 13-5 Astros’ win over Oakland. At the time no one could have ever envisioned that Springer had started a deep, deep funk which would have him endure a nightmarish six for 78 stretch at the plate (.077 batting average). Springer then hit .293 the rest of the season.
Abreu’s exile opened the door for Joey Loperfido to begin his Major League career. Very cool for Loperfido to smack a two-run single in his first game. He also struck out twice. Loperfido will amass whiffs by the bushel, he had 37 strikeouts in 101 at bats at AAA Sugar Land. Still, if he can hit .225 with some walks mixed in (he drew 16 with the Space Cowboys) and deliver some of his obvious power (13 homers in 25 games for the ex-Skeeters) that’s an upgrade over Abreu/Jon Singleton, as well as over Jake Meyers and the awful showing Chas McCormick has posted so far. Frankly, it seems unwise that the Astros only had Loperfido play seven games at first base in the minors this year. If McCormick doesn’t pick it up soon and with Meyers displaying limited offensive upside, the next guy worth a call-up is outfielder Pedro Leon. In January 2021 the Astros gave Leon four million dollars to sign out of Cuba and called him a “rapid mover to the Major Leagues.” Well…
Over his first three minor league seasons Leon flashed tools but definitely underwhelmed. He has been substantially better so far this year. He turns 26 May 28. Just maybe the Astros offense could be the cause of fewer Ls with Loperfido at first and Leon in center field.
Catch our weekly Stone Cold ‘Stros podcast. Brandon Strange, Josh Jordan, and I discuss varied Astros topics. The first post for the week generally goes up Monday afternoon (second part released Tuesday) via YouTube: stone cold stros - YouTube with the complete audio available via Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.